Exceedingly remarkable for its antiquity and its wide extent

A SECOND main stem of the nations dwelling in Russia is that of the FINNS, of which, though not one branch (the Hungarians excepted, if we choose to reckon them among them) has ever risen to a ruling nation ; yet, as the common flock of most of the northern nations of Europe, is exceedingly remarkable for its antiquity and its wide extent, from Scandinavia to a great distance in the asiatic regions of the north ; and thence again to the shores of the Volga and the Caspian. Dispersed as all the finnish nations are in this prodigious space, yet the resemblance, in bodily frame, in national character, in language, and in manners is preserved. It is scarcely less remarkable, that the generality of the finnish races still dwell only in the north, which has ever been their favourite abode, and on which account they are likewise called inhabitants of morasses or fens ; and the chace and the fishery have ever been with each of them their chief occupation and trade. So great a resemblance seems to leave us in no doubt concerning the common descent of the nations that fall under this division of our work ; which of them, however, is properly the parent flock, can hardly be decided.

William Tooke: View of the Russian empire during the reign of Catharine the second and to the close of the present century. Vol I. 1799

I do not think we shall ever return to Abo to settle the question

When we, were about to depart, our good-natured Finnish guide objected ; and, lighting a candle, preceded us down a ladder into a long vault, where a most singular sight presented itself. In rows of wooden chests, most of them with the lids off, were seen the knights, ladies, church dignitaries, even little children, all in the dress of their times, so completely salted by the briny air, and dried by the cold, that their skin appeared to be in perfect preservation, although shrivelled. Age, however, had dismembered one grandee, who had fallen to pieces, and whose remains were mixed up with his garments, a red velvet cloak still retaining its colour. One coffin was as large as a four- post bed. The body it contained was richly clad in ample robes of white silk, to which time had given a creamy colour; and on the hands were kid gloves. It was afterwards a matter of dispute between us whether the in dividual in question was a stately old lady or a bishop; but I do not think we shall ever return to Abo to settle the question. A little baby, a girl, lay in a corner, its wrists tied with blue ribbon, according to Northern custom. A boy would have worn pink. The guide made signs that it belonged to the lady, whose effigy, in jewelled robe and marble ruff, we had seen above. Our Finn took hold of its arm, and bent it, but it slowly recovered its straight position.

Marie Guthrie: Through Russia: from St. Petersburg to Astrakhan and the Crimea. v.1. 1874

To Imatra, where I find an immense but well-kept hotel

Wiborg I found to be the third city of Finland in point of population. It is situated at the end of a large bay where a review of the Russian Baltic fleet is generally held every summer. There is nothing in Wiborg calculated to especially interest strangers, who in fact, only visit it en route to the celebrated falls of Imatra, some forty miles distant to the north. These falls may be reached both by canal and post-road. It is best perhaps to go by one and return by the other. Every morning a small steamer leaves Wiborg for Lake Saima, " the thousand isles " — recalling, but not resem bling, those in the St. Lawrence River. Lake Saima is nearly as large as Lake Wenern in Sweden. The Saima Canal is a grand triumph of engineering skill, being in some respects not unlike the Gotha Canal, to which I devoted a recent chapter. It was con structed at a cost of $2,000,000, by a Swedish engineer, in 1856. The lake is 256 feet above the Gulf of Fin land, and it has therefore been found necessary to con struct as many as twenty-eight locks to withstand so great a pressure of water as this difference in level naturally implies. These locks are most substantially built of the famous granite rock of Helsingfors. From a town on the lake we are forwarded by diligence to Imatra, where I find an immense but well-kept hotel.

The falls have been misnamed, since there is no perpendicular descent of water; they deserve rather to be designated as rapids. They vividly recalled those in the Niagara River below the suspension bridges. They are formed by the rushing of a small river between steep granite walls. The violence and roar of the water are appalling. The rapids gradually slope through a distance of about half a mile, the whole amount of descent being sixty feet. A capital view of them is obtained from the side of the river opposite the hotel. The style of transport thither is calculated, however, to try weak nerves and giddy heads, for you are drawn across the seething, tempestuous flood in a basket slung on wire ropes. The river must have been of much greater volume ages ago, for the limits of its old bed are clearly defined in the vicinity of the rapids. Here there are several pot-holes, containing boulders which cannot have gyrated for centuries.

Frank Vincent: Norsk, Lapp, and Finn; or, Travel tracings from the far north. 1890

The inhabitants cannot possibly subsist by the produce of their own lands

The inhabitants of this place are Finns (which means inhabitants of boggy places). They are likewise called Tchukhontzi and Maimisti: they speak a particular language, which differs from all known original languages: they write in Gothick letters, and are of the Lutheran confession. They build their villages and houses on hills or mountains, at a considerable distance from one another, so that every one might have his corn-fields and meadow-lands near his own house. Besides the Finns, there are other nations inhabiting this country, such as Swedes and Germans, and since the conquest, many Russians.

The soil in this government is very little fit for cultivation, on account of a great many bogs, lakes, stony bottoms, and the severity of the northern climate; so much so, that the inhabitants cannot possibly subsist by the produce of their own lands. They are frequently brought by necessity to prepare their corn for bread without separating it from the chaff, or even to mix with it the bark of the fir tree. The fir and pine grow here in great plenty; and a very considerable trade is carried on at Vyborg for timber, but chiefly for deal boards and tar. There is likewise a sufficiently profitable traffick for fish. Near Serdobole and Rouskolsk there are quarries of grey marble, which is sometimes variegated with yellow streaks.

Sergeĭ Ivanovich Pleshcheev & James Smirnove: Survey of the Russian Empire, according to its present newly regulated state, divided into different governments. 1792 

Complaints about this Abo route are so great

We knew before embarking that the voyage to St. Petersburg would occupy at least eight days, and perhaps as many as eighteen. But, even with the chance of delay, we thought it advisable to avoid the more circuitous course now usually adopted — by the steamboat to Abo, and thence by land along the northern shore of the Gulf of Finland. We had no desire to face the annoyances complained of by all who enter Russia at that point. There being no public conveyance from the landing-port, we should have been compelled to take any carriage and any servant that happened to be idle, at the risk of being robbed by the one, or having our necks broke by the other.

The greatest objection to this route, however, lies in the severities of the Russian custom-house, which, troublesome everywhere, are on the Finland line so particularly annoying, that some friends who traversed it the preceding year say they would go five hundred miles about rather than be again exposed to them. Carriage, trunks, pocket-books, and pockets are searched, not once merely on landing, but over and over again at certain stations along the road. One had his box of tooth- powder carefully emptied to see what treason or what contraband might lurk in its dusky shelter. Another had his soap-balls cut in two, with the same purpose ; he next saw his stockings slowly unfolded, pair after pair, and was not sure that some of them did not vanish in the process ; for the searchers have a trick of coming three or four together, and, distracting their victim's attention by opening several packages at the same time, quietly secrete any article that pleases them ; yet, after all, ask a fee for having given so little trouble.

It should be a rule with the traveller in every country not to allow more than one of his trunks to be open at the same moment in such places. But, with the lightfingered Russians, even this precaution will not always save his property. An American gentleman, lately passing this very road, with his wife, while he had his feet on one portmanteau, and was sitting on the other to keep them from being all opened at once, had the satisfaction of seeing a costly shawl walk off before his eyes.

The best of it was, the theft was denied ; the search which he attempted in the adjoining cottage among the goods and chattels of the officer's wife, to whom he supposed it had been handed, was, of course, fruitless. For the sake of future travellers, he afterwards complained to the finance minister, who received him very courteously, and, perhaps, ordered one or two of the parties to be knouted, — then appointed others in their place, to play the same game on the very first opportunity. These are evils in Russia which, although civilization may banish them, neither the knout nor the emperor have yet been able to root out.
In short, the complaints about this Abo route are so great, that, though the country is very pretty, and the roads good, there are few who know its character that would not prefer almost any conveyance by sea all the way to St. Petersburg

Robert Bremner: Excursions in the interior of Russia. v.1. 1840