o me with a cheerful
smile, wishing me a prosperous journey. I went on, and left the place
immediately by the northern gate.

I was so lost in my own thoughts, that I walked along scarcely knowing
how or where. I was calculating the chances of my reaching the mine by
the evening, and considering how I should introduce myself. I had not
gone two hundred steps, when I perceived I was not in the right road. I
looked round, and found myself in a wild-looking forest of ancient
firs, where apparently the stroke of the axe had never been heard. A
few steps more brought me amid huge rocks covered with moss and
saxifragous plants, between which whole fields of snow and ice were
extended. The air was intensely cold. I looked round, and the forest
had disappeared behind me; a few steps more, and there was the
stillness of death itself. The icy plain on which I stood stretched to
an immeasurable distance, and a thick cloud rested upon it; the sun was
of a red blood-colour at the verge of the horizon; the cold was
insupportable. I could not imagine what had happened to me. The
benumbing frost made me quicken my pace. I heard a distant sound of
waters; and, at one step more, I stood on the icy shore of some ocean.
Innumerable droves of sea-dogs rushed past me and plunged into the
waves. I continued my way along this coast, and again met with rocks,
plains, birch and fir forests, and yet only a few minutes had elapsed.

It was now intensely hot. I looked around, and suddenly found myself
between some fertile rice-fields and mulberry-trees; I sat down under
their shade, and found by my watch that it was just one quarter of an
hour since I had left the village-market. I fancied it was a dream; but
no, I was indeed awake, as I felt by the experiment I made of biting my
tongue. I closed my eyes, in order to collect my scattered thoughts.
Presently I heard unintelligible words uttered in a nasal tone; and I
beheld two Chinese, whose Asiatic physiognomies were not to be
mistaken, even had their costume not betrayed their origin. They were
addressing me in the language and with the salutations of their
country.

[Illustration: On the shores of the Frozen Sea.]

I rose, and drew back a couple of steps. They had disappeared; the
landscape was entirely changed; the rice-fields had given place to
trees and woods. I examined some of the trees and plants around me, and
ascertained such of them as I was acquainted with to be productions of
the