206 SIBERIA IN EUROPE. chap. xvii. 



as well as with some taken later from the breast of a female 

 scaup. This convinced us that the eggs now brought in 

 were those of the scaup. The next take was a long-tailed 

 duck's nest, with five eggs, Then a man came in bringing 

 us four small nests of malenhya peteetza (small birds), a sedge- 

 warbler's, a red-throated pipit's and two willow- warblers'. 



The men who had collected these spoils for us were in the 

 employment of the Company, to whom belong the steamers, 

 the yacht or cutter, everything upon the island of Alexi- 

 evka, and even the island itself. The Company derives 

 a large and profitable trade in timber, which is shipped 

 principally to Cronstadt for the Eussian Government. 

 Whether the company be Mr. Sideroff or Mr. Iconikoff, 

 or both, or neither, remains one of those commercial secrets 

 so common in Russia, and which nobody can ever get at 

 the bottom of. These employes in Alexievka were all 

 Zyriani from Ishma, a race of people said to be of Finnish 

 origin. Some were reported to be very rich, the proprietors 

 of large herds of reindeer. Like the people of Ust-Zylma, 

 they are peasants, but were described to us as being more 

 luxurious in their living and in the furniture of their houses. 

 They were also said not to get drunk so often as the Ust- 

 Zylma folk, but when inebriated, not to be good-natured 

 and obtrusively affectionate as these are prone to be, but 

 quarrelsome and given to fighting. They have the reputa- 

 tion of being better workmen, and certainly beat the Ust- 

 Zylmians hollow at bird-nesting. In feature or size the 

 two do not differ much ; perhaps the Zyrians' eyes are more 

 sunken and their cheekbones a little more prominent; 



