approach a fire. I have always found that snow, vigorously
rubbed on the frozen part, is the best remedy. The stage between
Ust-kutsk and Yakurimsk was a short one, only about eighteen _versts_,
but it took us six hours to make it. When we awoke next morning bright
sunshine was streaming into the guest-room, which was older and filthier
than usual. But it possessed a cracked and cloudy looking-glass which
dimly reflected three countenances swollen and discoloured beyond
recognition. For we had neglected to anoint our faces with grease
(Lanoline is the best), but after this experience never neglected this
essential precaution.

The postmaster at Yakurimsk, a decrepit Pole of benign but unwashed
exterior, informed me that the woods around his village swarmed with
bears, and that on payment of a few roubles for beaters he could ensure
us a good day's sport. But although the offer was tempting I did not
feel justified in risking the delay. Wolves had also been numerous, but
had, as usual, confined their attacks to pigs and cattle. Before
visiting Siberia I had the usual fallacious notion concerning the
aggressiveness of this meek and much maligned animal. I remember, in my
early youth, a coloured plate depicting a snow scene and a sleigh being
hotly pursued at full gallop by a pack of hungry and savage-looking
wolves. In the sleigh was a Cossack pale with terror, with a baby in his
teeth and a pistol in each hand. I fancy that, in riper years, I must
have unconsciously based my estimate of the wolf's ferocity on this
illustration, for I have now crossed Siberia four times without being
attacked, or even meeting any one who had been molested. The only wolf
which ever crossed my path was a haggard mangy-looking specimen, which,
at first sight, I took for a half-starved dog. We met in a lonely wood
near Krasnoyarsk in Western Siberia, but, as soon as he caught sight of
me, the brute turned and ran for his life!

Our drivers and horses were exchanged at every station so that the
severe work of the previous night did not retard our progress after
leaving Yakurimsk. The weather was fine and we made good headway until
the 28th, on the afternoon of which day we reached the second town of
Kirensk. A few miles above the latter the Lena makes a wide _detour_ of
fifty to sixty miles and the post-road is laid overland in a straight
line to avoid it. It was a relief to exchange, if only for a few hours,
that eternal vista of lime-stone