SAHALIN,
October 6, 1890.
My greetings, dear mother!
I write you this letter almost on the eve of my departure for Russia. Every
day we expect a steamer of the Volunteer Fleet, and cherish hopes that it
will not come later than the 10th of October. I send this letter to Japan,
whence it will go by Shanghai or America. I am living at the station of
Korsakovo, where there is neither telegraph nor post, and which is not
visited by ships oftener than once a fortnight. Yesterday a steamer arrived
and brought me from the north a pile of letters and telegrams. From the
letters I learn that Masha likes the Crimea, I believe she will like the
Caucasus better still....
* * * * *
Strange, with you it has been cold and rainy, while in Sahalin from the day
of my arrival till to-day it has been bright warm weather: there is slight
cold with hoar-frost in the mornings, the snow is white on one of the
mountains, but the earth is still green, the leaves have not fallen, and
all the vegetation is still as flourishing as at a summer villa in May.
There you have Sahalin!
* * * * *
At midnight yesterday I heard the roar of a steamer. Everybody jumped out
of bed: hurrah! the steamer has arrived! We dressed and went out with
lanterns to the harbour; we gazed into the distance; there really was a
steamer.... The majority of voices decided that it was the _Petersburg_, on
which I am to go to Russia. I was overjoyed. We got into a boat and rowed
to the steamer. We went on and on, till at last we saw in the mist the dark
hulk of a steamer. One of us shouted in a hoarse voice asking the name of
the vessel. And we received the answer “the _Baikal_.” Tfoo! anathema! what
a disappointment! I am I homesick, and weary of Sahalin. Here for the last
three months I have seen no one but convicts or people who can talk of
nothing but penal servitude, the lash, and the convicts. A depressing
existence. One longs to get quickly to Japan and from there to India.
I am quite well, except for flashes in my eye from which I often suffer
now, after which I always have a bad headache. I had the flashes in my eye
yesterday and to-day, and so I am writing this with a headache and
heaviness all over.
At the station the Japanese General Kuse-San lives with his two
secretaries, good friends of mine. They live like Europeans. To-day the
local authorities visited them in state to present decorations that had
been conferred on them; and I, too, went with my headache and had to drink
champagne.
Since I have been in the south I have three times driven to Nay Race where
the real ocean waves break. Look at the map and you will see at once on the
south coast that poor dismal Nay Race. The waves cast up a boat with six
American whalefishers, who had been shipwrecked off the coast of Sahalin;
they are living now at the station and solemnly walk about the streets.
They are waiting for the _Petersburg_ and will sail with me.
I am not bringing you furs, there are none in Sahalin. Keep well and Heaven
guard you all.
I am bringing you all presents. The cholera in Vladivostok and Japan is
over.