NATURAL HISTORY of NORWAY, 39 



and the fentiment of fome philofophers attributing to it a vegeta- 

 tive or felf-renewing power, by which it grows again, tho' flowly*, 

 is confirmed by experience, the beft inftruc~tor ; for fufficient in~ 

 ftances of it appear" in Denmark, Luneburg, Friefland, Holland, 

 England, and Picardy in France. On this occafion, I muff obferve, 

 concerning the large bodies and parts of trees fo frequently found 

 among this vegetating turfl-ground, that they are not fuch con- 

 vincing teftimonies of the deluge, as fome account them ; a 

 much better proof may be drawn from other foilils, which never 

 could be natives of the places where they are found ; of this kind, 

 particularly, is that entire fkeleton of a whale, accidentally found skeleton of * 

 in 1687, in Tiftedale, near Frederickfhall. It was buried with 

 earth and fand, at leaff. 240 feet under ground. 



The fwamps and marfhes, or Myrs, as they are called here, lie 

 both on the ridges of the mountains, and in the vallies, at the 

 foot of the fteepeff. precipices ; thefe, in many places, render the 

 roads very unfafe, they being paffable only in the drieff. fummer 

 months, and fometimes not even then, unlefs a kind of caufe- 

 way is formed over them at the public charge, with thoufands of 

 logs and large pieces of timber laid acrofs the marm, which are 

 foon rotten. In thefe places the ground is as foft as dough, yield- 

 ing and moving under the foot, there being, probably, beneath 

 thefe marfhes, an abyfs of ftanding water, which is thus weakly 

 vaulted over. Near Lseflbe, in the diocefe of Chriftianfand, this 

 timber caufeway is carried on for near a mile, and if a horfe, or a 

 much lefs animal, happens to make the leafr. wrong ftep, he finks 

 beyond recovery. 



That there are coal-mines in Norway, and efpecially in the 

 diocefe of Aggerhuus, where the late governor DitlefWibe, a 

 gentleman ever attentive to the profperity and improvement of the 

 country, employed fome fkilful perfons in a fearch of them, not 

 altogether unfuccefsful, is what I have been informed of, but not 

 with a certainty to advance any thing pofitive on the fubjecl:. The 

 yellow, clear, and ropy fubflance on the furface of the water in 



* The excellent, though not infallible philofopher, Baron Leibnitz, falls into a 

 miftake, when he fays, in his Protogasa, Sect. xliv. pag.82. Torfam excifam re- 

 nafci nondum compertum eft, etfi aquse advehant in vicinis locis jam natam. And 

 pag. 83, Longum effet expectare dum torfa renafcatur, nee forte hoc continget, nifi 

 in orbe alio poft Platonicam rerum revolutionem. 



Part I. M the 



