Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Sidor ...
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
144
by discussions on travel, art and music or by the philosophic
and political discourse of the more serious senior passengers.
Then come a succession of Locks, Canals and Lakes. The
rich firs and silver birches, interspersed with oak, ash, alder
and sycamore, lining the shores of Lakes Wiken, Wettern,
Boren and Roxen, are noted by arboriculturists, botanists speak
lear nedly of the flora of the district, and geologists discourse
on the granitic formation of the boulders seen at every turn.
Less leamed travellers, like myself, are satisfied to admire all,
and to recognise, among the wild flowers growing in rich
profusion along the banks, the vetches, red campions and cowslips
of Scotland, and to note, amidst other familiar sights, the
pre-sence of many noble specimens of what my countrymen are
pleased to call the “Scotch fir”, with its gnarled trunk, rough
red bark, straggling twisted branches, and spread of dark green
needles.
Gliding gently eastwards, one falls into a reverie, mid
which is heard the whisper of a mild-eyed English giri to a
youth at her side: “So charming! So delightfully pretty!” to which
he, drinking in more of the beauty of her glances than of the
landscape, replies with descriptive genius “Awfully jolly!” As
a long låne of shady foliage with sunbeams streaming through
is reached, an impressionable Frenchman, lifting hånds,
shoul-ders and eyebrows in one simultaneous movement cries
“Mag-nifique!” and “Skön!” is ejaculated by more than one Swede
on board.
At various points on the route, the steamer passes slowly
through a succession of locks, and the passengers have time to
visit the tombstone of von Platen (who in conjunction with the
Scottish Engineer Thomas Telford designed and completed the
greater part of the canal), the iron works at Motala, the castle
of Wadstena, a renaissance budding of great beauty and
historie interest, and the church of Wreta Kloster, with
memorials of one of our own chivalrous Douglases who helped to
give Sweden her heritage of freedom.
After passing through this succession of Lakes and Canals,
the steamer sails into the Baltic and then through the Söder-
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>