e
Goldees. The Chinese are more civilized than the Manjours, and call
the latter 'dogs.' The Manjours take revenge by applying the epithet
to the Goldees, and these transfer it to Mangoons and Gilyaks. The
Mangoons are not in large numbers, and live along the river between
the Gilyaks and Goldees. Many of the Russian officials include them
with the latter, and the captain of the Ingodah was almost unaware of
their existence.

A peculiar kind of fence employed by the Russian settlers on this part
of the Amoor attracted my attention. Stakes were driven into the
ground a foot apart and seven feet high. Willow sticks were then woven
between these stakes in a sort of basket work. The fence was
impervious to any thing larger than a rat, and no sensible man would
attempt climbing it, unless pursued by a bull or a sheriff, as the
upper ends of the sticks were very sharp and about as convenient to
sit upon as a row of harrow-teeth.

It reminded me of a fence in an American village where I once lived,
that an enterprising fruit-grower had put around his orchard,--a
structure of upright pickets, and each picket armed with a nail in the
top. One night four individuals bent on stealing apples, were
confronted by the owner and a bull-dog and forced to surrender or leap
the fence. Three of them were "treed" by the dog; the fourth sprang
over the fence, but left the seat of his trousers and the rear section
of his shirt, the latter bearing in indelible ink the name of the
wearer. The circumstantial evidence was so strong against him that he
did not attempt an alibi, and he was unable to sit down for nearly a
fortnight.

[Illustration: TAIL PIECE--THE NET]

CHAPTER XIV.

I took the first opportunity to enter a Goldee house and study the
customs of the people. A Goldee dwelling for permanent habitation has
four walls and a roof. The sides and ends are of hewn boards or small
poles made into a close fence, which is generally double and has a
space six or eight inches wide filled with grass and leaves. Inside
and out the dwelling is plastered with mud, and the roofs are thatch
or bark held in place by poles and stones. Sometimes they are entirely
of poles. The doors are of hewn plank, and can be fastened on the
inside.

The dwellings are from fifteen to forty feet square, according to the
size of the family. In one I found a grandfather and his descendants;
thirty persons at least. There are usually two windows, made of fi