230 THE FOREST LANDS OF FINLAND. 
and looks at all this in the light of traditions still in the 
mouths of the people, which tell of wrecks of ships found 
on the heights of mountains in the interior of the country, 
his thoughts are naturally carried back to times in which 
the waters of the ocean covered the whole of Finland, and 
only the highest crests of the mountains rose above the 
waste of waters; and it is felt to be beyond doubt that 
the sea must have receded only as the land rose by up- 
heaval, hills, heights, and high lying places rising ever 
higher and higher. The sea would be caught in innumer- 
able little basons in the valleys and depressions, but, fed 
there by springs and melted snow, its water diluted and 
carried away, the water would gradually lose its saltness, 
and would come to form that inland archipelago, that 
coronet of inland seas, which in the midland and eastern 
portion of the country catches the eye unceasingly. Thus 
does Finland appear as a country which has escaped from 
the sea, and by slow degrees delivered herself from the 
waters of the two Baltic gulfs which still enfold her, as if 
unwilling to give up their hold. For even to-day this 
thousand-year-old process of nature may be seer to be 
still going on. 
‘Looking along the coasts of Finland everywhere are 
seen indications that the sea is slowly, but gradually, 
receding. Places which two centuries ago were on the 
coast now fiud themselves a considerable distance from the 
sea; different havens on the coast are becoming useless 
from the upheaval of the land; lakes and rivers are 
turning shallow, as through that upheaval they have a 
greater fall in the flow of their waters to the sea. Along 
the western coast of Finland are every year extensive 
stretches of land gained from the sea, and new islands 
arise out of the waves; and recorded elevations above the 
sea level, which are scarcely a hundred years old, testify 
to the same fact. The Fortress at Abo is now some feet 
higher above the sea level than it was a century back. 
‘This upheaval of the land varies in different localities, 
It is less marked on the south coast and in the Gulf of 
