250 SIBERIA AND SEA-TRADE 



wind might enable him to ascend the Ob against the 

 strong current ; but the weather proving tempestuous and 

 the wind contrary, he abandoned the attempt, and ran 

 for the Yenesei. He commenced the ascent of this river 

 on the 23rd of September, and after a tedious voyage, 

 struggling against contrary winds and shallow water, he 

 finally laid his vessel up on the Arctic Circle, half a mile 

 up the Kureika and 1 200 miles from the mouth of the 

 Yenesei, on the i7th of October. The following morning 

 the ship wa^ frozen up in winter quarters. A room in a 

 peasant's house on the banks of the river, looking down 

 on to the ship, was rigged up for the crew, and as soon 

 as the ice on the river was thick enough to make sledging 

 safe, Captain Wiggins returned to England by the over- 

 land route. 



Hearing that Captain Wiggins was in England, and 

 likely to rejoin his ship, with the intention of returning 

 in her to Europe through the Kara Sea, I lost no time in 

 putting myself in communication with him. I was 

 anxious to carry our ornithological and ethnological 

 researches a step further to the eastward, so as to join on 

 with those of Middendorff. Schrenck, and Radde in East 

 Siberia. I made the acquaintance of Captain Wiggins 

 on the 23rd of February, and came to the conclusion 

 that an opportunity of travelling with a gentleman who 

 had already made the journey, and consequently ''knew the 

 ropes," might never occur again. Captain Wiggins told me 

 that it was his intention to start from London on the return 

 journey in three days. I finally arranged with him to give 

 me five days to make the necessary preparations for accom- 

 panying him. I wrote to Count Schouvaloff, who had 

 given Harvie-Brown and myself excellent letters of intro- 

 duction on our Petchora journey, asking him to be kind 

 enough to send to my rooms in London similar letters for 



