264 TRAVELS OF A NATURALIST 



Under the bench H are parcels of kiggage not in present 

 use ; upon it are our portmanteaus, etc. 



Nails are round the walls for clothes, etc. 



Over the end windows is a board for birds. 



At present we spend our days much as follows : — We 

 breakfast about seven a.m. Eig up our hammocks for 

 our morning pipe. Write journals, letters, or go out 

 shooting, or receive visitors and show our guns and 

 curios — or visit the Ispravnik or others. 



We lunch at 12 or 1 p.m. 



Piottuch skins birds in the outer room, where we also 

 take our meals. 



Dinner at irregular times. 



At ten or eleven we sling our hammocks or turn in on 

 the floor in our respective corners. 



To-day we wrote letters, journals, etc., and strolled 

 about the town, shooting Tree Sparrows. There was 

 high wind and snow, but it was not very cold. 



We saw numbers of Samoyedes and their Keindeer in 

 town, and examined their sledge harness — Eeindeer reins, 

 bone fixings neatly carved, brass (Russian or English 

 made?) swivels, leather girths, etc. We hope to bring 

 home a set of the harness, as the bone parts are neatly 

 though rudely cut. 



We saw a party of Samoyedes and Russians, old and 

 young, playing a kind of ' tig-in-the-ring.' A number 

 hold the rope in a circle, and one in the centre tries 

 to ' tig ' those outside. Much laughter was going on. 



The taste for ornamentation amongst the Russian 

 peasantry seems to be very general, as most of the 

 houses, and all those of the richer peasantry, have the 

 staircase or porch end of the side and centre beams of the 

 roof rudely, but not ineffectively, carved or fretted. Some 

 of the patterns are rather pretty, but for the most part no 

 great ingenuity is displayed by the artist. Here is one 



