8 Field and Forest Rambles. 



tree ; and the crow draws nearer to man. There is skating and 

 trabogging in the early part of the day. The latter requires me 

 to state that this amusement is performed by means of small 

 sleighs with broad polished runners, on which two or more are 

 seated. When on some beaten path, or where the surface snow 

 has become so hard and glazed as to bear a heavy man, then 

 with feet or sticks we guide the sleigh as it flies down the slope, 

 the only drawback being the trouble of pulling it up. Again, 

 these pleasant social gatherings break the monotony of the short, 

 dull winter's day, and accordingly old as well as young often 

 take delight in the harmless and healthy pastime in spite of 

 many a mishap of a very ludicrous nature, such as when some 

 unapt steersman lands his fair burden in a snow wreath, or 

 dives thereinto head-foremost, so that the feet only are left 

 visible above the surface. 



April showers begin to tell on the river, and balmy south- 

 easter, like the Fohen of the Alps, eat away the snow which 

 vanishes before our eyes. It is getting unsafe to cross the 

 river, and the ice is giving way round the margins, and is 

 rising in the centre so that the water on the surface runs off 

 by the sides. We hear of the gradual opening up of the 

 navigation from the mouth upwards, and of large fields having 

 broken up and run out. Still we can cross the river with a pole, 

 but no horse is safe. At last it is only after a frosty night 

 that we can venture over, and then the raftsman, accustomed 

 to run from log to log, is about the only one brave enough to 

 venture across. Sometimes when he is in mid-river the whole 

 mass begins to move, and he has a narrow escape. Now 

 comes the grand finale — the enormous pressure from above 

 piles vast sheets pell-mell on each other, or sends tons upon 

 tons of solid ice (blocks often averaging twelve to twenty-four 

 inches in thickness) against the bank, tearing up soil, and 

 pushing everything before them. 



Occasionally an island in mid-river, formed of alluvium, and 

 famous for its splendid crops of hay, gets completely covered 



