240 THROUGH THE FIELDS WITH LINNAEUS 



characters showed them to be very old. Trees seldom 

 grow to such dimensions now in Scandinavia. 



The river is divided into three branches, two of them 

 flowing from lakelets or mere ponds ; the third branch, 

 which the travellers followed, flows from the Faemund 

 Lake. Logs placed side by side across the bogs enabled 

 their horses to pass the swampy tracts. They halted at a 

 small farm on the shore of the Elgsjo (Elk Lake), which 

 they reached by a ferry across the stream, which is 

 here unusually deep. ' Be ye the last to go over a deep 

 river,' said the proverbial philosopher, more cautiously 

 following Clewberg, who had the ill-luck to be soused ; 

 and there he stood, ' all shivering and shaking, and the 

 water a-squish-squashing in his shoes, and his trousers 

 all sticking slimsey-like to his legs,' as with fumbling 

 feet he crawled and splashed out, a magpie all the 

 while eyeing him keenly, with the instinctive humour 

 of animals. The magpie was a find. It was a Dale- 

 carlian magpie never described before, ' whose feet are 

 not armed, like those of other magpies, with four claws, 

 but have only three two before and one behind, which 

 is rather stronger than those in front. 1 ' He's laughing 

 at you, Clewberg,' said Sandel ; ' he's asking you about 

 the quality of the water.' Emporelius's gun had already 

 made an end of the poor magpie who had presumed 

 to quiz a philosopher, and that very night he was pre- 

 pared as a specimen. But the sportsman's triumph 

 was of no long duration his ammunition had run out. 

 1 Lowell. 



