CHAPTER XL. 



GOLCHIKA. 



Golchika Blowing Eggs Drift-wood on the Swamp The Little Stint 

 Rock Ptarmigan I secure a Passage to Yeneseisk Fighting over the 

 Ibis Button's Skuas Shell-Mounds The Captains come to Terms 

 Sandbanks at the Mouth of the Golchika Farewell to the Tundra. 



THE village of Golchika is on an island between the two 

 mouths of the river of the same name ; across both these 

 arms stretches a swamp, and beyond the swamps rise 

 the steep banks of the tundra. In summer Golchika is a 

 busy place ; all the processes of catching, salting, and 

 storing fish go on during a long day of twenty-four hours. 

 The sun having ceased to rise and set, the ordinary 

 divisions of time are ignored. If you ask a man what 

 time it is, he will most probably tell you he has not the 

 slightest idea. Order seems for the nonce forgotten, and 

 people sleep and eat when inclination bids them. 



Immediately after casting anchor, we took one of 

 the boats and paid visits of ceremony to the Russian 

 steamers. Boiling and I had arranged to spend the 



