TRAVELS 
3° 
The geographical divifion of a country is a matter arranged be¬ 
twixt fovereigns, and does not depend on the hand of nature. The 
king of Sweden may, with a ftroke of his pen, convert into Lap- 
land what is now Weft Bothnia; but fuch changes will effetft 
no alteration in the manners of the people, nor in the natural con¬ 
dition of the country. 
It is remarkable that Maupertuis who compofed an abridgment 
of geography, fliould have knov/n fo little of a country wherein he 
i 
made fo many obfervations. He conftantly confounds Lapland 
with Weft Bothnia, and gives to his journey, which only extended 
to the borders of Lapland, the title of Voyage au Fond de la Lap - 
pome , “ a Journey into the Interior of Lapland.” All other tra¬ 
vellers after him feem to have fallen into the like miftake, and 
fancied they had been in Lapland, when they had got as far as 
Tornea. They have likewife confounded the Lapland tongue 
with the language of Finland ; and when they have brought with 
them a fervant girl bom in the town of Tornea, have fuppofed 
they had got a Laplander. 
The country from Tornea to Muonionifca and Pallajovenio, 
though it changes its appearance to that of a wildernefs, does not 
greatly vary. The mountains are the fame; the cataradls, lakes 
and woods carry a near refemblance: in Ihort, the objects that 
prefent themfelves to the eye, have not a fufficient degree of diver- 
fity to render them worthy of obfervation. The face of the coun¬ 
try, however, proceeding from Pallajovenio to Kautokeino, by 
the little rivpr Pallojoki, is very different. The fmall rivers in 
general 
