258 A SUMMER ON THE YENESEI 



case, we had to make all preparations for an early 

 departure, for on 25tli August the river steamers — 

 Oryol, Turukhansk, and Lena — were expected to arrive, 

 and we must be ready to leave for the south. There was 

 plenty to be done. Specimens must be packed up, 

 stores must be examined, and good-byes said. 



And we were not the only people in Golchika who 

 were making ready for an autumn flitting. One by 

 one the cliooms disappeared from the other side of the 

 river. Almost every evening we could see against the 

 sky the tangle of reindeer horns which told that the 

 sledges were coming in from the tundra. It was quite 

 sad to walk along the river-bank and see the blackened 

 patches, now strewn with rubbish, which showed where 

 a choom had once stood, and no longer meet the kindly 

 brown faces which used to peer round the doorways 

 and wish us " Good-day" as we passed. 



On the 25th of August three of the remaining chooms 

 were moved across the river, and pitched just above the 

 house of Prokopchuk. Towards evening I was stroll- 

 ing up the valley, when far away I heard the strange 

 long cries with which the natives urge their reindeer. 

 Presently, across the marshes, came a score of sledges. 

 The drivers dismounted on the opposite bank and turned 

 the deer into the water. At first the leaders were 

 reluctant, but one of the natives launched a canoe and 

 headed them out into the stream. The rest followed 

 docilely enough, and soon the whole herd of perhaps a 

 hundred and twenty deer were grunting and splashing 

 their way across the river. I thought that there was 

 something familiar about the man who paddled his little 



