Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - VII. Lapland
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As I could not understand a word of her long
explanation in her mixed tongue of Swedish,
Finnish and Laplandish I sat up and opened the
box. It contained what looked like a handful of
earth. What was she going to do with it?
Again she tried her best to explain, again I
failed to understand her. She shook her head
impatiently, I am sure she thought I was very
stupid. Suddenly she stretched herself full length
on the moss and lay quite still and stiff with
closed eyes. Then she sat up and scratched the
moss for a handful of earth which she handed me
with a very serious face. Now I understood what
was in the birch-root box. It contained a little
earth from the grave in the wilderness where a
Lapp had been buried last winter under the snow.
Ristin was to take it to the priest who was to read
the Lord’s prayer over it and sprinkle it over the
churchyard.
We shouldered our knapsacks and set off again.
As we descended the slope, the aspect of the
landscape changed more and more. We wandered
over immense tundras covered with carex grass
and here and there patches of bright yellow
clusters of cloud-berries which we picked and ate
as we passed along. The solitary Dwarf-birches,
the betula nana of the heights, grew into groves
of silver birches, intermixed with aspen and ash
and thickets of willow-elder, bird-cherry and wild
currant. Soon we entered a dense forest of
stately fir trees. A couple of hours later we were
walking through a deep gorge walled in by steep,
moss-covered rocks. The sky over our heads
was still bright with evening sun but it was
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