4 HANDY BOOK OF 
derness where it overspread the ground in patches the 
haunts of hears, who slept soundly on this couch of Nature's 
making, and of innumerahle hirds, who filled the woods 
with melody, and chiefly built their nests with the finest 
portions of this useful moss. 
"The fanner talks of grasses and of grain, 
The sailor tells you stories of the main." 
"It is therefore no wonder," says Linnaeus, in his cele- 
hrated Oration at Upsal, when recurring to the dangers he 
had passed through while exploring the wildest regions of 
the North, " that I chose to make travelling in mine own 
" country the subject of my discourse. Every one thinks well 
of what belongs to himself, and every one has pleasures 
peculiar to himself. I have on foot passed over the frosty 
mountains of Lapland in quest of plants ; I have clambered 
up the craggy ridges of Norland, and wandered amid its 
almost impenetrable woods. I have made excursions into 
the forests of Dalecarlia, the groves of Gothland, the heaths 
of Smoland, and the trackless wastes of Scania. Truly 
there is scarcely a part of Sweden which I have not crawled 
through and examined, yet not without great fatigue of 
mind and body. My journey to Lapland was an under- 
taking of immense labour; but the love of truth and grati- 
tude towards the Supreme Being constrains me to acknow- 
ledge, that no sooner were my travels finished than a 
pleasant oblivion of past suffering came upon me, and I was 
richly rewarded by the inestimable advantages which I 
gained from my labours." 
Thus spoke the great Linnscus with respect to the benefit 
which a man derives from travelling in his own country ; 
and his remarks may well apply to the pleasures that are 
within the reach of all who seek to become acquainted with 
the natural objects by which they are surrounded. 
How many, ignorant concerning the ferns and mosses 
that grow near them, complain that the country is dull in 
