Across the Roof of the World. 



specially favourable stretch, and pushing onward over the immense 

 steppes which had long since begun to pall in the monotony of 

 their desolation. On the morning of the i6th we entered 

 an extensive forest country of fir and pine, sombre and forbidding 

 in their coats of snow and frost. 



Northward of Barnaul there is a continual succession of 

 verst posts which mark the distances between towns and villages, 

 tall poles painted black and white, and as we glided past at 

 intervals I experienced a feeling of inward satisfaction at the 

 rapid approach to the railway. 



My story is now drawing to a close. In the late afternoon of 

 February i6th I reached a small village, where, after an 

 hour's halt, I started out on the final stage which was to bring 

 me to the Siberian Railway, and the end of the trans-Asiatic 

 journey. 



From this point the winter road follows the Ob River, and 

 less than an hour's run revealed the lights of Novo Nicholaevsk. 

 Those twinkling lights in the distance were full of significance, 

 for they denoted the end of a long trek, of the close of 

 nearly a year's wanderings across the great Asiatic continent, a 

 journey to accomplish which many and varied forms of 

 transport had been utilised — "tongas," boats, coolies, ponies, 

 yaks, camels, oxen, mapas, Chinese carts, and sledges. The 

 long land journey of 3,500 miles was nearing its conclusion — the 

 great trek was drawing to a close. 



Those lights, too, now momentarily becoming more distinct 

 as we ghded swiftly onward over the silent steppe, brought 

 home to me the fact that I was approaching the Trans-Siberian 

 Railway, that greatest of modem engineering wonders. 



Further on we crossed to the left bank of the river, passing 

 the fine railway bridge which here spans it and over which runs 

 the line from Moscow to Vladivostok. The construction of 

 this great railway, initiated by Czar Alexander III and con- 

 structed at a cost of one hundred millions sterling, was a task 

 involving big engineering problems by reason of the immense 



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