I
TRAVELS IN SWEDEN,
IN
1 8 1 2 .
CHAPTER I.
Object in View—Voyage from Leith to Gottenburg—Colour of the Sea—Its Temperature
Becalmed in the Sleeve—Coast of Sweden—The Victory—Go ashore—Want of
Inns—Description of Gottenburg—Its Population—-Swedish Houses—Swedish Dinners
Swedish Currency—Mr. Lorent—Dr. Lampert—British Merchants settled in
■ Gottenburg—Herring Fishery—Our Carriage—Charges at the Hotel-—Rocks round
Gottenburg.
JHAVING finished my History of the Royal Society, and being accidentally
detained in Edinburgh without any specific employment, it
occurred to me that I might occupy the summer with considerable
profit to myself, and obtain a great deal o f amusement, i f I were to
take advantage of the peace lately concluded between Great Britain
and Sweden, and traverse part o f that vast and interesting country.
My objects were not only to observe the manners and dispositions o f
the people, and the progress which they had made in the arts and civilization;
.but likewise to take a mineralogical survey o f the country, as
far as that could be done by hastily traversing it; to view as nearly as
possible the state of chemistry in Sweden, and to make myself acquainted
with the discoveries made in that science by the Swedes
during the last ten years, with the greatest part o f which I was unac-
B