PREPARATIONS FOR THE JOURNEY. 31 



inquisitive, and when I assured him my visit to 

 Lapland was solely for the purpose of collecting, 

 he took his pipe out of his mouth, looked at me 

 for a little while, more " in sorrow than in anger," 

 and left the room with this comment : " Well, 

 surely you Englishmen are mad ! " It was clear 

 he had already got some such notion into his 

 muddled, brandified old head, and now he was 

 perfectly convinced. 



The dog I took up was a young unbroken 

 setter, and although I should advise every sports- 

 man visiting Lapland to take up, at least, one 

 good general-purpose dog, I should never re- 

 commend him using a first-class dog in the Lap 

 forests, where the steadiest dog that ever was shot 

 over would be spoilt in a month, for of all the birds 

 to try a young dog's temper, these willow grouse 

 are the worst. For the ptarmigan, on the fells, a 

 high ranging well-broken setter is of course the dog, 

 but in the forests and bushes, a slow, heavy, close- 

 hunting, retrieving spaniel would be by far more 

 useful. Although included in the weight of bag- 

 gage, my dog seldom rode in the sledge ; and out 

 of the 1000 English miles, I am sure he ran by 

 our side about 800. I was rather afraid of the 

 wolves, which often snap up a dog by the road. 

 However, we never saw a wolf during our whole 

 journey ; but I always had my revolver ready, for 



