﻿Pro/! Milne — Across Europe and Asia. 513 



roads between these gentle slopes, we had before us a view of two 

 very remarkable-looking peaks, which were in shape like Egyptian 

 pyramids. These, however, by the time we had reached Krasno- 

 jarsk, which was early in the afternoon, had so changed in their 

 appearance that they were only like towering ragged rocks. Near 

 the entrance to the town I saw upon my right a scarp of reddish 

 rocks. 



Instead of doing as I ought to have done, and gone for a 

 scramble among the surrounding hills, I joined my friends in 

 accepting an invitation to sup at the house of the military 

 governor. Here the effects of four days' and four nights' continuous 

 jolting very naturally resulted in my falling asleep in the drawing- 

 room of my host. Before midday next morning we were again 

 upon the move. The River Yenesei, which we crossed just outside 

 the town, is both broad and rapid. On the opposite side of the 

 river there is a range of sharply-pointed hills, amongst the peaks of 

 which I think I recognized my pyramids of the previous day. 

 Between the river and the foot of these hills, there is a narrow line 

 of cultivation. For some distance outside Krasnojarsk there was 

 a continuity of cultivated land, and we had many pretty views of 

 pine-clad hills, which looked down upon villages and fields in the 

 valleys which they bounded. 



On the 29th we passed through the little town of Kansk, a short 

 distance beyond which we ferried over the little river Kam. It is 

 so clear that all across you can see its pebbly bottom. These pebbles 

 are mostly siliceous, such stones as Flint, Jasper, and Agate being 

 common. On the opposite shore we were faced by a steep bank, at 

 least thirty feet in height, to the top of which we ascended through 

 a cutting. It was made up of a yellowish sandy soil, with here and 

 there a small patch of bluish clay. Growing on its slope there was 

 a stunted sweet-smelling Artemisia, and a small succulent broad- 

 leaved plant like a house-leek, whilst in the water below there were 

 beds of water- weed. Near the top of the embankment the soil as- 

 sumed a fine sandy character, which grodually merged into a black 

 earth. In one or two places, when these came together, I found 

 fragments of bone and chipped flints. With these there were 

 many pieces of burnt wood. Some few of the flints were in the 

 form of rough arrow-heads without fangs, but the greater number 

 were simply chips. In different parts of Siberia large quantities 

 of the remains of the early inhabitants have been found. In the 

 Museum at Irkutsk I saw many which had been brought to light 

 whilst making excavations in the vicinity of the town. Thus, whilst 

 digging the foundations for a new military hospital on the banks of 

 the River Ooshakofka, a tributary of the Angara, in addition to 

 stone arrows and fragments of coarse pottery, a number of imple- 

 ments and ornaments were also found. These latter were made 

 from ivory, which is apparently that of the Mammoth. One of 

 these resembles a dice box (or the head of a croquet-mallet), but 

 differs slightly in the diameter of its two extremities, and is not 

 hollow. The diameter of one end is 3i mil., and the other end 29 



DECADE II. — VOL. lY. — NO. XI. 33 



