INTRODUCTION. 



in phonetic spelling is seldom attained. Both knew Finnish, 

 or at least that dialect used around Muonioniska, well enough 

 to speak it fluently, and Mr. Wollet could even write it after 

 a fashion, but neither had ever studied it as a language, so as 

 to know its peculiarities further than would serve for most 

 practical purposes. The only Finnish book, I believe, that 

 Mr. Wollet ever read was the New Testament, to which he 

 diligently applied himself during his first winter in Lapland, 

 and therefore from a literary point of view his knowledge was 

 very hmited. Knoblock's must have been even less, for, as a 

 Norwegian, he held the vernacular speech in contempt. Hence 

 has come about a result similar to that which attended the com- 

 pilation of our own great Domesday Book by Norman scribes, 

 to whom English was a strange not to say unintelligible tongue. 

 With every desire to set down the right word, it was often 

 written wrongh', for however slight the difference may be, 

 scarcely any two men speak alike or hear alike. Some of the 

 worst mistakes I hope I have been able to correct, though in 

 every case I have done this with trepidation, fearing to commit 

 some graver error. In cases of uncertainty T have left the 

 names as they stand in manuscript, as I have done others which 

 I know must be wrong, though unable in my ignorance to set 

 them right. They could only be rendered accurately by some 

 one to whom Finnish was the mother-tongue, and all my 

 attempts to find such a person in England to help me have 

 failed. Even then there would probably remain not a few 

 words quite irreducible, owing to the defective way in which 

 they were originally spoken, though the pronunciation of most 



