The Emperor Alexander possessed himself of Finland after the treaty of Tilsit, and at a period when the deranged intellects of the monarch who then reigned in Sweden, Gustavus IV., rendered him incapable of defending his country.  The moral character of this prince was very estimable, but from his infancy, he had been sensible himself that he could not hold the reins of government.  The Swedes fought in Finland with the greatest courage; but without a warlike chief on the throne, a nation which is not numerous cannot triumph over a powerful enemy.  The Emperor Alexander became master of Finland by conquest, and by treaties founded on force; but we must do him the justice to say, that he treated this new province very well, and respected the liberties she enjoyed.  He allowed the Finns all their privileges relative to the raising of taxes and men; he sent very generous assistance to the towns which had been burnt, and his favors compensated to a certain extent what the Finns possessed as rights, if free men can ever accede voluntarily to that sort of exchange.  Finally, one of the prevailing ideas of the nineteenth century, natural boundaries, rendered Finland as necessary to Russia, as Norway to Sweden; and it must be admitted as a truth, that wherever these natural limits have not existed, they have been the source of perpetual wars.

I embarked at Abo, the capital of Finland.  There is an university in that city, and they make some attempts in it to cultivate the intellect:  but the vicinity of the bears and wolves during the winter is so close, that all ideas are absorbed in the necessity of ensuring a tolerable physical existence; and the difficulty which is felt in obtaining that in the countries of the north, consumes at great part of the time which’ is elsewhere consecrated to the enjoyment of the intellectual arts.  As some compensation, however, it may be said that the very difficulties with which nature surrounds men give greater firmness to their character, and prevent the admission into their mind of all the disorders occasioned by idleness.  I could not help, however every moment regretting those rays of the South which had penetrated to my very soul.

The mythological ideas of the inhabitants of the North are constantly representing to them ghosts and phantoms; day is there equally favorable to apparitions as night; something pale and cloudy seems to summon the dead to return to the earth, to breathe the cold air, as the tomb with which the living are surrounded.  In these countries the two extremities are generally more conspicuous than the intermediate ones; where men are entirely occupied with conquering their existence from nature, mental labors very easily become mystical, because man draws entirely from himself, and is in no degree inspired by external objects.