Sweden. 29 



boys used regularly to waylay me in the woods when I was out, to 

 beg for a little bit. They at length became regular pensioners, and 

 many a time in after years, when I have been out of tobacco in the 

 Australian bush, have I thought of these old men, and become a 

 beggar in my turn of any stock-rider who might casually 

 canter by. 



It is a pity, in most places, to see how badly the forests are 

 looked after, and how much waste yearly takes place. In many of 

 the more populous districts even firewood is becoming scarce, and 

 most of the forests in the midland districts are becoming sadly 

 thinned by the woodman's axe, especially where water-carriage is 

 near. Timber is consequently rising yearly in value. The fences 

 in the midland districts are a kind of light snake-fence, composed 

 of split palings stuck obliquely in the ground one above another. 

 It is one of the ugliest fences imaginable, and has nothing to recom- 

 mend it 5 and, to form a mile of such fencing, many hundreds of 

 valuable young trees are sacrificed. However, in many places they 

 are substituting neat single posts and rails. 



That agriculture is every year making head in Sweden, is certain. 

 Farming associations are held in every town, and a farming school 

 is established by Government in every district, where a dozen or so 

 young men are sent every year to work on the farm, and go through 

 a course of agricultural study. But at present theory is more in 

 fashion than practice. As the Swedes, however, are peculiarly 

 gifted with that most inestimable quality, common sense, things will 

 be sure to come right in the end. Few countries in Europe have 

 greater natural capabilities than Sweden as an agricultural land, and 

 although the two great drawbacks are want of capital, and the 

 severity and uncertainty of the climate, that farming must pay is 

 proved by the fact that more than two-thirds of the gentlemen's 

 families are brought up by it. But a stranger settling on a farm in 

 this country would at first have much to contend with. A total 

 ignorance of the language and habits of the people, the severity of 

 the climate, and the very different manner in which the farms are 

 managed here to what he has been accustomed, would sorely try a 



