ty gathered around a fire; men
and women talking, laughing, smoking, and watching the crew at work.
The light, of the fire poured full upon a few figures and brought them
into strong relief, while others were half hidden in shadow. Of the
men some wore coats of sheepskin, others Cossack coats of grey cloth;
some had caps of faded cloth, and others Tartar caps of black
sheepskin. Red beards, white beards, black beards, and smooth faces
were played upon by the dancing flames. The women, were in hoopless
dresses, and held shawls over their heads in place of bonnets.

A hundred versts above Sofyesk the scenery changed. The mountains on
the south bank receded from the river and were more broken and
destitute of trees. Wide strips of lowland covered with forest
intervened between the mountains and the shore. On the north the
general character of the country remained. I observed a mountain,
wooded to the top and sloping regularly, that had a curious formation
at its summit. It was a perpendicular shaft resembling Bunker Hill
Monument, and rising from the highest point of the mountain; it
appeared of perfect symmetry, and seemed more like a work of art than
of nature. On the same mountain, half way down its side, was a mass of
rock with towers and buttresses that likened it to a cathedral. These
formations were specially curious, as there were no more of the kind
in the vicinity. Borasdine observed the rocks soon after I discovered
them, and at first thought they were ancient monuments.

There were many birds along the shore. Very often we dispersed flocks
of ducks and sent them flying over islands and forests to places of
safety. Snipe were numerous, and so were several kinds of wading and
swimming birds. Very often we saw high in air the wild geese of
Siberia flying to the southward in those triangular squadrons that
they form everywhere over the world. These birds winter in the south
of China, Siam, and India, while they pass the summer north of the
range of the Yablonoi mountains.

The birds of the Amoor belong generally to the species found in the
same latitudes of Europe and America, but there are some birds of
passage that are natives of Southern Asia, Japan, the Philippine
Islands, and even South Africa and Australia. Seven-tenths of the
birds of the Amoor are found in Europe, two-tenths in Siberia, and
one-tenth in regions further south. Some birds belong more properly to
America, such as the Canada woodcock and the