44 
THROUGH ASIA 
on the other a sign-post giving the distances to the two 
nearest stations. From the entrance-passage you passed 
into the station-master’s room on the right, and on the 
left into the parlour for travellers. The latter was furnished 
with two sofas, two tables, a mirror, a good many chairs, 
and a large stove, in which the dried roots of the steppe 
plants were always burning. The fuel was kept piled up 
by the side of enormous hay-stacks, a short distance from 
the house. In the large square yard at the back were a 
number of carts and sledges ; and there also were the 
stables and a room for the drivers. 
At the station of Tamdi I rested for some hours during 
the night, and in the morning saw on the ice of the Tamdi 
stream the tracks of a number of wolves, which had been 
bold enough to enter the yard and steal three of the 
staresta’s geese. The thermometer showed 4°i Fahr. 
(- I5°5 C.), and the thin snow crackled under the wheels 
of the tarantass when we drove off in the early morning. 
Every blade of grass was feathered with hoar frost, and it 
was bitterly cold. 
