Across the Roof of the World. 



speed. They are hardy people, these dwellers of the steppes, 

 inured to all the rigours of tlie Siberian winter and capable 

 of undergoing much hardshij). Often during the niglit I would 

 look round the side of the leather apron covering the front 

 of the sledge to note the pace we were going; there sat the 

 driver on the cross-board which does duty as a seat, muffled up 

 in innumerable sheep-skins, a huge round figure having the 

 appearance of a gigantic barrel. Now and again he would 

 brandish his long whip and the team would dash on in a mad 

 gallop to tlic next post-house ; there they would be unharnessed, 

 their coats a mass of icicles from the perspiration, fresh horses 

 being put in for us to continue those exciting and breakneck 

 drives which sledge driving in Siberia alone can give. 



On the morning of the 13th I reached the village of Vidrika, 

 the Chief of Police meeting me at the post-house, in accordance 

 with instructions received from the Governor of Tomsk, through 

 whose district I was now passing. 



For the last stage into Zaminagorsk, a fair-sized town, I had 

 a drunken yemshik on the box, and the way he handled the 

 team, taking me over the plain at racing speed, was worthy of 

 the chariot days of Rome. 



Just before reaching the town there was a long descent to 

 make which we took at full speed, the yemshik yelling and 

 flourishing his whip, the while I was busy preparing for the upset 

 which seemed inevitable. But nothing happened and we reached 

 the bottom of the hill in safety and bowled on into Zaminagorsk, 

 where I gave the ^^emshik a more than usually large tip, whereat 

 he saluted me with much deference and promptly went off to 

 invest it in the local saloon. 



Beyond Zaminagorsk the country is undulating, and it 

 becomes more thickly populated, villages occurring at every fifteen 

 or twenty versts. Wlien passing through a village a Siberian 

 yemshik always does so at a pace calculated to maintain his reputa- 

 tion as a liandlcr of the ribbons of a high order, and the sledge, 

 bumi)ing in and out of ruts and depressions in the street, almost 



420 



