The Gulf of Bothnia extends six degrees to the north of Abo, but there is no trade or travel that requires a steamer, and ours is now to strike across the gulf, through the Aland Isles to Stockholm. We are bound there to visit Sweden and Norway. Those who have not this trip in view, and wish to see more of the country, can remain at Abo and go back to Wyborg and St. Petersburg by land. There is semi-occasionally a coach for travellers in Finland, but the more excellent way is by private carriage, or _carriole_, the carriage of the country; a narrow low sulky, with room enough for one, hardly for two, besides the driver. It has no top; but there is another trap called a _kibitka_, a long, narrow wagon with no springs, and a leathern hood which you can draw over you in case of rain, and with a bed in the bottom of it, on which, if not too long, you can stretch yourself out, while the driver attends to the little animal ahead, that tears up and down hill, through the sand, at a fearful pace, regardless of an occasional break-down and turn-over. This is a Russian innovation, and in the Paris Exhibition there were several very handsome specimens of the vehicle, which is far more pleasant to read about than to ride in. The _bondkara_ is still another wretched contrivance, about the same thing as our _buck-board_; with this essential, not to say fatal difference, that ours has four wheels, and the board extending from the forward to the hind axle makes an agreeable spring; an experienced driver sitting before, and the passenger behind him, holding on with both hands, can ride astride and not suffer much. The _bondkara_ of Finland has but two wheels, and the bench, without a back, is fastened to the axle-tree, the driver before, the traveller behind; the equilibrium must be preserved with care or the load goes to the ground, and when the wild horse tears down hill as if running away, the passenger must hold on tight with both hands on the sides of the seat, and the other—but he has no other, unless he’s a little behindhand, in which case he would do well to use it as best he can. The average speed of ten miles an hour is made, and that is pretty well in such a country as this.