elow zero (Fahr.). We
remained here for some hours waiting for reindeer, but the heat and
stench of the rest-house produced such nausea that more than once during
the night I was compelled to don my furs and brave a temperature that
rendered even inhalation painful, and instantly congealed the breath
into a mass of ice. To make matters worse, the hut was crowded with
Yakutes of loathsome exterior and habits, and a couple of cows and some
calves also occupied the foul den, which, of course, swarmed with
vermin. And so did we, after passing the night here, to such an extent
as to cause actual pain for some days afterwards whenever we left the
outer air for a warmer temperature. Oddly enough, these rest-houses were
usually crowded with people, who presumably never left them, for in the
open we never encountered a solitary human being, nor indeed a single
animal or bird, with the exception of a dead ermine which had been
caught in a trap and which our Yakute drivers, with characteristic
greed, promptly took from the snare and pocketed. Talking of ermine, the
district of Sredni-Kolymsk has always been famous as a fruitful
breeding-place of this pretty little creature, and they used to be
obtainable there at an absurdly low price, from sixpence to a shilling
apiece. A friend had therefore commissioned me to procure him as many
skins as we could conveniently carry, intending to make a mantle for as
many halfpence as the garment would have cost him pounds in England.
But we found that ermine had become almost as costly in Sredni-Kolymsk
as in Regent Street. The price formerly paid for a score would now
barely purchase one, for the Yakutsk agents of London furriers had
stripped the district to provide furs for the robes to be worn at the
Coronation of his Majesty the King of England. Far-reaching indeed are
the requirements of royalty!

It was impossible to procure food of an eatable kind here, or indeed at
any other _stancia_ throughout this part of the journey. The _ispravnik_
at Verkhoyansk had assured me that deer-meat would always be
forthcoming; and so it was, in a putrid condition which rendered it
quite uneatable. There was nothing else obtainable but frozen milk
(generally black with smoke and filth), so we were compelled to subsist
solely on the meat from Yakutsk, so long as it lasted, and on
"Carnyl,"[34] a kind of palatable pemmican brought from England and
intended only for use on the Coast. And we afterwards nearly