224 



THE POLAR WORLD. 



bones served for the parting repast. Thus of his own free-will, the winter hav- 

 ing already set in, Middendorff, ill and exhausted, remained quite alone in the 

 icy desert, behind a sheltering rock, in 15° N. lat., several hundred versts from 

 all human dwellings, almost without fuel, and with a miserable supply of food. 

 The three first days he was still able to move. He saw the lake cover itself com- 

 pletely with ice, and the last birds depart for the south. Then his strength ut- 

 terly failed him, and for the next three days he was unable to stir. When he was 

 again able to move, he felt an excessive thirst. He crawled to the lake, broke 

 the ice, and the water refreshed him. But he was not yet free from disease, and 

 this was fortunate, as want of appetite did not make him feel the necessity of 

 food. Now followed a succession of terrible snow-storms, which completely 

 imprisoned the solitary traveller, but at the same time afforded him a better 

 shelter against the wind. 



" My companions," he writes in a letter to a relation, " had now left me. 

 twelve days; human assistance could no longer be expected; I was convinced 

 that I had only myself to rely upon, that I was doomed, and as good as number- 

 ed with the dead. And yet my courage did not forsake me. Like our squir- 

 rels, I turned myself according to the changes of the wind. During the long 

 sleepless nights fancy opened her domains, and I forgot even hunger and thirst. 

 Then Boreas broke roaring out of the gullies as if he intended to sweep me 

 away into the skies, and in a short time I was covered with a comfortable snow- 

 mantle. Thus I lay three days, thinking of wretches who had been immured 

 alive, and grown mad in their dreadful prison. An overwhelming fear of in- 

 sanity befell me — it oppressed my heart — it became insupportable. In vain I 

 attempted to cast it off — my weakened brain could grasp no other idea. And 

 now suddenly— like a ray of light from heaven — the saving thought flashed 

 upon me. 



" My last pieces of wood were quickly lighted — some water was thawed and 

 warmed — I poured into it the spirits from a flask containing a specimen of nat- 

 ural history, and drank. A new life seemed to awaken in me : my thoughts re- 

 turned again to my family, to the happy days I had spent with the friends of 

 my youth. Soon I fell into a profound sleep — how long it lasted I know not — 

 but on awakening I felt like another man, and my breast was filled with grati- 

 tude. Appetite returned with recovery, and I was reduced to eat leather and 

 birch-bark, when a ptarmigan fortunately came within reach of my gun. Hav- 

 ing thus obtained some food for the journey, I resolved, although still very fee- 

 ble, to set out and seek the provisions we had buried. Packing some articles of 

 dress^my gun and ammunition, my journal, etc., on my small hand-sledge, I pro- 

 ceeded slowly, and frequently resting. At noon I saw, on a well-known decliv- 

 ity of the hills, three black spots which I had not previously noticed, and as they 

 changed their position, I at once altered my route to join them. We approach- 

 ed each other — and, judge of my delight, it was Trischun, the Samoiede chief- 

 tain, whom I had previously assisted in the prevailing epidemic, and who now, 

 guided by one of my companions, had set out with three sledges to seek me. 

 Eager to serve his benefactor, the grateful savage had made his reindeer wander 

 without food over a space of 150 versts where no moss grew. 



