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OUTHIER’S JOURNAL OF A VOYAGE TO THE NORTH. 307
returning from Granwik to the town: it is true, we were obliged to ftep from {tone to
ftone. The ice, owing to the rapidity of the water, was not firm there, although the
cold was fo intenfe that our fhoes were glued to the ftones, upon our waiting only for
twenty feconds in the fame place. M. Marilius, a furveyor, arrived from Stockholm
to fee our operations: he was fent by M. Nodelcreutz, director of the office eftablifhed
at Stockholm for geography, and charts and maps of the kingdom. It was M. Nodel-
creutz who prepared for us in his office the charts of the coafts and iflands of the gulph.
The weather continued fine, and obfervations with the fextant were made every day
as well as could be wifhed: they were continued on Monday night, the fifth ; but dur-
ing the night it began to fnow. It continued on Tuefday morning, the fixth, and from
that time till towards the end of May ; there was neither ice nor earth to be feen, there
was nothing but fnow. People began travelling in fledges on the rivers and lakes, as
if upon land. Orders were iffued, and almoft as immediately executed, for planting
fmall firs on the ice in avenues along all the places through which the road was to go,
which is moft ufually made over the ice, as foon as fufficiently ftrong, on account of its
being more even, and the fhorteft way.
They are obliged every year thus to mark the road, without which it would be im-
poffible to follow it ; and travellers would frequently be loft in the {mow when increafed
to the height of four or five feet. ‘The firft fledges which pafs over the fnow prefs down
and harden it: foon other {now falls, which fills up the road, and which fucceeding
fledges, keeping the fame path, harden anew; {fo that by the middle of winter the fnows
which have fallen, or which frequently the winds have drifted into the road, thus har-
dened, prefent a kind of highway extremely hard, as high as the reft of the fnow above
the ice or ground.
Wednefday, the feventh, it was fo cold that the thermometers fell to 20° below the
freezing point: in the remarkable year of 1709 it did not fall below 141°. This ex-
treme cold did not laft long. Thurfday morning, the eighth, it was much milder.
Friday, the ninth, and Saturday, the tenth, it thawed ; already a foot and a half of fnow
had fallen ; a good part had thawed ; but the ice was not yet fufficiently hard to bear.
Sunday morning, the eleventh, the fky was partly clear, and we prepared every thing
for obferving the paflage of Mercury over the difk of the fun ; but fog fucceeding, we
were not able to make the leaft obfervation. ‘The weather became more cold, and it
froze very hard till Wednefday night. Monday, the twelfth, was a grand holiday, the
feaft of All Saints, according to old ftile, which is followed by the Swedes: in the morn-
ing were two fervices in the church of the town, and one in the afternoon.
The laft veflels were not yet returned from Stockholm; they were expected with-
impatience, and much apprehenfion was entertained for them from the north winds,
and more rigid frofts, which would freeze the Gulph of Bothnia. It created much
joy on Thurfday morning, the fifteenth, to behold the wind turn to the fouth: it con-
tinued Friday, the fixteenth, with fnow from time to time, and a beginning of thaw,
which lafted throughout Saturday, the feventeenth, and Sunday, the eighteenth. The
wind was continually fouth, and very violent ; the ice began to be dangerous; a horfe
harnefled to a fledge was drowned, but the men init were faved. The violence of the
wind threw fo much water from the gulph into the river, that our little obfervatory
was already a foot under water: Mefirs. de Maupertuis, Le Monnier, and myfelf, went
in a boat to brmg away the quadrant, the pendulum, and the Englifh infirument ; which
however we could not effect without being up to the knees in water.
Mifs Bek, the lady to whom the medicines were fent from Pello, was lately married
to Dr. Ervafte: it was he who preached on Sunday; the fubjeét was the father of a
RR 2 family
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