y took it into his head that he would like to
possess himself of the skin, and, leaving the sledge, he approached the
brute with the intention of flaying it. He was about to take hold of
its muzzle, when the animal, resenting the indignity of having his nose
pulled, reared itself up on its forepaws, snarling furiously. Ere my
friend could spring back, the brute had seized him by the arm, and was
dragging him to the earth. In another instant his fangs would have been
at his throat, when the sportsman plunged his knife into its breast.
Still the wolf struggled with his antagonist. We were afraid to fire,
lest we should kill the man as well as the brute. It was a moment of
fearful suspense. The life-blood of the wolf was flowing freely, but
before he died he might have destroyed our friend. We drove to the spot
as fast as we could, in the hopes of being in time to rescue our
companion. As we were leaping from the sledge, the combatants rolled
over. Happily the man was uppermost. He drew a deep breath as we
released him.

"`I never wish to have such a fight as that again,' he exclaimed,
shaking himself. `It must have lasted a quarter of an hour at least.
How was it you did not sooner come to my assistance?'

"In reality, not two minutes had elapsed from the time he reached the
wolf till he finally killed it. His arm was somewhat lacerated, but his
thick coat had saved him. It was a lesson to me ever after, not to go
near a wild beast till I am certain he is put _hors de combat_."

"The breaking up of the ice on the various rivers of Russia is a time of
great excitement," observed the Count. "In an instant the natural
bridges which the winter has formed are destroyed, often with little or
no warning, and people are hurried down the stream on the floating
masses of ice, frequently unable to reach the shore, till, one mass
driven under the other by the fierce rush of waters, they are engulfed
beneath them. I was one year at Jaroslaf, on the Volga, at that period.
You, my friends, who were there at the time, will not have forgotten
the circumstance. I was on horseback, riding along the banks of the
river, to watch the huge masses of ice which came floating down the
stream. Sometimes they would glide calmly by, in almost unbroken
sheets; then they would meet with some obstruction--either a narrow part
of the stream, or a promontory, or a rock--and then they would leap and
rush over each other, as if imbued wit