experience of Siberian prisons has made me familiar with the
characteristic smell which accompanies the confluent form of this
disease. On the other hand, it may have been _kor_, the mysterious
epidemic which had lately desolated the Kolyma district, and of which we
had heard even as far south as Yakutsk.

[Footnote 53: Von Wrangell writes that during his coast journey an old
Tchuktchi near here told him that he was descended from the Chelagi, or,
as they are usually called by the Tchuktchi, the Tchewany, who many
years since migrated towards the west and have not since been seen. He
adds: "The first of these names has been preserved in Cape Shelagskoi,
and the second in that of Tchewan or Tchaun Bay."]

But food must be obtained at any cost. To leave this place without an
adequate supply would have been sheer madness, especially as we had
ascertained from the natives that the next settlement was at least nine
"sleeps" (or, in Tchuktchi dialect, days) away. Our own stores had now
dwindled down to a few frozen fish, but here, for the first (and by no
means the last) time, _vodka_ came in useful, for there lives no
Tchuktchi who will not sell his soul for alcohol. The fiery spirit
procured seal-meat sufficient to last us, with care, for ten days. I can
safely say that this is the most disgusting diet in creation, but we
devoured it greedily, with keen appetites sharpened by the knowledge
that twenty-four hours more would have seen us starving.

There were about thirty people in this place who had escaped the
prevailing pestilence, but all showed such a marked aversion to our
presence that I sparingly dispensed our _vodka_. A drunken Tchuktchi is
a murderous devil, and I had no desire to repeat my experiences amongst
these people of 1896, when my life was more than once in jeopardy
during their orgies. However, the natives of Erktrik (as this place is
called), were so openly hostile that even the usually truculent
Mikouline, who once, under the influence of his favourite beverage, had
offered to accompany me to a much warmer and remoter place than this,
was paralysed with fear. I therefore resolved to push on early the
following day (April 22), but that night we were all too exhausted to
keep the usual watch, and when we awoke late the next morning our three
Kolyma friends had bolted, taking some of our seal-meat with them. There
can be no doubt that the fugitives perished trying to reach their home,
for panic had depriv