THROUGH FINLAND 
349 
No. I. 
“ Gallia nos genuit, vidit nos Africa, Gangem 
“ Haufimus, Europamque oculis luftravimus omnem, 
“ Cafibus et variis acti terraque marique 
“ Siftimus hie tandem, nobis ubi defuit orbis. 
“ Des Fefcourt, de Corberou, Regnard, at Jukasjervi, 
“ 18th Auguft, 1681.’* 
Every body knows Regnard and his dramatic performances. 
He was the firft Frenchman who took it into his head to travel fo 
far to the north ; and he was fo enchanted with his fuccefs, that 
he fancied he had reached the end of the world, though he might 
have continued his journey two hundred miles farther in the fame 
direction, without having a right to employ the laft line of his 
infeription. If we could believe him, he met with a French 
blackfmith in Lapland, who told him, that in his whole life he 
"had feen but one traveller in that country, and that was an Italian. 
Upon his return to France he publifhed his travels through Lap- 
land, full of untruths and exaggeration, written rather to amufe 
than inftrud:, though the book made much noife at the time. He 
fays, for example, “ That he met blackfmiths in Lapland, who 
“ had the fkin of their hands fo hardened and callous, that they 
u could hold melted lead for fome time in the hollow of the 
“ hand.” He alfo tells you, “ That the eagles carry up into the 
« air the young rein-deer, and that the petits grts and ermines hang 
“ themfelves on a tree in autumn, to prevent their dying of hun- 
u ger in winter, &c.” 
No. IF 
