im,-' i CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY Cornell University Library The original of tiiis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924028510869 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA, A Journey in Russian Lapland and' Karelia. BY EDWARD RAE, FJl.G.S. Author of The Land of the North Wind, and The Country of the Moors. MAP AND ILLUSTRATIONS. LONDON: JOHN' MURRA V, ALBEMARLE STREET. 1 88 1. TJie right of Translation is reserved. Printed by R. & R. Clakk, Edinburgh. 7? k It, TO MY DEAR BROTHER AND SISTER IN AMERICA, T DEDICATE THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. TO THE READER. Dear Reader — If you are willing to embark on this expedition to The White Sea Peninsula, I must ask you to regard the account of our journey simply as a sketch — as accurate as, under many difficulties, I have been able to make it. There appear to be two ways of writing : one, to seek after somebody else's style — the other to write as you talk yourself. The latter is all that lies within my capabilities, and it must be the excuse which you will require to make for many things in the following pages. An indifferent Russian scholar, I found it fatiguing to extort information word by word from the natives with whom we associated : and the result by no means represents the labour undergone. I have taken certain details and statistics, chiefly of the fisheries, from En Sommer i Finmarken og Nord Karelen, by the modest and talented Nor- wegian Professor Friis, who skirted the region TO which I am about to describe. For the map I am indebted to the courtesy of the Royal Geographical Society. Originally a Russian chart, amended by Middendorf, reduced by poor Dr. Petermann of Gotha for Stiehler's Atlas, revised by Professor Friis, and rendered into English by Lieutenant Temple, F.R.G.S. — I have made various additions and corrections based on observation : and I do not hesitate to say it is a good map. Some of the woodcuts are from En Sommer i Finmarken : the others from the Expedition's photographs, transferred to wood by Mr. Arthur E. Smith's interesting and valuable process, Crypto- type. Of the etchings, with one exception, I can say little : they were experiments, made in haste, perhaps to be repented of at leisure. My first acknowledgments must be to my friends Mr. Murray and Mr. John Murray, whose unvarying kindly consideration has helped to transform a labour into a pleasure. For friendly assistance in Natural History, I have to thank Messrs. Higgins, Moore, Rye, and Eraser. Reader, I do not know if we shall meet again. I had contemplated one more journey for the past summer, to the lonely White Sea. My old com- TO THE READER. ix panion ' the Doctor,' whose unshaken courage and monumental patience survived many a trial, seemed at last to feel th at his taste for Arctic hardships had expired : and I have to express to my good friend Mr. Archibald Williamson my regret that the journey, which he readily agreed to share in the Doctor's stead, could not be carried out. I am happy to think there are many humble acquaintances in the far North who would be glad to see us once more. The more languages we learn, the more races and classes of human beings we see, the more we feel that their distinctions are skin deep. We have but to identify ourselves with our fellow-creatures, to find warm hearts, virtues, and refinement among the very outcasts of mankind. Friendliness and courtesy will go farther than money, and a joke is a better weapon than a revolver. And so the Doctor and I resign to others the regions through which, in more than one instance, we have been the pioneers : only cautioning our successors that such journeys call for more thought, nerve, and endurance than might be imagined. Apart from incessant impediments and frequent risks, the journey to The White Sea Peninsula was a hard one : and details which you, gentle reader. X TO THE READER. will find wearisome, may, perhaps, serve as foot- prints to a future wanderer in one of the least known countries in the world, when the good Doctor and I shall have been long forgotten. — Believe me, yours faithfully, EDWARD RAE. Redcourt, Birkenhead, Christmas 1881. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGE Sail from the Tyne — Purchas' pilgrims — The North Cape — Inventory of provisions — Various preparations — An Interpreter — Mosquito pre- parations — ^Vardo — A Lutheran baptism — Fort of Vardbhuus — We charter a steamer — A bird rock CHAPTER II. We sail to Vadso — The Perevodtchik — A Lapp idol — Valit — Voyage to Kola — Vaidda G(aba— Neutral ground — A zealous monk — Peisen Kloster — Trifan's mission — A sacred painting — Skolte Lapps — Sibt Navolok — A Viking's grave — Legend of Anika — The Kolafiord — Kola— Bombardment by the White Sea squadron .... CHAPTER III. Malmys — ^Walrus fishery — Position of Kola — The White Sea Peninsula — Churches — Persecution of the Lapps — ^A Kola house — Visit to the Ispravnik — Flans for journey — A passport — An archseological in- vestigation — A failure — A naturalist . . ... 26 CHAPTER IV. Expedition up the Tflloma river — ^A cataract — Fish — Tflloma — To the Nuot Lake — Nuotosero — Farewell to the Lapps — A reception — A bargain — A misfortune — Departure from Kola • . • • 39 CHAPTER V. PAGE ICildJn Island — The Mflrman coast — A Lapp ally — St. Gabriel's — Fishing stations — Murman fishes — L&vosero — Investigations — Corruption — A sufferer — Zakkar's Farewell 52 CHAPTER VI. Departure from Gavrilova — A luxury — A storm — The Irisjevernaya Si&nya — Arrival at Seven Islands — ^Wreck of the Alexei — Our camp — ^Visitors — Sir Hugh Willoughby — Expedition to the River Kar- lovka — A rainbow — Lapps of the ICarlovka — A mistake — Interroga- tions — The Mink — ^We appoint a secretary 66 CHAPTER Vn. A naughty boy — Camp life — Origin of the Lapps — A piece of mischief — An ornithological discovery — Temperature — Parahod — Holy Cape — A risk CHAPTER VIII. The Ponoi river — A lonely grave — A reinforcement — Lachta — The great river — Hyperborean manners — Voyage on the Ponoi — The river's banks — Mutiny — Birds — A late meal — First cataract — An indenture — Ponoi in the winter — Vaccination — Farewell to Ponoi — Yokkonga — Lachta^ — The last of the Ponoi gi CHAPTER IX. The White Sea coast— Lapp costumes— A storm— A harbour of refuge — Terski Villages— Matthias Alexander Castren— A dispute— The Terski fisheries — The Terski rivers 1 1 1 CONTENTS. CHAPTER X. PAGE Kouzomen — Feodor Andrevitch — Samoyedes — The Varzuga river — ^Vil- lage of Varzuga — A pioneer — A contract — Yekim's journey — Sergo- sero— Kamensky — The Upper Ponoi — The Bolshoi rapid — A letter from Lachta — Overtures for photography — White Sea midnight . 122 CHAPTER XI. Samoyede studies — Characteristics — Worship — Superstition — Religion — '• A recognition — A risk— The bear — Weariness — Samoyede gods — j Wizards- -Sacrifices — Burials — Samoyede Folk-lore — Story of the thirty old men — Marodata — Tanako — The one-armed servant — Samoyede song— Connections of the Samoyedes — Departure from Kouzomen — Vassili Ivanovitch Rogolofif 139 CHAPTER Xn. K passepartout — A rich establishment — Coming events — The White Sea monastery — A misunderstanding- — The God - worshippers- — Selfish- ness — History of Solovetsk — Its churches — Sacred paintings — Devotion 164 CHAPTER XIII. Kem — Its founders — A perquisition — An arrest — The Kem post-office — A Karelian aquaintance — The Samovar — Release of the Pere- vodtchik — The Old Believers — Dogmas and characteristics — Fish and dogs — Virtues of the Karelians 176 CHAPTER XIV. Appearance of Kem — An inflammable village — Old silver — An acquisition — Departure from Kem — An escape — lanotka's after career — A launch — Pongamo — Government posting stations — Stray Lapps — A deserted isba — Wild flowers 189 CHAPTER XV. PAGE Kalgalaks — A pleasant evening — Literary possibilities — A fishing spot — Somostrova — An anxiety — Qualities of the peasants — Keret — The Korelak — A selfish priest — A human spider — Suggestions — Wonders 201 CHAPTER XVI. misconception — Laziness — Return to Keret — The rapid — A difficult operation — An apparition — Kovda — Public baptism — Prejudices — Rusanova — Kandalaks — An unexpected meeting — A beautiful pano- rama — A wrangle — Transport — An inventory 213 CHAPTER XVII. Through the forest — Arctic flora — Neglected advantages — A travelled native — Mosquito precautions — Imandra — Sashyeka — Babinsky Lapps — Habits of the Lapps — Resources — -Miron Yefimovitch Arkipoff— A storm on the lake — The Island of Graves — The ritual of the dead .... 225 CHAPTER XVIII. Lapp sayings— Folk-lore— Ivan, son of Kupiska— The King of the Lapps— A story of Yokkonga— The priest's wedding— The fox and the bear — The salmon and the \xoyx\.—Jetanas — The giant's life — The giant and his boy— The Stallos— The fisher Lapp— Patto Pwadnje's revenge— Stallo's marriage— The beaver traps— The Sea Folk — The Goveiter — Dog Noses — Ruobba 238 CHAPTER XIX. The Umpdek Dunder— A novel bird— Rasnavolok— An unprofitable sacrifice — Pleasant companions — Arctic solitudes — The journey to LSvosero— Talk with a Lapp— The Russian Lapps— The Northern Lights 252 CONTENTS. CHAPTER XX. PAGE Mythology of the Lapps— The Noaids— The Kobdas—K self-sacrifice— The Lapp divinities— Tiermes— Sun-worshippers— The formation of a soul— The .ffa/i/^/J- Heaven and hell— The flood . . .262 CHAPTER XXI. Maselsky — The snowy mountain ridge — Education — Wild flowers of the Kola River — A Lapp gentleman — Tschongai — A profession of faith — Kola — The route from the White Sea 278 CHAPTER XXH. Onesime — The MassUnitsa — Obtainable necessaries in the White Sea Peninsula and Karelia — Negotiations with Laplanders — Michieff — An enquiry — Baseball — An international cricket match — Farewell to Kola 286 CHAPTER XXin. The Kola Gis arctica, hummed about the cloud- berry, which was forming into beautiful white blossom : and I gathered the Diapensia Lapponica. I saw bilberries between Siem Ostrova and Karlovka, which had lived CHAP. VI.] EARLY NAVIGATORS. 79 fresh and juicy under the winter's snow — enough to fill a boat White gulls had deserted the stormy water and the floating relics of fish, and were crowding on the snow, which lay a hundred yards from our tent. In August 161 1, on the four-and-twentieth day, the boat's crew of the English ship Amitie reached the Seven Islands. Here wee found many fishermen of whom wee enquired after Cool — Kola — and Kildina, and they made signs that they lay west from us — which wee likewise ghest to bee so — and with that they shewed vs great friendship, and cast a codde into our scute : but for that wee had a good gale of wind, we could not stay to pay them for it — but gave them great thankes, much wondering at their great courtesie. Poor sailors and fishermen, gone over two centuries ago to their account. I wonder if any one — encamped where we are now, two centuries hence — will know or care that the Doctor and I came to the Seven Islands. I asked the Perevodtchik to be so kind as to keep a minute record of the journey : and I often watched him biting his pencil end, at a loss for ideas. He was to make a clean copy on his return home : and after a month or two I received a neatly-written MS., which a neighbour had translated for him into English. After photographs were taken — he writes — of the tent at Tuloma, with Laplanders and the waterfall, Mr. Rae and the physician went with Laplanders seven versts, to the Laplanders' winter quarters. On their return presents were distributed, whereas the Laplanders paid (or gave) 8o THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [chap, vi US salmon, accompanied us to the boat, and gave us many congratulations with on the journey. Then the secretary goes on to Tiribirka Bay. We set the course for Gavrila, but before we arrived, a storm arose, and took the sail from us. At last we arrived at Gavrila. One day a tipsy Russian came up to me, and took me for a Jew who had escaped from Kem : but this was cleared up in this way — a Russian from another place who knew me from former years came up, wherefore he saluted me, and mentioned my name. Then all com- menced to make inquiries if we were functionaries, if we were in the service of the State, how far we intended to travel, until we were quite annoyed thereof, and gave them evasive answers, wherefore they left us as they could not get any information. Piotri Ivanovitch came to wish us good-bye. Poor Piotri, he told the Perevodtchik a sad love story. It was of years before, and Piotri was well off, and envied by his neighbours : but, as the little secretary expresses it : There rested always a sorrow over him. CHAP. VII.] A NEW ACQUAINTANCE. 8i CHAPTER VII. A naughty boy — Camp life — Origin of the Lapps — A piece of mischief — An ornithological discovery — Temperature — Parahod — Holy Cape — A risk. A BOY came one evening with a cap full of cormorants', puffins', eider-ducks' and gulls' eggs. He appeared to be the naughty boy of the village. He would whistle, and look at me with a knowing confidence, as if to say it was not so long since I had been a naughty boy with weaknesses too. Naughty boy : I want to sell the eggs. Traveller : How much ? Thirty-five kopecks, to buy half a botelka. Traveller : Rum ? Naughty boy : I often drink it. Traveller : How many summers hast thou ? Fifteen, give me some tobacco. Traveller : To smoke ? Naughty boy : I smoke whenever I can. Traveller : It is wrong to smoke and drink — here is a knife instead of money. Boy, confidentially to Perevodtchik : How much is it worth ? Perevodtchik : A rouble. Boy : Dost thou want more eggs } Traveller : What eggs ? Boy — imitating exactly the cry of a tern : Little ones. Traveller : Are they good to eat ? Boy — smacking his lips : Horoshohoroshd ! In an hour he was back again with a cap full of terns' and puffins' eggs, and on his knees in front of the tent. G 82 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [chap. vn. I gave him a pair of scissors, which he again submitted to the Linguist's valuation. Stoyt aneeli polbotelki f are they worth half a botelka ? Yes, said the little man impatiently : Oubiraisa! be off! I saw the boy afterwards kneeling and endeavouring to cut the long grass with the scissors. I sent for him another day, and he came to kneel as usual at the tent door, chewing a piece of grass between his replies. Traveller : Thy name ? Naughty boy : Lavrenti Petrovitch Balakin. Born ? In Kem. Been to school ? No. Read or write ? No. Go to church ? Yes, every Sunday. Why ? Boghou malitsa — To pray to God. Kak znayesh Bogha ? How knowest thou of God ? From my father and mother. Dost thou believe in a future life? Ya vierou posslai smertje shto paydou Boghou — I believe I shall go to God after death. Did he know good from bad ? Yes. His occupation ? A fisher. His pay ? Only food in return for his work. Would he live here always ? He did not know where else to go. What would he do with twenty kopecks ? Buy biscuit — no, rum. Had he smoked and drunk for long ? Yes. His food ? Bread, fish, tea. Had he seen Anglitschani before ? No. Tra- veller : What dost thou think of us ? Naughty boy : Nie shto — Nothing at all. His body was swaying curiously about as he knelt, and he began to answer at random. He was drunk already. Poor fatherless boy : no one to teach him : no one to show him a good example. Many of the Russians here were the worse for drink. They could buy rum for a shilling and fourpence a bottle, and did so only too freely. CHAP, vn.] WEATHER RECORD. 83 I dressed a fisherman's hand this day, and bequeathed a large roll of diachylon plaster to the Stanovitsche. Flesh wounds are frequent among the fishermen, from the use of hooks and knives. The weather at Seven Islands does not improve, though it changes. The wind goes to the north-west, but still brings sleet and rain. We spend the hours in the little tent, which keeps us famously warm and dry. The Arctic is a dull gray beaten up into white, and the Seven Islands stand coldly and sullenly in it. It rains and blows all through another night, and as we lie awake we hear the moaning of the winter sea. We have not seen the sun since we encamped here : but the few days spent in this dreary and forlorn spot, with gale, cold, sleet, rain, and the noise of the sea, have been among the very happiest of our lives. We cannot explain why : unless that the Doctor and I in our secret in- stincts enjoy and appreciate the primitive life of our nomad predecessors who have long since vanished from the earth. The camp will be struck on the arrival of the Arkh- angelsk. I saw but two women in the Stanovitsche : none stay, here : they must have come from the vessels. We pack, of course, I mean the Doctor packs, the fire with turf, which smoulders slowly all through the night in spite of rain or wind. In August 1 6 1 1 the weather here was tempestuous, foule, cloudie, mystie, snowy, and dismall. Some little way from our tent I found what seemed to be a Lapp burial-place. The Russian dead have been buried, probably for centuries, on Gossogorou, the 84 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [chap. vii. little island which helps to form the harbour. There the wooden crosses stand thickly. When the Lapps came to this region, it is hard to say : but that they are the original inhabitants I have little doubt. On the banks of the Yokkonga, sixty miles eastward, have been found stone knives and axe heads. We find traces of their past strewn all along this Arctic coast ; but none of a lost civilisation. I think the Lapps never had any civilisation to lose, but are very much now what they were when they used their stone implements in the forests of the Yokkonga. In form and feature the Russian Lapps vary much from those of Norway, and from the Samoyedes of Siberia in Europe, only a hundred miles distant. Their average intelligence is far greater, and their features have but little of the Mongolian type. Intermixture with the Russians may have modified the race characteristics among a large proportion, but the Lapps of pure descent are distinguished by the same energy and vivacity. I should take them, accordingly, for a race distinct from Norwegian, Lapp, or Samoyede, who much resemble each other. They seem to interrupt the links of continuous relationship extending among the Arctic tribes from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Only, their traditions and religious observances are, or have been, very similar. Possibly the paucity of reindeer, and the absence of the accompanying habits of life, may have imparted a neces- sary energy to these people : and made boatmen and fishers of them. Early one morning I was awakened by a loud voice CHAP, vn.] A LOSS. 85 and the appearance of an ugly face at the tent door. It was a boy of dirty looks, who greedily and impudently demanded twenty kopecks. Fancying he must be in want, I was about to give him money, when he thrust himself inside, and begged more rudely than before. Then I told him to go away, and at last he went. So did the Expedition's palernik, omelette pan, and all our eggs : the former perhaps borrowed to cook the latter. A Chinaman in San Francisco stole a few yards of india- rubber hose. Its proprietor dragged him all the way down the street, striking him at intervals, until quite out of breath. Then the Chinaman turned placidly round and said : What for ? You no likee lend 'um .■' One morning when I arrived at the tent, writes the secretary, Mr. Rae asked me to fry a little salmon. „ I therefore ask, If you have taken in the pan, for it was not outside. No, said Mr. Rae, the pan is outside with the eggs : you will be kind enough to look. I seek round the tept, but find nothing. A boy was suspected : I therefore went out to examine how it be, but find no boy according to the signal. I determined to open one of the Lapp graves, and taking two boys up to the spot, set them to dig. Though my hopes were raised by the appearance of layer after layer of stones, we came upon no traces of the Laplanders. While the boys were digging, my attention was attracted by a little bird which ran about the moss within a few feet of us. It was of the size of a small titlark, snipe-shaped. 86 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [chap. vii. having a black bill three-quarters of an inch long, slender black legs, black eyes, brownish head, snowy breast, faintly speckled throat, wings speckled like those of the golden plover, and tail short like a starling's. I could not hear its note. It ran quietly and seemingly uncon- cernedly about : often picking up small seeds, or approach- ing us. At last, within three yards of us, I found its nest : a simple little hollow on soft moss, with a few dry mar- oschka leaves, and containing two eggs. One was broken and much incubated, the other entire. This I brought home. The eggs were slightly over an inch long, brownish in colour, pointed at one end, and at the other covered with close brown blotches. I supposed the bird to be the little stint, not before known to breed in Russian Lapland. The bird made one or two quick little runs towards the nest whence I had taken the egg : finally snatching up one -half of the broken egg and flying off with it. Afterwards it carried off the remainder — whether to clean the nest or to save the egg from us, was not clear. I sent the &g^ to Henry Seebohm, author of that pleasant book, Siberia in Europe, who confirmed my opinion. The little stint, he says, seems a very quiet bird at the nest — quite different from Temminck's stint. When you awake a colony of the latter birds, they fly wildly round and round, crying vociferously or hovering in the air trilling. We saw none of these habits in the little stint. Its eggs can hardly be mistaken for those of Temminck's stint, but are in every respect miniature dunlin's eggs. CHAP. VII.] DEPARTURE FROM SEVEN ISLANDS. 87 The average size of the twenty eggs we obtained of the httle stint is about lyV ^ f '^^^^ — ^ ^^^^^ smaller than the eggs of Temminck's stint. The ground colour varies from pale greenish-gray to pale brown. The spots and blotches are rich brown, generally large, and sometimes confluent at the large end. It rains and blows again : our tent has withstood for several days and nights gales, rain, squalls, and snow, in turns. Not a dry or quiet hour has there been at Siem Ostrova. The wind moves from the east to the south, but does not improve the temperature. All winds are cold on this coast. The north wind comes from the polar ice : the east wind from the Kara Sea, Siberia, and the Oural : the south from the White Sea, the half-frozen lakes and the t'Andras behind us : the west from the snow- covered fjelds of Norway. In the afternoon a boy, one of my excavators, came to say that there were persons who knew where our palernik was : and that they wanted twenty-five kopecks for the information. I set out with the boy, and he drew the omelette pan from behind some rocks, a short distance from the camp. This was the only instance of theft that we have met with among the Russian peasants. It may have been only spite. In the night the Perevodtchik came running up, shouting Parahod ! steamer ! In ten minutes the tent was struck : rugs, quilts, boxes, and fifty other things were packed up : and men were carrying them down to the Expedition's gig, which lay afloat in readiness. In half- 88 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [chap vii. an-hour after the Arkhangelsk was sighted we were afloat in one boat, and the Perevodtchik and the baggage in another. The worthy Dane, Captain Braun, welcomed us and had our boat slung up on deck. We nearly had to deplore the loss of our baggage and the Perevodtchik, who persisted in hanging so closely to the Arkhangelsk's gangway ladder, that at every roll of the steamer our gig was swept under it by the swell : and thrice the gunwale was under water. We roared to him to let the boat fall astern, and eventually secured him and the baggage. We were soon off to sea, and saw the last of the friendly little Stanovitsche. It is very shameful that the poor Murmansk fisher- men should be deprived of all medical assistance. The captain told- me he feared a doctor sent here would infal- libly take to drinking. I said he might be kept on board the steamer, and travel backwards and forwards among the fishing stations. It is hand that not even an apothe- cary's assistant can be fOUnd on these thirteen hundred miles of coast between Vardo and Archangel. A poor sick or wounded fisherman, if he Would save his life, must sacrifice the bulk of the earnings which should keep his family from hunger in the winter months, and travel to the hospital in Archangel. An inspector was appointed two years since to report on the matter. After enjoying himself for a month at Tiribirka, this gentleman returned to Archangel to draw out a report, and his pay. Captain Braun sees many cruel cases of suffering here. CHAP. VII.] THE WITCHES OF THE YOKKONGA. 89 As we dined, it occurred to us that on that day a very agreeable event was taking place at the Doctor's home : and after dinner I rose, and had the happiness of making a speech in broken Russian in honour of the good friend whose wedding day it was. At breakfast time we rounded the Holy Cape, and steamed into the White Sea. At this cape lyeth a great stone, to which the Barkes that passed thereby were wont to make offerings of Butter, Meale, and other Victuals, thinking that vnlesse they did so, their Barkes or Vessels should there perish : and there it is very darke and mystie. The Lapp witches of the Yokkonga used to frequent the promontory to assist in the worship of the Paata of the Holy Cape : and they would sell a fair wind to the English sailors who traded to the White Sea. • This was a wide-spread superstition. In the Capitul- aries of Charlemagne at Aix-la-Chapelle were penalties against tempestarii, such ias raise storms and tempests : in the ancient Norwegian statutes were similar provisions. An Icelandic chronicle relates how the Bishop of Skalholt allayed a storm with holy water. Mela tells how on the lies de Sein, off the Brittany coast, lived priestesses who had the winds and tempests at their disposal. We passed Tri Ostrova at noon on a beautiful sunny day. Von Baer, the naturalist^ after his visit to Novaya Zemlia, was by thick fog driven into Tri Ostrova. Dreary and desolate as these shores had seemed on his northward journey, he was now charmed with their green slopes. A boat's crew from the Amitie, abandoned on Novaya go THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [Chap. vii. Zemlia in 1 6 ii , reached Kdnin N6s, and boldly crossed the White Sea. Hauing a good north-east wind wee set forward in the name of God, and when the sunne was north-west wee passed the point, and all that night and the next day sayled with a good wind, and all that time rowed. The next night, after ensuing, having still a good wind, in the morning about the east-north-east sunne, wee saw land on the west side of the White Sea, which wee found by the rushing of the sea vpon the land before wee saw it : and perceiving it to be full of clifts and not low sandie ground with some hills, as it is on the east side of the White Sea, we assured ourselves that we were upon the west side of the White Sea, vpon the coast of Lapland : for the which we thanked God that He had helped vs to sayle ouer the White Sea in thirtie houres. Late in the day the good captain stopped the Ark- hangelsk off Karabelni N6s, and we embarked with our effects in the family eanoe. The Perevodtchik's heart failed him when he saw our skiff afloat. We left the steamer, he writes, in a poor boat : all on board the steamer said we had too much luggage, and that we could not reach shore : but we pushed off and commenced row- ing towards the shore, which we also were happy to reach. The Perevodtchik rowed, the Doctor sat in the bow, with an umbrella hoisted as a sail, and I wielded a paddle in the stern. The wind rose and began to blow very stiffly, and the boat to leak freely : but we came in this way into still water behind a reef of rocks, and so into the mouth of the Ponoi river. CHAP, viii.] CASTAWAYS. 91 CHAPTER VIII. The Ponoi river— A lonely grave— A reinforcement — Lachta— The great river — Hyperborean manners— Voyage on the Ponoi— The river's banks- Mutiny — Birds— A late meal— First cataract— An indenture— Ponoi in the winter— Vaccination— Farewell to Ponoi— Yokkonga— Lachta— The last of the Ponoi. The coast consisted of undulating tableland or tAndra, with patches of snow, rising from the sea a hundred feet or more. We were on the extremity of Karabelni N6s, and saw before us a majestic stream, a mile and a quarter in width. Granite cliffs rose abruptly from the water's edge to a considerable height : and between them the great stream of the Ponoi, reinforced by the ebb-tide, was pouring down at the rate of four miles an hour. Accord- ingly, we rounded a reef of rocks and drew the boat up. The Arkhangelsk had disappeared on the horizon, and we were outcasts on a strange shore. Seeing some human beings on the cliff, the Linguist and I hastened towards them to ask for rowers. As we approached they retired, and finally we had to run over the tilndra to come up with them. They were three boys, who seemed to come from nowhere and to know nothing : so we returned to the boat. On the cliff stood a few 92 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [chap. viii. wooden crosses : beside them a lonely grave. Some poor mariner cast up by the sea, sleeping where the Ponoi rolls past, the winds always blow, and the snow always lies. We gathered some driftwood, found a cleft in the rocks to shelter us and the fire : then made ourselves as comfortable as we could, intending to await the flood-tide. Here we were, on the dreary Terski coast, stranded be- tween the White Sea and the ebbing river, with only the fire and our provisions to cheer us. While in the middle of a comfortable meal, we sighted a boat making for the sea, borne fast by tide, stream, and wind. We sent the Perevodtchik to make violent signals with an open umbrella : and at last, attracted by our boat, fire, and umbrella, the stranger came sailing straight to Karabelni N6s where we were. A handsome young Russian and a boy were on their way out to the salmon fishery, which extends from the river's mouth some miles to the north and south of it. The salmon, travelling from river to river, keep of course to the coast, and here the Ponoi fishers snare them. The young Russian agreed to await slack water and help us as far as Lachta, a navolok three miles, or more, up the stream. After some hours we set forth, towing, poling, rowing — with much difficulty and little progress. Three hours later we found ourselves aground on a stony bank in the middle of the river, half- a- mile from either side. The Doctor and I, wearing fishing-boots reaching to our hips, attempted to walk on shore. Within a hundred yards of the right bank we found the water CHAP, vin.] LACHTA. 93 deepen : a false step would have taken us into a violent current and deep water. It seemed absurd, in the lonely- night, to be walking about in the Ponoi river, far from our boat, with the tide very near the turn. Signalling for the boat, we got across, and walked to a bay on the river, where we found the huts of Lachta, and numerous boats on the sands. Every human being came out of bed to stare at us. We looked into the huts : they were uninhabitable — swarming with human beings, sleeping like cattle to- gether. It was impossible to spend the night here, and only with difficulty we found a boatman to take us to Ponoi. We told him that if he would only get ready quickly, we would make him a present of our boat. We left our pleasant young Russian roubles enough to make his face light up, and set out for Ponoi, sheltered from the piercing cold of the night by quilts and rugs. We saw a merlin, then a golden eagle : and on an over- hanging cliff the nest of a kany4k, or sparrow-hawk. We were many hours in the boat, and left it, with the double object of lightening it and warming our- selves. The banks were fringed with towering ice-blocks and boulders : the great cliff sloped, wall-like, almost per- pendicularly behind them. It was impossible to walk on or beneath the ice: and we scaled the cliff, only with exhaust- ing efforts, and found ourselves on the wide lonely tundra. So lonely it was, that even the lonely river seemed more genial. No bird, or animal, or human being could we see : and it seemed as if the Doctor and I were the last 94 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. chap. viii. creatures in a deserted world. From the upper edge of the cliff projected frozen snow, like eaves, which only- waited for a confiding and inquisitive traveller, to crash down into the river. At times we crossed ravines upon a hollow snow -crust, under which we could hear running water. We saw our boat below — an atom floating on the broad stream. A few hundred yards away from this great sunken river one would not know of its existence. It was the grandest river I had seen. We seemed reduced to the importance of insects. At last we found a zigzag sheep -track, and, beneath us, the rough gray roofs of Ponoi village. Ponoi lies on a platform left when the original con- vulsion split the tAndra, and the two great cliffs formed and fell apart. On the grassy bank stood a few dozen unpainted wooden log houses and huts, and two churches with green cupolas and belfries. The boat, with the Perevodtchik and other luxuries, had just reached the bank, where logs of timber and a few boats were lying. We walked, on a rough planked way, to a large new wooden building : the house of the merchant Sabotchakoff. This gentleman, like Savin on the Arctic and Karelian coasts, sells to the fishermen and Lapps, at enormous prices, stores and necessaries. We were taken into a small close room, with a stove and double windows : where we found our host's nephew, a hard-faced individual, with a loud voice. He was a gentleman with a simplicity of manners amounting to the grossest rudeness, hurling rough and impertinent o o w CHAP. VIII.] LES MOEURS. 95 questions at us, like the wolf who insisted upon picking a quarrel with the lamb. As this wretched human being's house was necessary to us, we determined to wear him out by innocent candour. Host, roaring as though he took us to be deaf : Where do you come from ? Traveller : From Lachta. How did you get to Lachta ? By boat. Host, irritably : Of course : but from where ? From Karabelni N6s. Host : From where, before that ? and so on for half-an- hour. Host : Where are you going to ? Traveller : Up the Ponoi. Host : You can't. Traveller : Oh. Host : There are rapids. Traveller, getting tired : Don't un- derstand. Host : Waterfalls. Traveller : How much does that cost ? Host, in a voice like a cataract : I said waterfalls ! Traveller : How many people are there in Ponoi ? Host, keeping to the point : Why are you going up the Ponoi ? Traveller : Who told you that ? Host : Why do you want to go up the Ponoi ? Traveller : I don't understand. Host, brutally : You do understand. Traveller, pleasantly : Can we have some milk ? Host, be- side himself : What the Sataoui do you want on this river ? Traveller, beginning to unpack : We have plenty of biscuit. I thought we should never get rid of this inquisi- tive boor : but we fairly wore him out, and he went away cursing our stupidity. He seemed to fear we had come to prospect for timber and minerals, or to compete with him in plundering the poor fishermen. Mercifully, he was called away for a week : and we never saw, nor hope to see, him again. 96 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [chap. viii. We spent an entire day in Ponoi, endeavouring by direct, and indirect or corrupt means, to engage a crew to explore the river with us. None had ascended the river, and, like the unknown elsewhere, it was taken to be terrible. Once get an idea of danger into these Russian peasants' heads, and you cannot get it out if you cut them in pieces. An active obliging man, promising fairly in the morning, and undertaking to collect a crew, comes in the afternoon very drunk on prospective credit of our pay. I went from hut to hut negotiating for boatmen, and incidentally amassing old silver crosses. At length importunity and subsidy secured us a crew. One lovely summer evening we embarked, in two boats, having abandoned the secretary and much of our baggage, with detailed instructions for their return to Norway in the event of our failing to reappear after a given number of days. We pushed out on to the broad stream : and after paddling for a short way, the ascent had to be made by towing. We are sitting side by side in a frail skiff, warmly covered up : one handsome young boatman is staggering at the tow-rope, over huge stones, and under ice and boulders : another is poling in the stern of the boat. Our baggage is in a second boat far astern. It is midnight. The soft northern sunlight lingers on the top of the great purple cliffs which close in the river. Rosy flame dwells upon the snow. The banks are lined, above the boulders, with ice — huge uncouth masses twenty feet high — heaped on either bank when the winter ice broke up. The great CHAP, viii.] ON THE PONOI RIVER. 97 stream is in half shade, but glances in reflection of the light above. Three or four hundred feet, steep as Dover cliffs, tower the great banks on either side of us. The stream is over a thousand yards broad. Two lazy Lapps propel our second lodka : and we wait at intervals for them. One Lapp is drunk : but as we forbade vodka in either boat, he will improve. The current is strong, and we progress but slowly. The Doctor thinks — or, what is equivalent, smokes : while I scribble. We are afloat on the mighty Ponoi, the mysterious river, almost uninhabited, and unknown. The Lapps who in winter time frequent its banks abandon it in the summer : and from Ponoi to Kamensky there lives scarcely a human being. The fishing seasons are uncertain, and the yields precarious : so the few Lapps of Kamensky alone inhabit in summer the Upper Ponoi. The river freezes, of course, completely over, and the ice extends far out into the White Sea. The ice above will be fatal to our chance of ascent : leaving no foothold between it and the strong current, for towing. We have brought one musical box with us which plays, ' Way down upon the Ponoi River. This cheers us, and reminds us of the family plantations and of the old folks at home. Salmon leap constantly near the boat — small fish of perhaps three pounds' weight. We went on for some hours. At one halting-place I asked how many days' bread they had. One loaf each. SMshetye niviertsi ! But listen, you idolaters ! I cried : I told you we were going for many days. How far can H 98 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [chap. viii. you go with a loaf each ? Two days' journey. Can you get any on the river ? No. How far can we go in two days ? Yevsie Feddoroff Matrokin : To the cataract. Traveller : And what will you do beyond the cataract ? Erasim Filippoff Andreanoff : Nothing. Traveller: How do you mean ? Artimon Kapidonoff Gubuntzov : We are not going beyond the cataract — the boat can't go. Tra' veller : We can drag the boat overland. Vassili Pimitrieff Kariloff: Spassibogh ! Thanks — forty men might do it. Traveller : How many hours from here to the cataract ? : Artimon Kapidonoff Gubuntzov, Yevsie Feddoroff Matrokin, Vassili Dimitrieff Kariloff, and Erasim Filippoff Andreanoff, together : Nine hours. Traveller : Mnyeh ! Truly there is much that is mysterious about the Ponoi. We would have given these sulky, stupid boatmen in a few days more than they would have earned all summer through. We don't like sulky, discontented people about us : they oppress our freedom of thought. Under the circumstances, I sent one boat back to Ponoi, with sealed directions in Norwegian for the Perevodtchik. This morning at four o'clock, writes the zealous little man — to whom, to do him justice, day and night were alike : two men came back with the luggage and letter from Mr. Rae, saying that I should procure men and a boat to take us to Kouzomen : could I not get here, then I ought to go to Lakta. I immediately departed from Ponoi in order to hire a boat. Only a day before, a post-boat sailed from Ponoi for Kouzomen. Sometimes one does not go for two or three CHAP, viii.] A CONTRAST. 99 months. The men said one would go again soon. But the Russian soon is not sudden enough for us. These boatmen devoured their black bread without a spasm of conscience : crossing themselves before tasting it : like a Russian in the cathedral at Moscow, who was seen crossing himself devoutly with one hand and picking his neighbour's pocket with the other. The remaining boatmen chatted pleasantly with us. Six months ago they paid for bread a shilling and ninepence a poud — 40 lbs. Now they paid half-a-crown. Within eighteen months Russia was for the first time in her history importing wheat : and bread cost in St. Petersburg itself over four shillings ^. poud. In Ponoi no meat or fish, tea or sugar, can be bought : only salt-fish, salt reindeer-flesh, and vodka. We saw a nest of a kanyM, sparrowhawk, round which the parent birds were curiously swooping, attended by a small bird. Then we came upon a rough-legged buzzard teased by two ravens, who were hoarsely threaten- ing him. Then a solitary black crow went down the river on some matter of business, and strings of geese flew overhead. Salmon leapt more frequently. Above us, on the brink of the cliff, was a ledge of snow, pure white against the sky, ready to fall into the river on the first warm day. Huge blocks of ice lined the shore, blue and white, or brown with sand. A few versts higher, the river winds, so that we might be in a land- locked Norway fiord. Stopping for supper, we shared our chocolate with the men, who pressed upon us in return some excellent black bread. We went on shore, and 100 THE WHITE SEA PENINSULA. [chap, viii- I found the Ranunculus ' Lapponicus and the cinquefoil. Artimon Kapidonoff returned with a handful of wild onions. As in the Tfiloma, we found gold-like glittering particles of mica in the sand. We heard the cuckoo con- stantly here and on the T