CLIMATE. 103 



by engineers at 225,000 horse-power, is partly utilised by industry, but the mills 

 do not here, as at the Sarps-fos, prevent access to the view. 



On the Baltic side the gentle slope of the land has prevented the development 

 of such stupendous falls as on the west side, though even here there are some of a 

 very imposing character. Thus the majestic Dal-elf, which throughout its lower 

 course is little more than a series of lakes, contracts suddenly at Elf-Karleby, and, 

 dividing into two branches, descends through a number of rapids a total height 

 of 50 feet just before reaching the sea. There are also some fine cascades on the 

 Skellefteâ and the Luleâ. At the Njommelsaskas, or " Hare Leap," the Luleâ has 

 a clear fall of over 266 feet in height, and several hundred yards in width, and 

 higher up a lake, separated from another reservoir by a simple ledge, rushes over a 

 cataract 140 feet high. To this lake the Lapps have given the name of Adna- 

 muorkekortje, or " Great Cloudy Fall." 



Climate of Scandinavia. 



The main ocean current on the Norwegian seaboard sets south-west and north- 

 east. The warm waters from the tropics strike the outer banks of the peninsula, 

 often throwing up drift-wood and seeds from the West Indies, which the Lapps 

 carefully preserve as amulets. So well known is this northward current that 

 when anything falls overboard the sailors jocularly speak of going to pick it up 

 at Berlevaag ; that is, at the easternmost extremity of Lapland. This stream of 

 warm water gives to Norway its climate, to the people their trade, commerce, 

 daily sustenance, their very lives, so to say ; for, but for it, the shores of the 

 fiords would be blocked with ice and uninhabitable. The Scandinavian peninsula 

 forms with Greenland the marine portal through which the Atlantic communi- 

 cates with the Frozen Ocean. But under the same latitude what a prodigious 

 difference of climate ! On one side ice and snows eternal, on the other mainly 

 fogs and rain. The great western island absolutely treeless ; the eastern 

 peninsula covered with tall forests, orchards of blossoming apple, pear, plum, 

 and cherry trees, gardens in which the vine itself is cultivated as a wall fruit in 

 a richly manured soil. Yet a portion of Scandinavia, estimated at 60,000 

 square miles, is already comprised within the polar zone, where throughout the 

 winter night follows night in perpetual darkness. In summer, on the other 

 hand, the dying day melts in the new dawn. The Finmark hills command 

 the amazing spectacle presented at the summer solstice by the midnight sun 

 grazing the horizon, and again climbing the eastern skies. From the crest of 

 the Avasaxa, overlooking the Torneâ valley near the arctic circle, the sun may 

 be seen, between June 16th and 30th, describing fifteen complete circuits in the 

 heavens. As he stands bathed in sunshine, the spectator beholds at his feet all 

 the southern lands shrouded in the great mantle of night, and the snowy heights, 

 instead of reflecting a white light, are made glorious by the dazzling colours in 

 which the purple of the setting sun is blended with the soft tints of dawn. With 

 the great lakes, the boundless heaths, the snowy mountains, storms, and limitless 



