12 A SHOOTING TRIP TO KAMCHATKA 



Tchuktchis in a drawn battle. Khartchin and Gon- 

 gotch, the two Kamchadale leaders, decided in concert 

 to exterminate every Russian in the country, and to- 

 invade the valley of the Kamchatka River. A suc- 

 cessful assault was made on the fort of Nijni-Kam- 

 chatsk, which was rased to the ground ; neither women, 

 nor children were spared. Fortunately for the invaders, 

 a Russian schooner, the Gabriel, sent from Okhotsk 

 to the relief of Pavlutzki, had been delayed off the 

 coast by unfavourable winds, and lay at anchor at 

 the mouth of the Kamchatka River. When news 

 of the native uprising reached the Gabriel, the journey 

 to Anadyr was put off, and men were landed with guns 

 to the relief of the settlement. The fort was stormed, 

 and the chiefs of the rebellion were sentenced to- 

 death ; other tavoiis met with a similar fate. The 

 Cossacks spent the remaining part of the year in 

 quelling the insurrection, and wholesale massacres, 

 took place. The combat ended, as the French say, 

 owing to want of combatants. Had it not been for 

 unsettled weather, the Kamchadales would have pro- 

 bably regained their independence, many a life would 

 have been sacrificed in vain, and years would have 

 elapsed before the peninsula found itself again under 

 Russian rule. Such are the laws of the Universe — 

 a mere chance, an imforeseen event, an atom has its- 



