ITER DALECARLIUM 255 



heads free of love was science all-sufficient for him 

 now? 



In the fact of Elizabeth Moraea's habitual residence 

 at her father's country house is the simple solution of 

 what has been a difficulty to Linnaeus's biographers. In a 

 small place like Falun a town not then a hundred years 

 old, 1 and not then mustering half its present number of 

 7,000 inhabitants it must otherwise have been difficult 

 for the Beauty of the place, called the ' Fair Flower of 

 Falun,' to remain unknown to a handsome and accom- 

 plished young man whose society was sought by all the 

 leading men, her father included, and who went about 

 investigating, studying, and making himself known in 

 all the separate villages which then composed the town 

 of Falun. 



Sara Elizabeth had never seen anyone like Linnasus 

 before ; he ousted the ' certain baron ' completely from 

 his place in her fancy. His ideas were an outlook from 

 the sordid, mercenary views of the mere speculators in 

 copper with whom she was acquainted, her father at 

 the head of them for shrewdness and tightness in 

 grasping. She could not help admiring this bright 

 being who despised the gods of her family cash and 

 comfort who showed her fresh forms of wealth sur- 

 rounding her, and beauty even here in barren, blighted 

 Falun; and he loved her partly for her beauty, but 

 chiefly for her sympathy. He loved her because, as 

 Mahomet said of Fatima, * She believed in me when 

 1 It was founded by Queen Kristina in 1645. 



