54 A SPRING AND SUMMER IN LAPLAND. 



ing cowslips and violets, and thinking that the 

 hedges were getting too blind for hunting. The 

 sledging was now becoming very bad, for less 

 snow had fallen here this year than usual, and all 

 the fields by the roadside were bare. "We saw very 

 little arable land, nothing but rough tussocky 

 meadows, filled with little sheds or barns, in which 

 they put the hay when it is made. This is a good 

 plan, for it is much easier to bring it home in the 

 winter on sledges than in the summer. As soon 

 as we left Skelleftea the country again became flat 

 and ugly ; a deep snow set in towards the after- 

 noon, and, had there been anything worth seeing 

 by the roadside we could not have seen it, for we 

 were quite blinded by the falling snow. We did 

 little more than forty miles this day, and at night 

 slept at laful, where we had humble but very com- 

 fortable night quarters. "We were now only about 

 twelve miles from Pitea, and less than fifty from 

 Lulea, which town we meant to reach by the 

 following night. 



Next morning, when we left, we found that a 

 deep snow had fallen in the night, and the sledging 

 was first-rate. We reached Pitea by breakfast time 

 -a dingy, little, old town, with neither a barber 

 nor a bookseller in it, both of whom I much 

 wanted to consult. There was, however, as good 

 an inn here as any country inn in England, and 



