FORTIa's TRAVELS IK SWEDEN,

5^7

Chap. II. — Catara&s of Trolhcetta.—Road to Stockholm through Nerlcta and Wejhwnia.

Objeds on the Road and in its Neighbourhood interejiing to a Naturalijl.

ON our return to Kunghill we continued our journey, as defcribed in the itine-rary. At Stroeum you take a fledge, or a peafant’s cart, as the feafon happens to be,■to go to Trolhcetta, where thofe catara&s are fituated, fo worthy the attention of travel-ers ; as far as this ftage you keep alongfide the river, which is on your right, and feefome cultivated plains, particularly hop grounds. From Stroeum you continue the highroad to Wenerfborg for about fix hundred paces; leaving it then to the left you turnto the right hand dire&ly towards the river which forms in this fpot a fmall bafon, theWater of which is as ftill as the furface of a lake, although at but a fmall diftance fromthe cataracts : you crofs the river in very light boats, paying for the fare four fous eachpcrfon : for the fpace of a quarter of a mile you then follow the courfe of the river onthe oppofite bank, along a road made of planks, conftru&ed for the conveyance of iron,from the fpot where the river ceafes to be navigable, to that where it begins to be foagain. You may alfo, by making a longer circuit, or in cafe of going from Wenerf-borg, pafs the river above the catara&s; for it is abfolutely requisite you fliould keepon the fame fide as the hamlet of Trolhcetta, as nothing is vifible from the other on ac-count of the mountains which form the fide of the river: at the fpot where you pafsthe Gceutha (below the catara&s) is the iron warehoufe, which confifts of a tolerablylarge building on the ground floor, with different apartments, numbered. If defirousof avoiding the walk of a quarter of a mile, you will find, after eroding the river, car-riages peculiar to the country, which will take you to Trolhcetta and bring you backagain, charging, on account of the time they flop, a mile, notwithftanding the diftancebe no more altogether than half as much. We were condu&ed all the way to Trol-hcetta by the waterman who ferried us over, and gave him for his pains eight {killings,with which he appeared well fatisfied. We advife beginning from above, near the vil-lage of Trolhcetta itfelf, where the faw-mills are, and defeend again to below the cata-ra&s ; thus obtaining a profpe& of the whole, which is highly pi&urefque, not only onaccount of the different falls, but of the rocks likewife which are feen on every fide :We were there on a fine funny day, and the earth was covered with fnow, which per-haps added to the beauty of this point of view : great expence has been incurred in theattempt to make this part of the river navigable, and thus opening a communication be-tween lake Wener and the North Sea ; but it is apprehended with much reafon thatthis undertaking will never be brought to a favourable iffue : it would, perhaps, be atnore certain and lefs expenfive plan to dig a canal, which leaving the river above thecatara&s might terminate in the bafon before alluded to : the diftance would be littleWore than a quarter of a mile, and a number of locks might remedy the inequality ofthe ground. Your curiofity fatisfied, you return the fame way back to Strceum, andstrive at Wenerjborg , which poffeffes nothing remarkable but its iron market, this townbeing the entrepot for all that the province of Vermeland fends to Gottenburg; it isfituated on the fpot near which the Goeutha iffues from lake Wener. There is a raifedway of great length over the canal of Carlfgraff: it is arched at intervals, the fame as abridge, and is the road to Norway ; it has a parapet (for what reafon we could not con-je&ure) on one fide only : in the middle is a fione bearing an infeription which defig-nates under whofe government it was conftru&ed. All this however but ill repays thepains of going to Wenerfborg; wherefore when at Kunghill you will do well to repafs

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