TRAGICAL EVENT. 341 



Poor Svensson fell at about one hundred and fifty 

 paces from the Ho-Hassja, where, at the moment the deadly 

 shot was fired, we firmly believed him still to be, and 

 at some fifty paces to the left of us, instead of one 

 hundred or more to the right, as he would have been, had 

 he remained stationary. 



When we had somewhat recovered from the first shock of 

 this dreadful accident, we bore our poor old companion to 

 the sledge an operation which was attended with some 

 difficulty, as the ground in places was rugged and broken ; 

 and having laid the corpse in the vehicle, and covered it 

 with a cloak, we slowly and sorrowfully wended our way 

 back to Ytter-Malung, the hamlet from which we had 

 started in the morning ; but how different were our feelings 

 and reflections ! Then we were all life and animation, but 

 now a band of mourners. Dissolution is at all times awful ; 

 but when the grim tyrant comes upon us altogether un- 

 expectedly, it is doubly so. Truly was it written, "In the 

 midst of life we are in death." Such an end too for a 

 man who, though desperately wounded in two instances, 

 had escaped with life in innumerable conflicts with bears ; 

 to be mistaken for a wild beast, and deliberately shot down 

 as such by a companion ! Had he been killed by a bear, 

 I should have looked on the event with comparative com- 

 posure, for, according to the old proverb, he who plays 

 with edged tools must expect to cut his fingers; but as 

 it was, the calamity presented not a single point of solace 

 or mitigation. 



On reaching Ytter-Malung, where the dead body was 

 deposited, the soldier Atter was dispatched in a sledge to 

 the authorities, to inform them of what had happened ; 



