Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1871-05-26
WHAT WE DID AT QUICKJOCK.


WHAT WE DID AT QUICKJOCK.
Interesting sketch of Life In LapIand.
In the last number of Chambers Jour
nal there is sketch of travel in Lap
land worth reading. The writer, speak
ing of a little inland town, says:
"Quickjock wore it's gayest aspect.
The Capps had come hither from all
parts to attend the service in the little
church. st. Johns Day is their great
festival, on which they commemorate
the arrival of summer. The pastor had
at least 20 mouths to supply with food,
and every morning two boats set off
with their nets to the lake for the days
supply. They would return about IL a..
m., with large quantity of fish, but it
was never too large for the consumers,
who would each of them eat six pounds
as easily as one pound if set before them.
Nothing was ever left for the morrow.
They subsist entirely on fish, milk and
bread. The harmless little people
pleased the travellers immensely. There
was nice little couple, says Captain
Hutchinson, we took great fancy to-,
and after much consultation, decided
to our satisfaction which was the
boy and which the girl. AS both men
and women haye long hair, and
neither whiskers nor beard, and
dress alike in high blue cloth billycock
hats, and reindeer skin coats and leg
ings, it is almost impossible to disting-
uish them. We asked them how old
they were, and whether they belonged
to the school. The laugh was greatly
against us when we found the gentle
man to be 26 and the lady, his wife, "a
instead of ID and IL, as we had settle l
them to be- In this lovely living Lii
liput potatoes are the size of walnuts,
lamb steaks as big as larks, and calf
about the dimensions of large cat.
No doctor is within hundred miles, for
the Lapps are never i'll until just before
they die; and the one doctor even at
Lulea is in despair at the want of pa
tients. The effects of climate are very
curious to watch. The summer had set
in, and everything seemed to be grow
ing by steam; though Quickjock lies at
such an altitude that an hours walk up
any of the mountains around would
bring one to perpetual snow. With the
warmth come the mosquitoes, which are
as troublesome to the natives as to
visitors, and are prepared against by
covering the tops of the chimneys with
sods of earth, and kept out by never
opening the windows at all, and the
doors only for the indispensable amount
of ingress and egress.
"On Sunday morning the travellers
l. Co.. canine, tho
whole of the little settlement dressed in
their best. The Lapps were in their
go to-meeting' skins and numerous
beads and Jewels. The Swedes were in
black cloth dress suits. Even the
children wear swallow-tailed coats and
trousers and a more comical looking
little creature could not be imagined
than tiny boy of four years old whom
we saw airing himself with his back to
the fire, his hand under his coat tails,
just like the good old English gentle
man all of the olden time There are
seats in the church for one hundred and
fifty, but twenty persons composed the
congregation. Three hours journey
from the little town is Waldi Spiket,
with conical peak, surmounting a
sheer precipice of 1000 feet, and range
of snow-clad mountains rising one above
the other beyond it, There is first-rate
shooting to be had in the neighborhood,
piarmigon, hares, wood grouse and dot
terel and in the lowlands in front OF
the village, golden-eye, widgeon, teal,
scamp, velvet duck, etc. All this, with
nothing to pay, no lease to be asked,
and nothing to be desired but an Eng
lish dog Everywhere in the forest are
strange sights and strange birds, which
have no fear of man, which whistle as
one passes, and, though frightened for
moment at the report of ones gun,
fly off for only few yards, and then
return, and twitter and chirp as before
"The ants in Lapland are three times
as large as our common ant. Their
nests are hillocks of fir sprigs and rub
bish, often four feet high, the inside a
mass of eggs and ants; well-beaten
roads diverge from them in every dlrec-
ton, like the lines of railway from Lon
don in Bradshaw. These ants says
the writer, 'cross the little streams and
brooks by means of natural bridges.
One day | was jumping over a brook.
and brushed with my head and shoul-
ders two willow branches which met
over the water; in an instant l was
covered with ants, which were making
their way across the bridge which had
disturbed
"After the travellers had sojourned for
week at the pastors house, Captain
Hutchinson wrote note to him in his
best Swedish, inclosing bank notes for
27 shillings, for six days board and
lodging, and asking permission to re-
main another week. The pastor bor-
rowed his guests dictionary, and, al
though entirely unacquainted with Eng
lish, concocted the following answer:
'"'Master Captain: Much thanks for
generous paiment. Master and Mistress
fain may to be here than one week
With humility, 80 L. LEsTADIUs.'
"The travellers remained a fortnight,
and were sorry to take leave of all but