210 IN CAMP AT DVOINIK 



sighted a brig under full sail. We hoisted a rendezvous 

 flag, and went on board. Though flying Danish colours, 

 we found she was an English vessel the I no, from 

 Newhaven. The captain told us he had been some days 

 trying to get into the Petchora, but he was unable to 

 reach it by steering between islands Nos. 3 and 4, owing 

 to the ice, and had come round the east passage between 

 islands 7 and 8 and Varandai. This ice accounted 

 for the extraordinarily cold weather we had been having 

 since the previous Sunday. 



About four we landed at Dvoinik, and took possession 

 of a stranded vessel that was lying high and dry upon 

 the beach. It was settled that the company's steamer 

 should call for us on the following Tuesday, Wednesday, 

 or Thursday, according to the final arrangements for the 

 starting of our schooner, the Triad, in which we were to 

 make part of our homeward passage. Meanwhile we were 

 to live at Dvoinik, in regular Robinson Crusoe fashion. 

 The deserted vessel looked very comfortable, and we 

 anticipated a jolly time. 



Leaving the men to sweep up the hold, we started 

 off in high glee for a raid upon the Little stints. We 

 hastened over the tundra, making for the marshy ground 

 upon which I had seen the dunlins, but not one was 

 there. Possibly, we thought, the young could fly by this 

 time, and had joined their parents on their favourite 

 feeding-ground. On the brackish lake close by we shot 

 a brood of long-tailed ducks, and afterwards found an 

 empty nest in the short, coarse grass, placed exactly at 

 high-tide water-mark. It contained down enough to 

 identify the species. There was no cover to the nest, 

 except a margin of thin turf, that looked as if it had been 

 turned up by a spade. On the lake there were, as before, 

 a coaple of black-throated divers. I waited for a short 



