; but a story is
told of a magistrate high in office, having been here a short time
since, who never travelled but in a sledge like a small house, drawn
by an hundred dogs. Besides this, he is said to have journeyed with
such rapidity, that at every station several of these animals
belonging to the Kamtschadales expired, which he never paid for. In
the summer, the Kamtschadale is obliged to be always ready with his
boat to conduct the traveller either up or down the rivers; nor can
the soldier be sent any where without having one of these people for
his guide. Thus it frequently happens that they are absent a fortnight
or more from their ostrog, and lose the best opportunity of providing
themselves with fish for the winter, as, besides the mere act of
taking the fish, it requires several days of fine summer weather to
dry them. If the wet should set in, during this operation, the fish
instantly becomes magotty, and the whole stock is rendered useless.
From the great numbers of soldiers, (as, besides the cossacks, there
is a battalion of five hundred men, and about twenty officers,
quartered in Kamtschatka), and the small number of Kamtschadales, it
must be sufficiently evident, that the latter are frequently taken
from their work, and, it may be added, almost without remuneration;
for the post-money allowed by the crown, which amounts to one kopeck
the werst, considering the high price of every article, is, surely,
not only an inconsiderable, but an insulting reward for the service
performed," Thus far K. To some readers, it may be necessary to
mention, in order to their due understanding of this reward, that 100
kopecks make a rouble, the value of which varies according to the rate
of exchange from 2s. 6d. to 4s. 2d. British, having been so low as the
former rate in the year 1803, and that three wersts are about equal to
two English miles, so that we may fairly enough estimate this insult,
as K. expresses it, at one half-penny per mile!--E.

[87] Krusenstern's description of the houses and their contents is exactly
in proportion to the other parts of his very unfavourable report. Even
of two of them, which he says are the very ornament of Kamtschatka,
the furniture is represented as most wretchedly deficient. "That of
the anti-room consisted merely of a wooden stool, a table, and two or