The presence of this grass, as well as the whole aspect of the forests, marshes, cornfields, meadows, waters and herbage, evinced a great conformity betwixt this country and Smoland. Many herbaceous plants grow here which are not to be found
in Upland, Sudermannia, Ostro-gothia, nor Scania, though natives of Smoland.
In passing over a meadow towards the water-side I heard something snap and crackle in the marshes, as if the water had been boiling. In several places the latter was dried up, so that mud only remained, and these spots were almost entirely covered with a kind of shell-fish which made the above-mentioned noise. I observed the same in several similar places, but in others none were to be seen till I had stirred up the mud, when it proved full of these animals, which seemed to have made their way deeper and deeper into the soil as the water had withdrawn. The same sound may be observed in a thousand places, originally dry, when the water has access to them, but I had never ascertained the cause till now. (These shells seem to have been the Mya arenaria, Faun. Suec. n. 2127.)
The Swammerdamia flies of Swammerdam and Lister were flying about here, as numerous as atoms. I observed an in
sect unknown to me, with a yellowish globular body the size of a lentil. Amongst the grass were thousands of the most minute species of Gnat, (Culex pulicaris,) the males being distinguished by their hairy foretops (antennæ).
The water swarmed with innumerable small fishes, just spawned, so pellucid that they were rendered conspicuous chiefly by their large eyes. The observer of nature sees, with admiration, that "the whole world is full of the glory of God."
This neighbourhood abounds with the Stellaria minima of botanists, (Callitriche,) generally supposed to be very rare. It is evidently no naturally distinct species, but a variety caused by circumstances. Every one knows that the common kind always floats in the water; whereas this minima never grows where water is actually present, but where it has been dried up in consequence of hot weather. Not being, therefore, able to sustain itself upright, it must creep, and becomes at the same time
diminutive from a deficiency of its usual aliment. If any one doubts this, let him place this dwarf plant in a rivulet, or the larger one in a situation from which the water is retiring, and the result will remove every doubt.
The inhabitants here are frequently afflicted with the scurvy, whence arise ulcers of the mouth and uvula, ulcerous sores and swelling of the feet, as well as aching pains in the legs and feet, and dropsical swellings of the latter. It may be expected that the peasants will be most liable to these latter diseases on festival days[51].
[51] Linnæus perhaps means, that they may have a pretence to avoid the drudgery of going to church, through some of the hardships he has already described; yet here the church seems to have been near at hand, and in itself not unentertaining.