OUR COLLECTORS 171 



be expected they should be. They had now reached the 

 last day of a four weeks' fast, during which they were 

 supposed to eat nothing but bread and water, with fish if 

 they could get it. During the period of probation it was 

 intensely ludicrous to watch the expression on our steers- 

 man's face when he held up as many fingers as there still 

 remained days of fasting to be gone through, opening his 

 mouth wide the while, then grinning all over as he said, 

 " Moi skaffum." " Skaffum " is pigeon- English for " eat," 

 derived, we were told, from the Swedish (skaffa, to 

 provide).* This fellow's name was Feodor ; he was a 

 good-natured simpleton, indescribably lazy and always 

 thinking of his stomach we had nicknamed him " Moi 

 skaffum." Gavriel, our other Russian, was not very 

 much sharper, but was by no means lazy when directed 

 in his work, though he had not the sense to discover for 

 himself what wanted doing. Our half-bred Samoyede, 

 also called Feodor, Malenki Feodor we dubbed him 

 was a sharp, active lad, always finding out something to 

 do ; with a little training, indeed, he would have made an 

 excellent servant. He learnt while with us to skin birds 

 well, and was by this time a fair nester. Simeon, our 

 thorough-bred Samoyede, was a philosopher stolid, 

 phlegmatic, and a good worker. He was our birds'-nester 

 par excellence. He knew the tundra well and the birds 

 upon it ; for three years he had lived in Varandai, and in 

 his palmier days had reindeer of his own. Nothing 

 moved Simeon ; success did not elate him, nor failure 

 depress him. He would take the extra rouble we always 

 gave him when he brought us a rare bird's nest as a 

 matter of course, without a "thank you." And when, as 

 we witnessed once, he steadied the boat for a drunken 



* The universal skoff ( "food" and " to eat ") of the British sailor seems a 

 more probable derivation. ED. 



