TO THE HOLY HILLS 345 



and then, turning round, looked me straight in the face 

 for quite a while, and then in a hoarse cracked voice, 

 like some old crow, said twice over and very slowly, 

 ' England, impossible ! England far away ; far, far away.' 

 (Aknglia nailzah ! ne mozhnah. Ahnglia dalyoko, otcken, 

 otchen dalyoko), and then relapsed into silence. 



There was some touch in this man's face that told one 

 at once that he was not all there. He was, in fact, a bit 

 soft. An excellent workman, a recognised authority on 

 many matters (they all accepted him as the weather- 

 prophet), he was one of those curious twisted phenomena 

 one sometimes comes across, where cunning is combined 

 with warped wits. He was a natural, and a very uncanny 

 one at that, with a curious influence over all the Samoyeds. 

 I think even the Russians in their hearts feared this 

 strange creature, for they were always most careful not 

 to round counter to him in any way. 



September %th. — ' NE. Bitter cold. Snow. Gale 

 again. Young Uano— " Uano droogoy," as he calls him- 

 self, who sat long in tears in my hut yesterday saying his 

 Russian was dead, drowned, and he himself was broken 

 — rushed in this morning in great excitement, seized my 

 hand and cried, " My Russian here, my Russian ! my 

 Russian ! ' as if he could not say it often enough. So 

 that, what between his tears and laughter, for he was 

 quite hysterical, I had all my work cut out to humour 

 him and get him gone. But his Russian, Alexis, did not 



