8o A SHOOTING TRIP TO KAMCHATKA 



no time devour the offal, only resuming their journey 

 when the last morsel has been licked up. In such 

 cases the driver is helpless. It frequently occurs that 

 two teams meet, and if one of them is not turned well 

 aside beforehand, the dogs will rush at each other in 

 wild confusion, and a general luclt^c takes place ; they 

 all get entangled in the harness, one on the top of the 

 other, the drivers' efforts to separate them being of no 

 avail, and the scrimmage generally ends in bloodshed. 

 A good team of dogs is worth over 200 roubles 

 {^20), and, if well managed, can easily do 100 versts 

 (70 miles) in twenty-four hours. 



Our other companion, a Yakout tradesman, who 

 had settled down in Kamchatka, on being questioned 

 as to the interior of the country, informed us that 

 we should be able to find six or eight ponies at 

 Petropavlovsk, and that there was but one possible 

 route, leading to the valley of the Kamchatka River, 

 and following the whole length of the peninsula in 

 a northerly direction down to Nijni-Kamchatsk. He 

 said there were several small settlements by the 

 rivers, inhabited by Kamchadale fishermen, and that 

 the largest village was Milkovo, where he had taken 

 up his abode. He invited us to stay at his house, 

 saying that he had heard of the existence of wild 

 sheep on the higher range of Ganal as well as further 



