TROUT-FISHING IN SWEDISH LAPLAND. 59 



fifteen rapids, and only found one boat that "refused" 

 to leak. At the extremity of the lake the Seddvastrom 

 (strom meaning river) rushes into a deep pool, where 

 I hooked and lost a finer trout than any I had hitherto 

 seen, bearing out my fancy that the farther down this 

 river one journeys and the larger it becomes, the 

 heavier are the fish. Out of this pool the river sweeps 

 down into the Kingselet Lake, where there stands a 

 collection of Lapp houses, or rather hovels. The only 

 representative of the race was a Lapp woman, with 

 long, lank hair, and yellow, shrivelled and hag-like 

 skin, looking like what an old writer on Lapland calls 

 " one of the Lapland witches, formerly of such fame 

 in the north." The ground was strewed with deer- 

 sledges, birch bark, pony sledges and reindeer horns. 

 Inside the witch's hut were all kinds of implements 

 for holding, churning and skimming milk. But she 

 was a good-humoured old thing, so she was presented 

 with a dozen trout, and as we departed she ran along 

 the shore waving her conically- shaped red cap, and 

 not looking where she was running, till she disappeared 

 suddenly into a large hole, making it seem as though 

 she had vanished head first into the earth. I was 

 relieved to see her rise again none the worse, and 

 laughing gaily until we had passed from sight. 



Before finally departing from the Eingselet, as the 

 collection of houses called Gaikvik was but five hours 

 distant, I returned to the river, to the same point 

 where, after losing the large trout, I had quitted it. 

 Here the fishing was certainly brisk, and I should 



