Sweden.
This great northern peninsula is singularly interesting, and in no respect more so than in what regards its inland navigation. At what period, or in hat manner, it was first peopled, seems beyond the reach of authentic re cords ; but it is well known, that in very remote times there issued from it an energetic race, who, during many ages, triumphed, and formed settlements in various parts of Europe. By the aid of Count Platen, a nobleman to whose talents and assiduity that country stands indebted for many improvements, we are chiefly enabled to furnish our readers with the following observations respecting the inland navigation of Sweden.
Its coast is bordered by innumerable islands and bays, and the whole of the interior is intersected by lakes of various sizes. These lakes are fed, connected, and dis charged by large rivers : thus separated, the inhabitants were under the necessity of having recourse, very early, to internal navigation upon the lakes and rivers, although the latter are not unfrequently intercepted by dangerous rapids ; and the modes of passing these rapids, in some parts of Sweden, Norway, and Finland, would appear incredible, if they were not still practised. The follow ing detailed account of this operation, as given by the Count Platen, cannot fail to be interesting. Very light and tender boats, of from 20 to 24 feet in length, contain ing from three to five men, run down the middle of the stream with incredible velocity. It produces a sensa tion impossible to be described, when, from a steep rock on the shore, one sees the boat approaching the cataract, two men pulling in the usual way with oars, and the pilot, who is appointed and sworn for this business, steer ing at the helm also with an oar. He particularly is not to he disturbed by any thing whatever : his look is steady and penetrating,, and even his hair, on botii sides his head, is tied fast behind his neck, lest it might, by the motion of the wind, or by his rushing through the air, aaaae before his eyes. The moment he reaches the edge of the fall, he animates his companions to pull with all their strength, in order to give his boat sufficient war for the action of the steerage ; he then rushes down the tremendous current, between steep rugged shores and isolated masses of rocks, in the midst of the falls, and is frequently hid from the spectator by the foaming of the broken roaring water; in a moment Ire reappears run ning with incredible velocity rigid against a perpendicu lar rock, with all the probability of instant destruction, increased by his cries to augment the velocity by fresh efforts ; when, in the very last moment, as the boat seems touching the mck, he casts it in a quite different direction, often at an angle of 90 degrees, and again dis appears in the next curve of the stream. Thc whole of
these operations is an affair of an instant, scarcely to he measur eel by time. The Count once made a trial of this mode of navigation in company, w ith two able English officers, upon a considerable river in Nor.r.ay ; and though the falls were of the lowest sort, they. all agreed that they should not have liked to have trusted the best of their own bargemen. But in rivers of this sort, many rapids defy navigation, and in these cases carrying places are necessarily adopted. 'File improvement of side-cuts succeeded the carlying places, and some of the hate(' (or cuts) arc so ancient in this country, that their origin is unknown. The old laws and regulations for canal cut ting are found as far back as the 14th century. In the year 1007, the neck of land upon which Stockholm stands was in onc night cut through by the King of Nor way, Olof Haroldson, who, being blocleed up in the lake AIaelar, escaped by this expedient with his fleet. The navigation from Upsala to Bishop Tuna in 1030, the order issued about the year 1320, by Knut Jonson Blae, in the name of the Swedish King IMagnus, for removing the obstructions in the navigation froni Upsala to Bishop Tuna, are all testimonies of the ancient existet;ce of in land navigation in Sweden. An ancient author relates, that, in 1435. the administrator Engelbrecht endenoured to cut through the neck of land at Sodertelje, in order to pass his vessels into the lake 'Iaclaren; and, on the 3d May, 1455, King Charles VI11. directed the naviga tion from Upsala to Bishop Tuna, to be cleared out and restored. There is in existence a letter from the learn ed and active Catholic Bishop I3rask, to a nobleman of high rank, dated 15th July, 1526, wherein he mentions a plan of joining the Wenern with the Baltic, nearly in the same way as it is now about to be a.ccomplished ; and a short cut at the eastern extremity of the lake Roxen, is still known by the name of the Bishop's Canal. But this great man, violently opposing the Reformation in religion introduced by Gustavus the First, was expelled from the country, and all his projects of improvement were suspended.