The Journal of a Sporting Nomad 



wet blotting-paper than any other simile I can 

 suggest. 



It seems these people had never tried a cold 

 water plunge after the bath before I showed 

 them how to manage it. On this occasion the hut 

 was built all by itself at a spot where the Kenai 

 River issues from the lake. The Indians were in 

 the habit of having a hot bath when they paid 

 their rare visits to this district. I pitched my 

 camp alongside after my six days' hard work 

 ascending this river, and as my Indians had 

 heated the house preparatory to having a bath 

 themselves, I decided to go first. The experience 

 was similar to that already described, except that 

 on emerging I at once ran down and plunged into 

 the icy cold river. The boys thought I had gone 

 mad, I think, for their faces were a study ; but I 

 persuaded Elia and Shanghai, two of the three 

 boys I then had with me, to experience the plunge. 

 Probably it has now caught on and become 

 a practice, due, I flatter myself, to my initiative. 

 In any case it was an innovation that would do 

 them more good than harm, for after emerging from 

 such a furnace the probabilities were they stood 

 about in the cold and caught dangerous chills. 



The end to our waiting on " Prasnic " at length 

 arrived, and so did a Russian bishop of sorts, 

 whose diocese must embrace many hundreds of 

 miles of coast-line. He arrived in a boat and was 

 received by our padre. All the Indians who 



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