I took the first opportunity to enter a Goldee house and study the
customs of the people. A Goldee dwelling for permanent habitation has
four walls and a roof. The sides and ends are of hewn boards or small
poles made into a close fence, which is generally double and has a
space six or eight inches wide filled with grass and leaves. Inside
and out the dwelling is plastered with mud, and the roofs are thatch
or bark held in place by poles and stones. Sometimes they are entirely
of poles. The doors are of hewn plank, and can be fastened on the
inside.
The dwellings are from fifteen to forty feet square, according to the
size of the family. In one I found a grandfather and his descendants;
thirty persons at least. There are usually two windows, made of fish
skin or thin paper over lattices. Some windows were closed with mats
that could be rolled up or lowered at will.
The fire-place has a deep pan or kettle fixed over it, and there is
room for a pot suspended from a rafter. Around the room is a divan, or
low bench of boards or wicker work, serving as a sofa by day and a bed
at night. When dogs are kept in the house a portion of the divan
belongs to them, and among the Mangoons there is a table in the center
specially reserved for feeding the dogs.
I found the floors of clay, smooth and hard. Near the fire-place a
little fire of charcoal is kept constantly burning in a shallow hole.
Pipes are lighted at this fire, and small things can be warmed over
it. Household articles were hung upon the rafters and cross beams, and
there was generally a closet for table ware and other valuables. The
cross-beams were sufficiently close to afford stowage room for
considerable property. Fish-nets, sledges, and canoes were the most
bulky articles I saw there.
Part of one wall was reserved for religious purposes, and covered with
bear-skulls and bones, horse-hair, wooden idols, and pieces of colored
cloth. Occasionally there were badly-painted pictures, purchased from
the Chinese at enormous prices. Sometimes poles shaped like small
idols are fixed before the houses.
A Goldee house is warmed by means of wooden pipes under the divan and
passing out under ground to a chimney ten or fifteen feet from the
building. Great economy is shown in using fuel and great care against
conflagrations. I was not able to stand erect in any Goldee houses I
entered.
Like all people of the Mongolian race, the natives pretended to have
little curiosity. When we landed at their villages many continued
their occupations and paid no attention to strangers. Above Gorin a
Goldee gentleman took me into his house, where a woman placed a mat on
the divan and motioned me to a seat. The man tendered me a piece of
dried fish, which I ate out of courtesy to my hosts. Several children
gathered to look at me, but retired on a gesture from _pater
familias_. I am not able to say if the fact that my eyes were
attracted to a pretty girl of seventeen had anything to do with the
dispersal of the group. Curiosity dwells in Mongol breasts, but the
Asiatics, like our Indians, consider its exhibition in bad taste.
Outside this man’s house there were many scaffoldings for drying fish.
A tame eagle was fastened with a long chain to one of the scaffolds;
he was supposed to keep other birds away and was a pet of his owner.
There were many dogs walking or lying around loose, while others were
tied to the posts that supported the scaffolds.
The dogs of the Goldees are very intelligent. One morning Mr. Maack
missed his pots which he had left the night before full of meat. After
some search they were found in the woods near the village, overturned
and empty. Several dogs were prowling about and had evidently
committed the theft. Fearing to be interrupted at their meal they
carried the pots where they could eat at leisure.
While steaming up the river I frequently saw temporary dwellings of
poles and bark like our Indian wigwams. These were at the fishing
stations upon sand bars or low islands. The afternoon following our
departure from Gorin I counted about thirty huts, or _yourts_, on one
island, and more than fifty boats on the river.
For half a mile the scene was animated and interesting. Some boats
were near the shore, their inmates hauling seines or paddling up or
down the stream. In one heavily laden boat there was one man steering
with a paddle. Four men towed the craft against the current, and
behind it was another drawn by six dogs. Out in the river were small
skiffs and canoes in couples, engaged in holding nets across the
direction of the current. The paddles wore struck regularly and slowly
to prevent drifting down the stream.
[Illustration: TEN MILES AN HOUR.]
One boat with two men rowing and another steering attempted a race
with the steamer and fairly passed us, though we were making ten miles
an hour. All these natives are very skillful in managing their boats.
When we passed near a boat we were greeted with ‘_Mendow, mendow,’_
the Mongol word of welcome. Sometimes we were hailed with the Russian
salutation of ‘_sdrastveteh_.’ In one boat I saw a Goldee belle
dressed with considerable taste and wearing a ring in the cartilage of
her nose. How powerful are the mandates of Fashion! This damsel would
scorn to wear her pendants after the manner of Paris and New York,
while the ladies of Broadway and the Boulevards would equally reject
the Goldee custom.
The natives of this part of the Amoor have a three-pronged spear like
a Neptune’s trident, and handle it with much dexterity. The spear-head
is attached to a long line, and when a fish is struck the handle is
withdrawn. The fish runs out the line, which is either held in the
hand or attached to a bladder floating on the water.
Ropes and nets are made from hemp and the common sting nettle, the
latter being preferred. The nettle-stalks are soaked in water and then
dried and pounded till the fibres separate. Ropes and cords are equal
to those of civilized manufacture, though sometimes not quite as
smooth. Thread for sewing and embroidery comes from China, and is
purchased of Manjour traders.
The night after we left Gorin the boat took wood at the village of
Doloe. It was midnight when we arrived, and as I walked through the
village nearly all the inhabitants were sleeping. The only
perambulating resident was very drunk and manifested a desire to
embrace me, but as I did not know his language and could not claim
relationship I declined the honor. Near the river there was a large
building for government stores and a smaller one for the men guarding
it. A few hundred yards distant there was a Goldee village, and for
want of something better Borasdine proposed that we should call on one
of its inhabitants. We took a Russian peasant to guide and introduce
us, our credentials and passports having been left on the steamer.
As we approached the first house we were greeted by at least a dozen
dogs. They barked on all keys and our guide thought it judicious to
provide himself with a stick; but I must do the brutes the justice to
say that they made no attempt at dentistry upon our legs. Some of
them were large enough to consume ten pounds of beef at a sitting, and
some too small for any but ornamental purposes.
The door was not locked and the peasant entered without warning, while
we stood outside among the dogs. Our guide aroused the chief of the
establishment and made a light; a strip of birch bark was used, and it
took a good deal of blowing on the fire coals before a flame was
produced. When we entered we found the proprietor standing in a short
garment and rubbing his oblique eyes to get himself thoroughly awake.
Near the place he had vacated, the lady of the house was huddled under
a coverlid about as large as a postage stamp, and did not appear
encumbered with much clothing. Three or four others had waked and made
some attempt to cover themselves. At least a dozen remained asleep and
lay in a charming condition of nudity. The Goldee houses are heated to
a high degree, and their inmates sleep without clothing. The delay in
admitting us was to permit the head of the house to dress in reception
costume, which he did by putting on his shirt.
After wishing this aboriginal a long and happy life, and thanking him
for his courtesy, we departed. I bumped my head against the rafters
both in entering and leaving, and found considerable difference
between the temperature in the house and out of it. The peasant
offered to guide us to visit more Goldees, but we returned to the boat
and retired to sleep.
The Russian peasants and the natives live in perfect harmony and are
of mutual advantage and assistance. The peasant furnishes the native
with salt, flour, and other things, while the latter catches fish,
enough for both. Each has a peaceable disposition, and I was told that
quarrels were of rare occurrence.
The Chinese call the natives _Yu-pi-ta-tze_, which in English means
‘wearers of fish-skins.’ I saw many garments of fish-skins, most of
them for summer use. The operation of preparing them is quite simple.
The skins are dried and afterward pounded, the blows making them
flexible and removing the scales. This done they are ready to be sewn
into garments.
[Illustration: A GOLDEE HOUSE]
A coat of this material embroidered and otherwise decorated is far
from ugly, and sheds water like India rubber. Fish skins are used in
making sails for boats and for the windows of houses. A Russian who
had worn a Goldee coat said it was both warm and waterproof, and he
suggested that it would be well to adopt fish-skin garments in
America.
The Goldees and Mangoons practice Shamanism in its general features,
and have a few customs peculiar to themselves. At a Goldee village I
saw a man wearing a wooden representation of an arm, and learned that
it is the practice to wear amulets to cure disease, the amulet being
shaped like the part affected. A lame person carries a small leg of
wood, an individual suffering from dyspepsia a little stomach, and so
on through a variety of disorders. A hypochondriac who thought himself
afflicted all over had covered himself with these wooden devices, and
looked like a museum of anatomy on its travels. I thought the custom
not unknown in America, as I had seen ladies in New York wearing
hearts of coral and other substances on their watch-chains. Evidently
the fashion comes from l’Amour.
[Illustration: THE HYPOCHONDRIAC.]
The morning after leaving Doloe we had a rain-storm with high wind
that blew us on a lee shore. The river was four or five miles wide
where the gale caught us, and the banks on both sides were low. The
islands in this part of the river were numerous and extensive. At one
place there are three channels, each a mile and a half wide and all
navigable. From one bank to the other straight across the islands is a
distance of nineteen miles.
The wind and weather prevented our making much progress on that day;
as the night was cloudy we tied up near a Russian village and
economised the darkness by taking wood. At a peasant’s house near the
landing four white-headed children were taking their suppers of bread
and soup under the supervision of their mother. Light was furnished
from an apparatus like a fishing jack attached to the wall; every few
minutes the woman fed it with a splinter of pine wood. Very few of the
peasants on the Amoor can afford the expense of candles, and as they
rarely have fire-places they must burn pine splinters in this way.
Along the Amoor nearly every peasant house contains hundreds, and I
think thousands, of cockroaches. They are quiet in the day but do not
fail to make themselves known at night. The table where these children
were eating swarmed with them, and I can safely say there wore five
dozen on a space three feet square. They ran everywhere about the
premises except into the fire. Walls, beds, tables, and floors were
plentifully covered with these disagreeable insects. The Russians do
not appear to mind them, and probably any one residing in that region
would soon be accustomed to their presence. Occasionally they are
found in bread and soup, and do not improve the flavor.
Life on the steamboat was a trifle monotonous, but I found something
new daily. Our steward (who is called _Boofetchee_ in Russian) brought
me water for washing when I rose in the morning, and the samovar with
tea when I was dressed. Borasdine rose about the time I did and joined
me at tea. Then we had breakfast of beef and bread with potatoes about
eleven or twelve o’clock, and dinner at six.
The intervals between meals were variously filled. I watched the land,
talked with Borasdine, read, wrote, smoked, and contemplated the
steward, but never imagined him a disguised angel. I looked at the
steerage passengers and the crew, and think their faces are pretty
well fixed in memory. Had I only been able to converse in Russian I
should have found much more enjoyment. As for the cook it is needless
to say that I never penetrated the mysteries of his realm. Little
games of cards wore played daily by all save myself; I used to look on
occasionally but never learned the games.
One of the Russian games at cards is called poker, and is not much
unlike that seductive amusement so familiar to the United States.
Whence it came I could not ascertain, but it was probably taken there
by some enterprising American. Some years ago a western actor who was
able to play Hamlet, Richelieu, Richard III., Claude Melnotte, and
draw-poker, made his way to Australia, where he delighted the natives
with his dramatic genius. But though he drew crowded houses his cash
box was empty, as the treasurer stole the most of the receipts. He did
not discharge him as there was little prospect of finding a better man
in that country; but he taught him draw-poker, borrowed five dollars
to start the game, and then every morning won from the treasurer the
money taken at the door on the previous night.
As we approached the Ousuree there was a superior magnificence in the
forest. The trees on the southern bank grew to an enormous size in
comparison, with those lower down the river. Naturalists say that
within a short distance in this region may be found all the trees
peculiar to the Amoor. Some of them are three or four feet in diameter
and very tall and straight. The elm and larch attain the greatest
size, while the ash and oak are but little inferior. The cork-tree is
two feet through, and the maackia—a species of oak with a brown, firm
wood—grows to the diameter of a foot or more.
In summer the foliage is so dense that the sun’s rays hardly
penetrate, and there is a thick ‘chapparel’ that makes locomotion
difficult. Just below the Ousuree the settlers had removed the under
growth over a small space and left the trees appearing taller than
ever. In a great deal of travel I have never seen a finer forest than
on this part of the Amoor. I do not remember anything on the lower
Mississippi that could surpass it. Tigers and leopards abound in
these forests, and bears are more numerous than agreeable.
Occasionally one of these animals dines upon a Goldee, but the custom
is not in favor with the natives. It is considered remarkable that the
Bengal tiger, belonging properly to a region nearer the equator,
should range so far north. On some of its excursions it reaches 53°
North Latitude, and feeds upon reindeer and sables. The valley of the
Amoor is the only place in the world outside of a menagerie where all
these animals are found together. The tropical ones go farther north
and the Arctic ones farther south than elsewhere.
It is the same with the vegetable kingdom. The mahogany and cork tree
grow here, and the bark of the latter is largely used by the natives.
On the slopes of the mountains a few miles away are the Siberian pine,
the Ayan spruce, and here and there a larch tree. Cedars and fir trees
are abundant and grow to a great size. The whole appearance of the
region is one of luxuriance and fertility.
The mouth of the Ousuree is a mile wide, and the stream is said to be
magnificent through its whole length. Its sources are in Latitude 44°,
and its length is about five hundred miles. While I was at Nicolayevsk
Admiral Fulyelm said to me:
“I have just returned from a voyage on the Ousuree. It is one of the
loveliest rivers I ever saw. The valley bears such a resemblance to a
settled country with alternate parks and open country that I almost
looked to see some grand old mansion at every bend of the stream.”
A little past noon we sighted the town and military post of Habarofka
at the mouth of the Ousuree. It stands on a promontory overlooking
both rivers, and presents a pleasing appearance from the Amoor. The
portion first visible included the telegraph office and storehouses,
near which a small steamer was at anchor. A Manjour trading boat was
at the bank, its crew resting on shore; a piece of canvas had been
spread on the ground and the men were lounging upon it. One grave old
personage, evidently the owner of the boat, waved his hand toward us
in a dignified manner, but we could not understand his meaning.
Coming to shore we narrowly missed running over a Goldee boat that
crossed our track. Our wheel almost touched the stern of the craft as
we passed it, but the occupants appeared no wise alarmed. Two women
were rowing and a man steering, while a man and a boy were idle in the
bow. A baby, strapped into a shallow cradle, lay in the bottom of the
boat near the steersman. The young Mongol was holding his thumb in his
mouth and appeared content with his position.
The town was in a condition of rawness like a western city in its
second year; there was one principal street and several smaller ones,
regularly laid out. As in all the Russian settlements on the Amoor the
houses were of logs and substantially built. Passing up the principal
street we found a store, where we purchased a quantity of canned
fruit, meats, and pickles.
[Illustration: “NONE FOR JOE.”]
These articles were from Boston, New York, and Baltimore, and had
American labels. The pictures of poaches, strawberries, and other
fruits printed on the labels were a great convenience to the Russian
clerk who served us. He could not read English, but understood
pictorial representations. On the boat we gave the cans to the
steward, to be opened when we ordered. The pictures were especially
adapted to this youth as he read no language whatever, including his
own. On one occasion a quantity of devilled turkey was put up in cans
and sent to the Amoor, and the label was beautified with a picture of
His Satanic Majesty holding a turkey on the end of a fork. The natives
supposed that the devil was in the cans and refused to touch them. The
supply was sent back to Nicolayevsk, where it was eaten by the
American merchants.
Accompanying Borasdine I called upon the officer in command. We were
ushered through two or three small rooms into the principal apartment,
which contained a piano of French manufacture. Three or four officers
and as many ladies enabled us to pass an hour very pleasantly till the
steam whistle recalled us, but we did not leave until two hours after
going on board. Two or three men had been allowed on shore and were
making themselves comfortable in a _lafka_. Two others went for them,
but as they did not return within an hour the police went to search
for both parties. When all were brought to the steamer it was
difficult to say it the last were not first—in intoxication.
Several passengers left us at Habarofka, among them the black eyed
girl that attracted the eyes of one or two passengers in the cabin; as
we departed she stood on the bank and waved us an adieu. In the
freight taken at this point there were fifteen chairs of local
manufacture; they were piled in the cabin and did not leave us much
space, when we considered the number and size of the fleas. On my
first night on the Ingodah the fleas did not disturb me as I came
after visiting hours and was not introduced. On all subsequent nights
they were persevering and relentless; I was bitten until portions of
my body appeared as if recovering from a Polynesian tattoo. They used
to get inside my under clothing by some mysterious way and when there
they walked up and down like sentries on duty and bit at every other
step. It was impossible to flee from them, and they appointed their
breakfasts and lunches at times most inconvenient to myself.
If I were Emperor of Russia I would issue a special edict expelling
fleas from my dominions and ordering that the labor expended in
scratching should be devoted to agriculture or the mechanic arts. I
suggested that the engines should be removed from the Ingodah and a
treadmill erected for the fleas to propel the boat. There have been
exhibitions where fleas were trained to draw microscopic coaches and
perform other fantastic tricks; but whatever their ability I would
wager that the insects on that steamboat could not be outdone in
industry by any other fleas in the world.
One of my standard amusements was to have a grand hunt for these
lively insects just before going to bed, and I have no doubt that the
exercise assisted to keep me in good health. I used to remove my
clothing, which I turned inside out and shook very carefully. Then I
bathed from head to foot in some villainous brandy that no respectable
flea would or could endure; after this ablution was ended, I donned my
garments, wrapped in my blanket, and proceeded to dream that I was a
hen with thirteen chickens, and doomed to tear up an acre of ground
for their support.
[Illustration: TAIL PIECE—SCENE ON THE RIVER]