SOME WANDERINGS IN THE NORTH OF FINLAND. 103 



England, though I believe the species of ant is the same 

 as ours. 



On the hill tops there are few trees, for ice of ages past 

 has scraped the ground so bare that vegetation can only 

 grow in the crevices between the rocks. As you go down 

 the hill the trees become thicker again and you may have to 

 cross the wide track of some old morraine, where there are 

 boulders piled one on another : if you are not careful, your 

 foot will slip into deep holes between the boulders hidden by 

 moss and rotten tree trunks. Still further down, the trees 

 become thinner but the moss much deeper, reaching up to the 

 knees. Presently the trees seem to end, and you come to a 

 wide tract of flat ground where stand a few gaunt birches, 

 long dead, and ready to fall at a touch. Here and there are 

 tumps of dwarf birch bushes and coarse grass. This is a 

 swamp, and as you go across it to the forest which you see 

 again on the other side, the ground moves in waves around 

 you, and between the small tumps on which you stand is 

 horrid dark red ooze, into which you slip occasionally as you 

 try to jump from one tump to another. The ground gets 

 wetter and wetter, and at last you may have to wade 

 through water up to j^our knees. It is useless to clutch at 

 a tree for support, as you try some quaking bit of ground, 

 for the tree is dead and falls upon you. If you stop for a 

 few moments, you are at once attacked by mosquitoes, so 

 that the only thing to do is to go steadily forwards and 

 hope that you will not come to an impassable place or be 

 swallowed up by the bog. 



The coarse grass which grows about these swamps is 

 sometimes cut by the natives and stored in rough little log 

 huts until it can be fetched on sleighs in the winter to 

 their homes. The farms are always by the side of a river 

 or lake, so that the people can communicate with each other 



