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TRAVELS 
CHAPTER XXVI. 
Maupertutis Description of Tome —Account of this Town, by the 
Author—The Climate—View of the Sun at Midnight—Profpedl 
from the Church of Lower Tornea—Harbour of Torneh—State 
of the Bothnian Gulf in this Vicinity—Trade of the Town — 
Some Travellers mentioned that have vifted Tornea—Infcriptions 
I 
preferved in the Church at Jukasjervl. 
T~^ROM the time that Maupertuis, and the other French aca- 
demicians, travelled into this country to meafure a degree, 
as a mean of afcertaining the actual figure of the earth, Tornea 
emerged from its obfcurity, and is now well known to all the 
■world. The firfl advance it made towards fame was not in its 
favour. Maupertuis’s defcription of it, which he read in the aca¬ 
demy at Paris, infpired every breaft with tender commiferation for 
the poor inhabitants, who had the misfortune to be born in fo 
miferable a town. “ The town of Tornea,” he fays, “ on our 
“ arrival there on the 30th of December, prefented an afped: truly 
(< frightful. The low houfes, from bottom to top, were funk in 
“ the fnow, which hindered the light from entering in by the 
“ windows, while the fnow always falling, or ready to fall, ob- 
ftruded the rays of the fun, which was feldom vifible even for 
“ a few 
