This sketch is taken from one of their snow shoes, made of wood. Its length is six feet, from h to i; breadth, from k to g, five inches. The hind part, i, is rather more obtuse than the other end, h, which last is elevated about two or three inches. From h it gradually widens to f. The part from c to d, where the foot stands, is about eight inches; its breadth three. The under part of the shoe is convex, and furrowed lengthwise; the upper flattish, raised about ten lines, and the edge all round is sharp. At b is a band, made of fir root twisted, serving to tie the shoe fast round the ancle. The general thickness of the shoe throughout is from three to four lines. Some people wear a pair of the same size; others have the left shoe smaller than the right. Each is often lined or covered, about the central part, with a piece of hairy reindeer skin, to prevent the foot slipping about upon the shoe, and give a firmer step in walking over the snow. This is most practised in Kimi-Lapmark, where the wild reindeer are most abundant. The Lapland thread is made out of the tendons of reindeer fawns half a year old. Such thread is covered with tin foil for embroidery, its pliability rendering it peculiarly fit for the purpose. The tendons are dried in the sun, being hung over a stick. They are never boiled. To show to what a high degree of perfection these people have arrived in the art of making such thread, I brought away a sample of it, which I believe none of our ladies could match. Shoes and baskets made of birch bark are used both in Angermanland and Helsingland, as well as ropes of the same material, which will not sink in water, but these are not in general use. The bows which serve the Laplanders for shooting squirrels are composed of two different kinds of wood, laid parallel to each other. The innermost is birch, the outermost of what they term _kior_, _kioern_ or _tioern_. (This is procured from a tree of the Common Fir, _Pinus sylvestris_, that happens to grow in a curved form, usually in marshy places, or on the banks of rivers, and whose contracted side is hard like box: see _vol._ i. _p._ 255; also _Fl. Lapp. n._ 346, λ.) If this be not practised, the bows are more apt to snap. Each layer of wood is externally convex, yet not so much as to render the bow quite cylindrical. When the Laplanders expect any visitors, they are particularly careful to have plenty of _ris_ (branches of the dwarf birch) spread on the floor, under the reindeer skins on which they sit; otherwise they would be thought deficient in civility, and the mistress of the family would be censured as a bad manager, when the guests returned to their own homes. The mode of their entertainment is as follows.