86 TRAVELS IN SWEDEN.

selves throughout the kingdom. The present king has been
zealous in his endeavours to support them, as he has been
indefatigable for the general improvement of the country;
and Sweden owes much to his care during the time he has
been upon the throne.

It was now approaching the middle of June, and each
successive day either found me at the hospitable table of
Hr. St. G., or at those of my Swedish friends. A strong
effort was necessary; and though I was as yet unprovided
with an attendant, I determined upon fixing the time of my
departure; on the day previous to which, accident brought
before me a person, who I fancied was suited to my purpose.
He was a dapper little Swede, who, with a smiling face and
many bows, entered my room While I was packing up, and
offered his services. This hero, whom I shall now introduce
to public notice by the name of Jean, which he still retains,
and probably ever will, though his Swedish appellation was
Johan Lundsted, I found out was a tull befjent by profession,
or in other words a custom-house officer; but his services
would be dispensed with for the time, if he should be hired.
He had served also in a kind of military capacity; having,
as he informed me, had the honour of acting as a spy to the
late emperor Napoleon; when fortune played him a scurvy
trick, as, being taken by the Cossacks, he was sent a pri-
soner into Siberia. This seemed the principal feature of his
life ; though as to the battles he had been witness to, and the
strange risks he had run, they were innumerable; and with