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298 TRAVELS
a moment, juit to leave my thermometer in fome proper place,
and immediately went out again, where I would remain fone
quarter of an hour, or ten minutes, and then enter again, and
fetch the inftrument to afcertain the degree of heat. My afto-
- nifhment was fo great that I could fcarcely believe my fenfes,
when I found that thofe people remain together, and amufe them-
felves for the fpace of half an hour, and fometimes a whole hour,
in the fame chamber, heated to the 7oth or 75th degree of Cor
fius. The thermometer, in contact with thofe vapours, became
Sometimes fo hot, that I could fearcely hold it in. my hands.
The Finlanders, all the while they are in this hot bath, con-
tinue to rub themfelves, and lafh every part of their bodies with
fwitches formed of twigs of the birch-tree. In ten minutes they
become as red as raw flefh, and have altogether a very frightful
appearance. In the winter feafon they frequently go out of the
bath, naked as they are, to roll themfelves in the fnow, when
the cold is at 20 and evén 30 degrees below zero.* They will
fometimes come out, {till naked, and converfe together, or with
any one near them, in the open air. If travellers happen to. pafs
by while the peafants of any hamlet, or little village, are in the
bath, and their affiftance is needed, they will leave the bath, and
affift in yoking or unyoking, and fetching provender for the
horfes, or in any thing elfe, without any fort of covering what-
ever, while the paffenger fits fhivering with cold, though wrapped
up in a good found wolf’s fkin. There is nothing more wonder-
~
* [ {peak always of the thermometer of a hundred degrees, by Celfius.
ful
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