odd volume of Cooper's novels
which we had picked up at Gizhiga, and strolling along the high bluffs
over the gulf with our rifles in search of foxes. Soon after dark,
just as we were drinking tea in final desperation for the seventh
time, our dogs who were tied around the _yurt_ set up a general howl,
and Yagor came sliding down the chimney in the most reckless and
disorderly manner, with the news that a Russian Cossack had just
arrived from Petropavlovsk, bringing letters for the Major. Dodd
sprang up in great excitement, kicked over the teakettle, dropped his
cup and saucer, and made a frantic rush for the chimney pole; but
before he could reach it we saw somebody's legs coming down into the
_yurt_, and in a moment a tall man in a spotted reindeerskin coat
appeared, crossed himself carefully two or three times, as if in
gratitude for his safe arrival, and then turned to us with the Russian
salutation, "Zdrastvuitia."--"At kooda?"--"Where from?" demanded
Dodd, quickly. "From Petropavlovsk with letters for the _Maiur_,"
(mai-oor'), was the reply; "three telegraph ships have been there,
and I am sent with important letters from the American _nachalnik_
[Footnote: Commander.]; I have been thirty-nine days and nights on the
road from Petropavlovsk." This was important news. Colonel Bulkley
had evidently touched at the southern end of Kamchatka on his return
from Bering Sea, and the letters brought by the courier would
undoubtedly explain why he had not landed the party at the mouth of
the Anadyr River, as he had intended. I felt a strong temptation to
open the letters; but not thinking that they could have any bearing
upon my movements, I finally concluded to send them on without a
moment's delay to Gizhiga, in the faint hope that the Major had not
yet left there for Okhotsk. In twenty minutes the Cossack was gone,
and we were left to form all sorts of wild conjectures as to the
contents of the letters, and the movements of the parties which
Colonel Bulkley had carried up to Bering Strait. I regretted a hundred
times that I had not opened the letters, and found out to a certainty
that the Anadyr River party had not been landed. But it was too late
now, and we could only hope that the courier would overtake the Major
before he had started from Gizhiga, and that the latter would send
somebody to us at Anadyrsk with the news.

[Illustration: INTERIOR OF A YURT OF THE SETTLED KORAKS]

There were no signs yet of the Penzhin