ISO 
REIN DEER. 
one kind of moss makes the fields look as if they 
were covered with snow, another kind blackens 
over all their trees, and even hides their verdure. 
This moss, however, which deforms the country, 
serves for its only support, as upon it alone the 
rein deer can subsist.' The inhabitants, w ? ho, dur- 
ing the summer, lived among the mountains, drive 
down their herds- in winter, and people the plains 
and woods below. Such of the Laplanders as 
inhabit the woods and the plains all the year 
round, live remote from each other, and having 
been used to solitude, are melancholy, ignorant, 
and helpless. They are much poorer also than 
the mountaineers ; for, while one of those is found 
to possess a thousand rein deer at a time, none of 
these are ever known to rear the tenth part of that 
number. The rein deer makes the riches of this 
people ; and the cold mountainous parts of the 
country agree best with its constitution. It is for 
this reason, therefore, that the mountains of Lap- 
land are preferred to the woods ; and that many 
claim an exclusive right to the tops of hills cover-* 
ed in almost eternal snow. As soon as the summer 
begins to appear, the Laplander, who has fed his 
rein deer upon the lower grounds during the win- 
ter, then drives them up to the mountains, and 
leaves the woody country, and the low pasture, 
“which at that season are truly deplorable. The 
gnats breed by the sun's heat in the marshy bot- 
toms and the weedy lakes, with which the country 
abounds more than any other' part of the world, 
are all upon the wing, and fill the whole air like 
clouds of dust in 'a dry windy day. The inhabi- 
tants, at that time, are obliged to daub their faces 
with pitch, mixed with milk, to shield their skins 
from their depredations. All places are then so great- 
ly infested, that the poor natives can scarce open 
their mouths without fear of suffocation ; the insects 
