384 
THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. 
[chap. 
exceptionally, no open places. But towards the north the forest 
passes into the treeless tundra through bare spots occurring 
here and there, which gradually increase, until trees grow only 
in valleys and sheltered places, and finally disappear completely. 
Similar is the passage of the forest to treeless regions (steppes), 
which at first are here and there bestrewed with more or less 
detached groups of broad-leaved trees, until they wholly dis¬ 
appear, and the land forms an endless plain, out of whose fertile 
soil the warm summer sun calls forth a great variety of 
luxuriant vegetable forms, whose many-hued flowers, often 
large and splendid, clothe the fields with the richest splendour 
of colour. Here is the true homeland of many of the show- 
plants in the flower-gardens of Europe, as, for instance, the 
peony, the Siberian robinia, the blue iris, &c. 
If the Siberian wooded belt forms the most extensive forest 
in the world, this flower-steppe forms the world’s greatest 
cultivable field, in all probability unequalled in extent and 
fertility. Without manure and with an exceedingly small 
amount of labour expended on cultivation, man will year by 
year draw forth from its black soil the most abundant harvests. 
For the present, however, this land, with its splendid capabili¬ 
ties for cultivation, has an exceedingly scanty population; and 
this holds good in a yet higher degree of the forest belt, which 
is less susceptible of cultivation. At a considerable distance 
from the rivers it is for the most part an unknown land, where 
the European seldom or never sets his foot, and where only the 
native nomad or hunter wanders about. These forests, how¬ 
ever, are by no means so rich in game as might be expected, 
perhaps because the mosquitoes in summer are unendurable by 
warm-blooded animals. 
The main population in the forest belt consists of native nomad 
or hunting tribes, of which Samoyeds, Ostyaks, Tunguses, and 
Yakuts are the most numerous. Only along the rivers do we 
find Eussian villages and peasant settlements, placed there for 
