56 THE SAMOYEDES 



principally islands. It was so good that we accomplished 

 the distance in four hours, stopping for half an hour mid- 

 way to feed the horses. We scarcely saw a bird on the 

 whole journey. 



Habariki is a poor little village, without a church, 

 and containing not more than a dozen houses. The 

 sandy banks of the river are about fifty feet higher than 

 the level on which it is built, and keep it out of the reach 

 of the floods that come with the thaw. The village was 

 admirably adapted for the winter quarters of Sideroff's 

 steamer, which lay below the bend in a little creek 

 running back out of the Petchora, protected there from 

 danger of being smashed to pieces by the blocks of ice 

 that crash down on the breaking up of the river. 



After a good lunch we hired two sledges and started 

 in search of the Samoyedes with Captain Engel and a 

 Russian, the engineer of the steamer. We had ascer- 

 tained that there were some chooms about four versts off, 

 but just as we arrived at the place we found everything 

 ready for a move northward. The chooms were taken 

 down and packed on sledges, and the reindeer, to the 

 number of about 500, were collected together ; and before 

 we had been there ten minutes the order to march was 

 given. We were informed that they were not going far 

 that afternoon, and would probably erect their chooms in 

 the course of the evening within a verst of Habariki, but 

 that before doing so they were going to take out fifty of 

 the reindeer which belonged to a Russian. We were 

 anxious to see the operation of lassoing, and drove with 

 the Samoyedes in our sledges to the place selected for 

 the purpose. As soon as we left the road our horses 

 stuck fast with the snow up to their traces, and we were 

 glad to give up our almost ineffectual struggle to get 

 along on foot, and seat ourselves on one of the reindeer 



