EXPORTS BY ARCHANGEL AND THE WHITE SEA. 129 



serve them for a launch, by means of which they can 

 easily paddle to the bank. 



' Like the rafts, the praams take on board a great many 

 pilgrims from the upper country ; giving them a free pas- 

 sage down, with a supply of tea and black bread as rations, 

 in return for their labour at the paddle and the oar. Not 

 much labour is required, for the praam floats down with 

 the stream. Arrived at Solaubola, she empties her cargo 

 of oats into the foreign ships (most of them bound for the 

 Forth', the Tyne, and the Thames) ; and then she is 

 moored to the bank, cut up, and sold. Some of her logs 

 may be used again for building sheds, the rest is of little 

 use except for the kitchen and the stove.' 



1 Like all great rivers,' says Mr Dixon, ' the Dwina has 

 thrown up a delta of isles and islets near her mouth, 

 through which she pours her flood into the sea by a dozen 

 arms. None of these dozen arms can now be laid down as 

 her main entrance ; for the river is more capricious than 

 the sea ; so that a skipper who leaves her by one outlet in 

 August, may have to enter by another when he comes back 

 to her in June.' 



Interesting, amusing, and saddening narratives are 

 given relative to the arm by which he entered the river, 

 some of them illustrative of the difficulties of dealing with 

 provincial authorities in Russia, both in relation to trade 

 and to matters of perhaps more importance ; and he goes 

 on to say : 



' In catching a first glimpse of the city of Archangel, 

 you are struck by the forest of domes and spires ; the 

 domes all colour and the spires all gold. . . . On 

 feeling for the river-side a captain finds no quay, no dock, 

 no landing-pier, no stair. He brings to as he can, and 

 drags his boat into position with a pole 



Archangel is not a port and city in the sense in which 

 Hamburg and Hull are ports and cities, with clusters of 

 docks and sheds, with shops and waggons and a busy 

 private trade. Archangel is a camp of shanties, heaped 



K 



