tle snow fell on the day previous to our departure, but it did
not materially affect the road, and only served as a warning to us
that winter was at hand, and we should not expect much more pleasant
weather. We made our way as rapidly as possible along the coast of the
Okhotsk Sea, partly on the beach under the cliffs, and partly over low
wooded hills and valleys, extending down to the coast from the central
mountain range. We passed the settlements of Amanina (ah-man'-in-ah),
Vaempolka (vah-yem'-pol-kah), Kakhtana (kakh'-tan-ah'), and Polan
(po-lahn'), changing horses and men at every village and finally, on
the 3d of October, reached Lesnoi--the last Kamchadal settlement in
the peninsula. Lesnoi was situated, as nearly as we could ascertain,
in lat. 59 deg. 20', long. 160 deg. 25', about a hundred and fifty versts
south of the Korak steppes, and nearly two hundred miles in an air
line from the settlement of Gizhiga, which for the present was our
objective point.

We had hitherto experienced little difficulty in making our way
through the peninsula, as we had been especially favoured by weather,
and there had been few natural obstacles to stop or delay our
progress. Now, however, we were about to enter a wilderness which was
entirely uninhabited, and little known even to our Kamchadal guides.
North of Lesnoi the great central range of the Kamchatka mountains
broke off abruptly into the Okhotsk Sea, in a long line of tremendous
precipices, and interposed a great rugged wall between us and the
steppes of the Wandering Koraks. This mountain range was very
difficult to pass with horses, even in midsummer, and was of course
infinitely worse now, when the mountain streams were swollen by the
fall rains into foaming torrents, and the storms which herald the
approach of winter might be at any moment expected. The Kamchadals at
Lesnoi declared positively that it was of no use to attempt to cross
this range until the rivers should freeze over and snow enough fall to
permit the use of dog-sledges, and that they were not willing to risk
fifteen or twenty horses, to say nothing of their own lives, in any
such adventure. The Major told them, in language more expressive than
polite, that he didn't believe a word of any such yarn; that the
mountains had to be crossed, and that go they must and should. They
had evidently never had to deal before with any such determined,
self-willed individual as the Major proved to be, and, after some