The fish, of which they had collected about sixteen pounds, was hung up in the hut to dry. It was chiefly Pike, with some Char (Salmo alpinus).
The fat parts, with the intestines, after
having been cleaned, are put together till they become sour, when an oil is obtained for the purpose of greasing shoes. The scales and larger fins are collected and dried together. From them is afterwards procured, by boiling, an unctuous substance, into which they dip their fishing-nets, having first dyed or tanned them with birch bark, in order to make them more durable. The spawn of the fish is dried, and afterwards used in bread, dumplings, and what is called välling (a sort of gruel made by boiling flour or oatmeal in milk or water). The livers are thrown away, being supposed to occasion drowsiness, and pain in the head, when eaten.
These fishermen had been here six weeks, and intended staying a fortnight longer, when the season of the pike's spawning would be over. They lived during this period chiefly on the spawn and entrails of the fish they caught.
For this fishery these people pay no tax, neither to the crown nor to the native Lap
lander, who has free access to the water only when these adventurers have left it. Though he himself pays tribute for it, he dares not throw in the smallest net during the stay of his visitors; for, if they find any of his nets, they may throw them up into the high trees, as I was told they often had done.
The poor Laplander, who at this season has hardly any other subsistence for himself or his family, can with difficulty catch a fish or two for his own use. I asked one of them why he did not complain of this encroachment; but was told that having once applied to the magistrate, or judge of the district, the great man told him it was a trifle not worth thinking about; and he esteems the decrees of this exalted personage to be sacred, and altogether infallible, like the oracles of Apollo. He reverences his king as a divinity, and is firmly of opinion that if he were informed of the above grievance it would no longer be suffered to exist.
June 2.
The forest here was full of the noblest pine trees, growing to no purpose with respect to the inhabitants, as the wood is not used even for building huts, nor the bark for food, as it is in some other parts. I wonder they have not contrived to turn these trees to some account, by burning them for tar or pitch.