les in a breathless and exhausted condition. One more such
hospitable reception would forever have incapacitated us for the
service of the Russian American Telegraph Company! I had only time to
cast a hurried glance back at the Major. He looked like a frightened
landsman straddling the end of a studdingsail-boom run out to leeward
on a fast clipper, and his face was screwed up into an expression of
mingled pain, amusement, and astonishment, which evidently did not
begin to do justice to his conflicting emotions. I had no opportunity
of expressing my sympathetic participation in his sufferings; for
an excited native seized the halter of my horse, three more with
reverently bared heads fell in on each side, and I was led away in
triumph to some unknown destination! The inexpressible absurdity of
our appearance did not strike me with its full force until I looked
behind me just before we reached the village. There were the Major,
Viushin, and Dodd, perched upon gaunt Kamchadal horses, with their
knees and chins on nearly the same level, half a dozen natives in
eccentric costumes straggling along by their sides at a dog-trot, and
a large procession of bareheaded men and boys solemnly bringing up
the rear, punching the horses with sharp sticks into a temporary
manifestation of life and spirit. It reminded me faintly of a Roman
triumph--the Major, Dodd, and I being the victorious heroes, and the
Kamchadals the captives, whom we had compelled to go _sub jugum_,
and who now graced our triumphal entry into the Seven-hilled City. I
mentioned this fancy of mine to Dodd, but he declared that one would
have had to do violence to his imagination to make "victorious heroes"
out of us on that occasion, and suggested "heroic victims" as equally
poetical and more in accordance with the facts. His severely practical
mind objected to any such fanciful idealisation of our misery. The
excitement increased rather than diminished as we entered the
village. Our motley escort gesticulated, ran to and fro, and shouted
unintelligible orders in the most frantic manner; heads appeared and
disappeared with startling kaleidoscopic abruptness at the windows
of the houses; and three hundred dogs contributed to the general
confusion by breaking out into an infernal canine peace jubilee which
fairly made the air quiver with sound. At last we stopped in front of
a large one-story log house, and were assisted by twelve or fifteen
natives to dismount and ente