3°6 
TRAVELS 
“ The work is ended which is begun; there is time loft to fay, 
“ what ffiall I do ?” 
“ The tool of the induftrious man is fharp; but the plough- 
“ ffiare of the fool wanteth grinding.” 
The following comical tale is a fpecimen of Finniffi improvi- 
fation, by a young poet of the name of Vanonen, living between 
Wafa and Uleaborg. For this piece I am indebted, as I mentioned 
before, to the governor of Wafa, who was perfonally acquainted 
with the poet, by whom, at the governor’s defire, it was didated 
to one who wrote it out. The governor fet a great value on the 
original, and preferved it as a moft precious relic. I therefore 
think myfelf much obliged by the communication. The poet, he 
told me, was poor, becaufe he preferred the pleafures of imagina¬ 
tion to the duties of a peafant and the labour of rural occupations. 
This young man, who can neither read nor write, has a native 
vein of humour, and is in his way very droll. He is of courfe 
heartily welcome in the houfes of the peafants, whom he amufes 
with his mirth and plealantry. 
The Paldamo confifts of about two hundred and forty-eight 
lines. The fubjed is a ridiculous retaliation, by a trick played 
upon a cuftom-houfe officer, by a Finniffi peafant. I have heard 
people intimately acquainted with the pure import and genius of 
the Finniffi language, in reading this poem, break forth with en- 
thufiafm in its praife, and burft into laughter almoft at every line. 
The tranflation, though literal, and rendered word for word, re¬ 
tains but little of thofe beauties and that humour, which confift 
in the brevity, precifion and energy of the original language. 
