236 A SHOOTING TRIP TO KAMCHATKA 



report that water was high and the current extremely 

 strong, involving the risk of drowning our ponies. 

 To my disgust steady rain continued all day, and we 

 decided, in consequence, to proceed on the morrow 

 up another nullah, that of the Paratunka, where no 

 crossing was needed, but where the ground was not so 

 favourable for game. 



In the evening, as I sat pondering over my mis- 

 fortunes, a native brought me a magnificent pair of 

 caribou antlers, which I taped and found to measure 

 over sixty inches. This reindeer had been killed 

 by him last spring in the immediate vicinity of the 

 village. He also showed me a huge bear- skin, of 

 a light yellow colour, with a darker line down the 

 back ; the head itself was absolutely white. Pie 

 asked fifty roubles for it, saying that one seldom 

 met with such a specimen, and that he had tracked 

 the animal over a fortnight before securing him on 

 the spurs of the Velutcha. I thought he rather over- 

 estimated the value of the skin, and refused to give 

 him such a high price, whereupon he said I could 

 take it for nothing ; this I likewise declined to do. 

 Later I forgot all about it, and greatly regretted not 

 having bought such an uncommon variety of a Kam- 

 chatkan bear. Before dinner I took an invigorating 

 hot bath in Nikolai's premises, and noticed, to my 



