_THE LOWER AMUR._
My plans altered.--A serious alternative.--Khabarofka.--Fur
trade.--Post-office and bank.--A Siberian garden.--Started for
Nikolaefsk.--The Lower Amur.--Its affluents.--Fish.--A Russian
advocate.--Goldi Christians.--Sophiisk.--A procureur.--Lake
Kizi.--Mariinsk.--Snow mountains.--Mikhailofsky.--Hot-springs
of Mukhal.--Beautiful scenery.--Tyr monuments.--The “white
village.”--Mouth of the Amur.
Approaching Khabarofka on the evening of August 8th, I thought that my
journeys on the Amur were ended. I had refused advice that I should
go on to Nikolaefsk, my great object being to reach Vladivostock as
quickly as possible, there embark for Japan, and thence proceed to
America. As to how this could be accomplished no definite information
was forthcoming. Something was said at Blagovestchensk about a
steamer called the _Dragon_, and her periodical trips between China,
Japan, Vladivostock, Sakhalin, and Nikolaefsk. Merchant ships also
were reported to leave the Siberian ports from time to time, as also
men-of-war, returning southwards after spending the summer months out
of the heat of the tropics. My friends, therefore, at the telegraph
station promised to inquire what ships were to leave Vladivostock,
and I was to learn the reply on arriving at Khabarofka. A new factor,
however, was added to my calculations by Baron Stackelberg, my
fellow-passenger, who understood that his friend, Professor Milne,
was staying at Vladivostock. The Baron had telegraphed thither to his
agent to inquire of the professor if he were “_plein de voyage_,” and
if so, whether he would proceed by sea to meet him at Nikolaefsk for a
pleasure tour, and then accompany him to Kamchatka. The Baron expected
to find a telegram at Khabarofka, and then, said he, “If Mr. Milne come
by the _Dragon_ to Nikolaefsk, it will be better for you to go there
with me, and take the boat on its return to Sakhalin, Vladivostock,
and Japan, or you may otherwise have to wait at Vladivostock until the
_Dragon_ returns.”
Such were our thoughts as we approached Khabarofka, where, on arriving,
I found, to my dismay, that the Ussuri boat had grown tired of waiting
for us, and had gone, and that another would not start for three
days.[1] No message awaited me at Khabarofka, and from the Baron’s
telegram it seemed that Mr. Milne was not at Vladivostock, but that the
_Dragon_ had just left, or was about to leave, for Nikolaefsk, to which
port, however, there was no steamer proceeding from Khabarofka for
several days. I was, therefore, in a dilemma. If I went south, I might
have to wait a month for the _Dragon_; and if I stayed for the river
steamer to Nikolaefsk, I might lose the _Dragon_, and thus go 1,250
miles out of my way. I fell asleep that night not knowing what to do,
hoping that with morning light the way might be clearer. On waking, I
learned that the Baron had been to the agents and taken them to task
because the steamer going north to Nikolaefsk had also not waited the
arrival of our boat as announced. So successfully had he stormed,
according to his own account, that the agent had ordered the _Zeya_,
instead of going back, to go forward to Nikolaefsk.
At no previous point in my journey had I felt it so hard to decide
what to do for the best. On leaving England, my tour had been planned
to last three months, a period I had already exceeded, while more
than half the globe remained to be traversed. I had, moreover, left
in the hands of others editorial duties that called for my return,
and now there seemed the possibility of prolonged delay. I looked up
most earnestly for wisdom, and determined to be guided by the Baron’s
advice. Gloomy rumours had reached me of the sad condition of the
Sakhalin prisoners, and I asked the Baron whether he thought it at
all likely that if I went to the island, and afterwards sent a report
to the authorities, it might tend to better the prisoners’ condition.
He first asked me gravely, though somewhat to my amusement, whether
what I was doing was likely to bring the governments of our respective
countries into collision, and then, on being assured that I was acting
simply as a private individual, he told me that at Vladivostock I
should get no information or statistics respecting Sakhalin, since
the books were kept at Nikolaefsk, to which place, therefore, he
recommended me to go. Accordingly, fortified with the hope of being
useful, I decided to do this; but it was not without many misgivings,
though out of that decision sprang results for which afterwards I was
deeply grateful. I did not find the _Dragon_, and had ultimately to
retrace my steps to Khabarofka; but my going to Nikolaefsk led to the
better distribution of more than 12,000 tracts and several Scriptures,
and afforded me glimpses of heathen life for which I shall ever be
thankful.
The boat was not to start till noon, and this gave me leisure to see
something of our stopping-place. Khabarofka stands on a promontory, at
the junction of the Amur with the Ussuri, and overlooks both streams
from the top of the bluff, in which, in this direction, the Khoekhtsi
hills, running at right angles from the coast, terminate. The position
is well chosen for a military post, and the town is not without
importance commercially. There are several stores, and the merchants
trade with the aborigines of the north in furs to the value of £30,000
a year. Whilst calling on a merchant with whom I had travelled, there
entered a Chinaman with what looked like a number of dried rabbit-skins
hung on his arm. They proved to be sable-skins, almost as they come
from the animals’ backs, turned inside out. In this condition the
natives barter them to the Chinese, who, in turn, sell them to the
merchants, some of whom are agents for large firms in Petersburg and
Moscow. On this occasion the Chinaman asked seven silver roubles,
or a guinea, for each skin, which showed that they were not of high
quality.[2]
Besides the stores in Khabarofka there is an establishment where
they employ 50 men and build steamers, etc., to the value of £10,000
yearly. One of the principal agents of the Steamboat Company lives in
the place, drawing a salary of £500 a year, which is thought there a
handsome income; but he told me he could not remain, since there was
no school near for the education of his children. On entering the
post-office, there were to be seen in a large chest, bags, not to say
sacks, full of silver roubles, the guardianship of which seemed fully
to justify the presence of an armed Cossack, one of whose cloth is
always found keeping watch in the post-office and over the mail-bags in
transit. The post-office, in fact, is a quasi bank, for on arriving at
Nikolaefsk I found that my host kept his banking account 6,000 miles
distant, at Petersburg. He paid in his money at the local post-office,
and then telegraphed to the capital, upon which his bankers gave him
credit for the deposit. There are State banks in Siberia, at Tomsk,
Krasnoiarsk, and Irkutsk; but, from the narrow escape I had at Tomsk of
being delayed in getting my cash, I was thankful for having exchanged
my money in Petersburg for a number of hundred-rouble notes, which I
carried in a pocket-girdle.[3]
At Khabarofka I visited the garden of one of the merchants, said to
be the best in the place. It was 10 years old, full of apple and pear
trees, but they were wild ones, transplanted eight years before. None
of the apples were so large as a good English crab, and the “Bergamot”
pears were as small. The latter tasted something like the quince, and
were useless except to preserve for eating with roast meat. Among
other trees were the walnut, the acacia, the bird-cherry, a thorn with
a berry larger than is commonly seen in England, called _résan_; the
_boyarka_ or service tree, with bunches of berries like grapes (called
_calina_), and the beech. Among the shrubs, plants, and flowers were
maize, wild white lilac, raspberries, currants, and strawberries,
dahlias, verbenas, wild pæonies, stocks, carnations, and pinks; and
among climbers the wild pea, and the Siberian vinegar plant. These,
with other flowers, of which I did not know the names, made a fair show
for Khabarofka, where the cold winds begin in the middle of September,
and snow covers the ground from November to March. In the neighbourhood
were abundance of trees common to a temperate region, such as the oak,
maple, alder, larch, pine, poplar, willow, and lime. Some prettily
overhung the river’s bank, which was enlivened with boats drawn up by
Manchu and Chinese, some of whom were selling excellent French beans,
whilst others were engaged in making and mending shoes.
Having thus made the most of my time at Khabarofka, I once more boarded
the _Zeya_, on Saturday noon, for a voyage of 626 miles to Nikolaefsk,
in the course of which we were to pass, though not necessarily to stop
at, 52 stations. Some were native villages, the names of which had been
adopted by the Russians; others were Russian settlements with Sclavonic
names; whilst other stations bore double titles, both Russian and
native.
The basin of the Lower Amur is bounded on the west by the Bureya
mountains, between which and the river lies a flat and partially
swampy country; whilst on the east its limit is the coast range
already referred to as the Sikhota Alin. The course of the river is
north-east. Its principal tributaries flowing in on the left or western
bank are the Kur, Girin, and Amgun; on the right bank, the Dondon and
the Khungar. The largest of these on the left bank is the Amgun; the
largest on the right is the Dondon, which is 500 yards wide at its
mouth. At Khabarofka, the Amur has a width of 900 yards; and as we
steamed away, the right bank stood out in contrast to the left, which
was flat; but after proceeding 20 miles, the character of the scenery
changed. Both banks became flat, islands were numerous, and the stream
widened to five miles. This kind of scenery continued for the rest of
the day, and our evening progress was highly enjoyable, varied now and
then by the appearance of the summer yourts of the natives, or the
lonely post-stations, deserted in summer, where horses are kept in
winter, when the river is frozen and transformed into a road. At the
confluence of the Dondon, the river has soundings up to 37 feet, and
the channel measures three miles in breadth. This is the widest part
of the river without intervening islands, though 17 miles lower, where
the left bank is marshy and dotted with lakes, the entire width extends
to 12 miles.[4]
At Viatskoy, 50 miles from Khabarofka, I stayed on my return journey,
and was offered a sturgeon a yard long, which a man had caught, and
was keeping in the river tied by a string beneath the gills. Of the
fish caught on the Lower Amur, the Russians think very highly of
the sterlet, and the sturgeon is costly. For this small specimen at
Viatskoy was asked 2_s._ 6_d._, but in Moscow they said it would fetch
£1. They sometimes catch sturgeon weighing from 200 to 300 lbs., and
the dried bones and cleansed gelatinous entrails of this fish form a
prominent article of commerce between the natives and the Manchu. The
bones cost in Manchuria, for culinary purposes, nearly 4_s._ per lb.,
and the gelatine in Moscow 7_s._ per lb.
In latitude 50° N., the Amur receives on the left bank, from Lake
Bolan, an affluent 900 yards wide and 30 feet deep. Hills now rise on
both banks, and at Perm (or Milku) the depth of the river increases
to between 50 and 60 feet. At Tambofsk, 280 miles from Khabarofka,
the banks become mountainous on either side, the river contracts to
an average width of a mile and a third, and soundings often reach to
90 feet; and thus the river continues, for a distance of 60 miles,
to Zherebtsofsk. From Zherebtsofsk to Sophiisk, the scenery changes
again, the river enlarges, runs between numerous islands and several
sandbanks, and at Sophiisk its depth is nearly 50 feet.
Our company on board was small in number, which was to be expected,
seeing that the boat was a “special.” In the first-class there were
only three persons besides the Baron and myself, namely, M. Kruskopf,
the telegraph inspector, an advocate, and with him a young man dressed
like a Russian shopkeeper. The last two I had observed among the
second-class passengers from Kara. We were now brought into closer
contact. The advocate spoke French, and I gathered from him that the
young man was his client, whose father had recently died, leaving him
£20,000. They were come from Central Russia to realize the money, for
which the advocate, since he would be occupied at least all the summer,
was to have the modest fee of £3,000.[5]
On the morning after leaving Khabarofka, M. Kruskopf left the boat to
visit the station at Troitzkoy, but he did not forget me; for, unasked,
he telegraphed to Nikolaefsk to his friends, told them I was coming,
and requested them to look after my welfare. The day was Sunday, and
I enjoyed a quiet morning in my cabin; and in the afternoon we had
steamed 170 miles--to Malmejskoy. Here we saw on the bank some Goldi,
who called to my mind pictures I had seen of North American Indians.
Some of them had a cross suspended from the neck, which in their
case had a meaning; for those who wore it thus were baptized, and so
distinguished from the pagan Goldi. I gave a few tracts among these
people, and in return received, in one of the villages, a curious
salutation. Offering an illuminated text to a little girl, her mother
directed her to express her thanks by crossing her hands with the palms
uppermost, and then go down on all-fours at my feet with her head to
the ground.
At Tambofsk, or Girin, 280 miles further, was a village where, on the
return journey in the beginning of September, I bought melons and ripe
black currants, the latter good, but with less taste than those grown
in England. Other berries, tart but juicy, were offered for sale.
Here, too, were lying on the bank some drunken gold-miners, whom the
captain refused to take on board in that condition, leaving them till
he should call again three weeks later, by which time possibly they
might be sober and wiser. I met gold capitalists both at Nikolaefsk and
at Vladivostock; but from the report sent to the Emperor concerning the
Primorsk, it appeared that in 1878 only 600 lbs. of gold were washed
throughout the province, the small quantity being set down to the lack
of workmen. At Tambofsk we passed out of the district inhabited by the
Goldi, and entered that of a distinct though somewhat similar tribe,
called the Gilyaks, of both of whom I shall speak hereafter.
The next place of note to which we came, 412 miles from Khabarofka, was
Sofiisk, from which there is a road 33 miles long by the shore of Kizi
Lake to the coast at De Castries Bay. Light draught steamboats can go
within 12 miles or less of De Castries; and as the navigation of the
mouth of the Amur is difficult, it was at one time proposed to make a
canal, or a railway, to connect the lake with the sea. Surveys were
made by Mr. Romanoff, but the plan is not likely to be carried out.
The steamer passed Sofiisk on my first journey, but in returning we
stayed for a couple of hours; and as there was a prison in the place,
I presented my letters, and requested to be allowed to see it. Also
I gave to the Commandant of the 5th East Siberian battalion, Colonel
Ussofovitch, who was stationed there, a box of books and tracts,
with a letter in French, asking that they might be distributed among
his soldiers. The colonel did not know French, and a young officer,
who called himself the “procureur” of the battalion, was called in
to interpret. What this gentleman’s precise office was, I could not
exactly make out, but it seemed to be something between that of a judge
and a military head police-master. He took me to see the building,
where, to my surprise, were 150 prisoners, many of whom, however, were
on their way to Sakhalin. The wooden planking of the footways in the
town was miserably out of order, and I hinted to the procureur that
since they had insufficient work for the prisoners, it would be well to
employ them in repairing the pavements. This idea seemed never to have
struck him, and he replied at once that he would consider the matter.
The procureur spoke French fluently, though with a Russian accent,
and he knew something also of the dead languages, Hebrew among them.
He said that he had studied this language in prospect of becoming a
priest; but that, when he could not see his way to £200 a year in the
church, he had entered the army, which, he said, “paid” better. In this
case, it seemed to me, the Russian Church, by reason of its miserable
emoluments, had lost to her clergy a youth of greater intellectual
culture than the majority of her priests. The population of Sofiisk
was given me as 700 military and 300 civilians, amongst whom I found
a ready sale for the Scriptures. At the telegraph office complaints
reached me, as at Khabarofka, that they had no means of educating their
children, there being no local school.
The Amur at Sofiisk is nearly two miles wide; seven miles lower it
expands to upwards of four miles. Thirteen miles beyond, the banks
are low, flat, and marshy; but the land is good, and is cultivated
by Russian settlers. Here, too, is the town of Mariinsk, the oldest
Russian settlement, next to Nikolaefsk, on the Lower Amur, and situated
on the right bank of the river, at the entrance to the Kizi Lake.[6]
[Illustration: A RUSSIAN PRIEST IN WINTER DRESS.]
Mariinsk was founded by the Russian-American company in the same
year with Nikolaefsk, and was a trading post until the military
occupation of the river. Difficulties of navigation diminished its
military importance, and the post was transferred to Sofiisk, founded
in 1858. On an island opposite Mariinsk is the trace of a fort,
built by Stepanof, the Cossack adventurer, who descended the Amur in
1654. During the winter he remained here he collected nearly 5,000
sable-skins as tribute. On our return journey we took in at this place,
as passengers, a priest, his wife, and son; the lady being the daughter
of the late Metropolitan Innokente of Moscow, the wonderful priest who,
travelling 8,000 miles, crossed Siberia with his translations of a
portion of the New Testament into the language of the Kuriles, and then
took them back in print. This lady seems to have inherited something
of her father’s enterprise, for I have heard recently from a friend
that he met her travelling in Western Siberia.
Mr. Collins mentions that from Mariinsk is seen, to the south-west,
a very high mountain, with much snow upon it; and Mr. Ravenstein
observes that a few miles below Tambofsk, or Girin, may be seen the
craggy summits of mountain ranges, at greater or less distance from
the river, covered, in places, as late as June with snow. It was
after June when I passed down the stream, but I saw mountains to the
left with what looked like snow-drifts, or corries filled with snow.
My fellow-passengers, however, and especially the Baron, stoutly
maintained that I was mistaken, and that what we saw was either chalk
or an effect of light. The formation of the rocks on some of the
mountain crests was very remarkable, and they were arrayed in such
straight lines, here and there, that they looked like the building of
Titans rather than Nature’s handiwork.
Passing Mariinsk we reached Mikhailofsky, a distance of 526 miles from
Khabarofka, on Monday afternoon,--that is to say, in about 48 hours,
which was more rapid travelling than the captain had accomplished on
the Shilka and Upper Amur. A merchant afterwards whispered to me,
however, that it was reckless navigation. The captain had not made the
passage before; so, placing a man in the bows with the measuring-rod,
and rising above all questions as to where the channel lay, he just
shot ahead, suspecting no ill where no ill seemed. Fortunately we ran
on neither rocks nor shoals, but I was exhorted to be thankful that
we had not come to grief. Had we been allowed to proceed at this rate
we should have reached Nikolaefsk in another 24 hours, but a telegram
awaited the captain at Mikhailofsky to say that another boat of the
company was coming up from Nikolaefsk, for which he was to wait, then
exchange cargoes and passengers, and return. This involved a delay of
30 hours, which gave me an opportunity of visiting a settlers’ village,
the priest of which informed me that he had in his parish 400 persons,
of whom only 15 could read. The forest in the neighbourhood has been
cleared, and rye, barley, and oats are successfully cultivated. So,
too, are vegetables on the river’s bank, for the market at Nikolaefsk.
Cucumbers were just coming in, and the people were eating them like
apples. When the Baron and I made a morning call at one of the houses,
they simply brought forth cucumbers and salt wherewith to regale us.
I saw, too, in this village a curious specimen of Russian economy.
Not able to purchase whole panes of window-glass, the peasants had
used fragments of any form they could get, and fixed them with pieces
of birch bark, cut to the shape. Mikhailofsky, however, was not a
flourishing village, and it must be added that the colonies of the
Lower Amur are generally the least prosperous in the country.
Late on Tuesday evening the promised steamship _Onon_ arrived, and
I left the _Zeya_, in which I had spent the previous 16 days, and
travelled 1,900 miles. Next morning we arrived at a Gilyak village,
called Mukhal, near to some hot springs which are said to be beneficial
in cases of rheumatism, syphilis, diarrhœa, and goitre. The Polish
exile, in whose charge they are, is allowed their monopoly, and the
Government gives him a grant of £50 a year. About mid-day we passed
another Gilyak village called Tyr. The Amur here contracts to 900
yards, and from a bold cliff, 100 feet high on the right bank, a fine
view is obtained up stream. The river’s banks spread to a width of
five miles, and well-wooded islands lie between. To the south are
dark forests and mountain ridges, and at the back of the cliff is a
tableland several miles broad. On the opposite bank enters the river
Amgun, which rises in the Bureya mountains, and, after a course of not
less than 700 miles, flows into the Amur through a delta covered with
forest.
The cliff at Tyr is interesting to the archæologist by reason of
its Tatar monuments with inscriptions, the history of which appears
somewhat doubtful.[7]
I went ashore to examine these monuments, of which Mr. Ravenstein
mentions four--one with a granite base, and the upper portion of grey,
fine-grained marble, and another of porphyry resting on an octagonal
pedestal. Unfortunately, I could stay only a very short time, as the
steamer did not wait. I found two monuments near the edge of the cliff,
with characters cut thereon. A third is about 400 yards to the east,
on a more elevated point, and on a bare rock foundation. The principal
one, which I examined most, resembles a thick upright tombstone, about
five feet high. The Archimandrite Avvakum says everything proves
that the spot where the monument is standing was once the site of
a temple devoted to the worship of Buddha, and in Chinese language
was called “_Youn-nen-se_”--that is, the “Temple of Eternal Repose.”
The two inscriptions on either side--one in Chinese and the other in
Mongolian--were written, he thinks, by some illiterate Mongol lama, not
thoroughly acquainted with Chinese grammar. On the left-hand side are
the Sanscrit words, “_Om-mani-badme-houm_” in Thibetan letters; and
beneath, in Chinese, “_Dai Yuan shouch hi-li-gun-bu_”--that is, “The
great Yuan spreads the hands of force everywhere.” In a second line on
the same side the words, “_Om-mani-badme-houm_” are written in Chinese
and Nigurian. The inscriptions on the right side contain the same in
Chinese, Thibetan, and Nigurian. “And then,” says the Archimandrite,
“there is nothing more”; about which statement, however, with all
deference, I venture to express my doubts; for although I do not read
Chinese, and could only examine the monuments for a very few moments,
yet I came to the conclusion that whether the interpretation first
given be correct or not, it is inadequate, and far from exhaustive.
I saw clearly on the stone some large Chinese characters, perhaps two
inches high, and some of the Chinese passengers were able partially to
decipher them; but the general appearance of the stone reminded me of a
palimpsest manuscript which had been, in the first place, covered with
small characters, about half an inch square or less, over which the
larger characters had been written. Beside the monumental stone, which
was mounted on a pedestal, there were lying near five flat stones, cut
across the centres from side to side with transverse grooves, about an
inch wide and deep. Mr. Collins says they are supposed to have been
altars of sacrifice, once elevated and within the temple, and that
the grooves served to conduct the blood of the victim into the proper
vessel. Whether this be so or not I cannot say, but they looked to me
much more like the capitals or bases of pillars, with the grooves for
keeping them in place.[8] It is much to be wished that the spot should
be visited, and the monuments examined by a competent scholar.
Towards evening we passed another Gilyak habitation called the
“white village,” and afterwards found the banks of the Amur becoming
abrupt, the islands low and to a great extent exposed to inundation.
We had long been passing out of the region of foliferous trees, and
in approaching Nikolaefsk they were almost entirely supplanted by
conifers, fir-trees prevailing, birches and some few other leafy trees
occurring only in favoured localities. The Amur at Nikolaefsk reaches
in some places to a depth of 15 feet, is a mile and three-quarters
wide, with a current of from four to five knots. The river enters
the sea at a distance of 26 miles from the town, the Liman, or gulf,
measuring more than nine miles at its widest.[9]
Thus, on Tuesday evening, the 13th of August, I arrived at Nikolaefsk,
having completed the passage of the Lower Amur. I have said almost
nothing, however, of its curious heathen inhabitants, whose
acquaintance I am so glad to have made, and to whose description I
shall now proceed.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] This was bad enough, but not all. There was no inn, post-house,
or hotel in the place; the only lodging that offered was a room
constructed on a floating barge, without beds or bedsteads, and in
which might sleep, on the seats or the floor, Russians, Chinese,
Manchu, or anyone else that chose. Here, however, my Finnish friend,
M. Kruskopf, came to my aid, and volunteered to get me a bed at the
telegraph station, an offer I should thankfully have accepted, but the
captain of the _Zeya_ consented to my sleeping on board till morning,
when he expected to go back.
[2] On returning to Khabarofka I found one of my fellow-passengers had
bought eight skins, for which he had paid 50_s._ each, and for one for
his wife’s hat £4. I heard subsequently that the best sable-skins are
from the neighbourhood of the Okhotsk sea, and are worth £4 each. My
informant, an old sea captain, said that in 1857 he bought 2,000 in
Kamchatka at 30_s._, and that they commanded in New York from £5 to £6
each. Among them were 22 skins for a lady’s set of trimmings, which,
when made up, cost her £200. The skins of the younger sables, he said,
were blacker than those of the older, which are apt to be more or less
grey. The former sell better in Berlin, and the latter are highly
esteemed in Paris.
[3] Besides these hundred-rouble notes I took, to pay for horses, £30
in one-rouble notes, the same amount in three and five-rouble notes,
small silver coin to the value of 100 roubles, and a bag of copper
kopecks, for at the post-houses they are not bound to give change,
and the clerks gladly pocket the difference when smaller money is not
forthcoming. In the peopled parts of the Sea-coast government there
is a postal delivery once a week, at Okhotsk once a month, and at one
happy place in the far north, I was told, the postman arrives but once
a year! They have a “parcel post” in Siberia, by which packets must not
exceed £500 in value, nor weigh more than 1 cwt. The rates are, for 200
miles, ¾_d._ per Russian pound, and ¼_d._ per pound extra for every 60
miles up to 1,600, Beyond that distance it costs ¼_d._ per pound for
every 160 miles.
[4] Mr. Ravenstein, in his admirable and generally accurate work (page
187), gives the Amur below the Dondon a breadth in one bed of six
miles, and further on a width of 15 miles, including the islands; but
I have been unable to confirm these figures from either the chart of
the captain of the steamer, or from a well-executed Russian survey of
the Amur river at the India Office, which was politely shown me by Mr.
Trelawney Saunders.
[5] After this I thought the profession of an advocate profitable,
and readily believed him when he told me that he possessed in Russia
on the Volga nearly 8,000 acres of land, which cost about £1 an acre.
It was the best land, he said, in all Russia; 600 acres he used for
growing wheat, and the rest for rye, selling his corn to the merchants
of Samara. He told me that in forensic matters things are reversed as
between Russia and England, that whereas in England a barrister looks
forward to being a judge, in Russia a judge (who is paid only £300 to
£400 a year) looks forward to being an advocate, which he can become
only after spending five years in court.
[6] This lake seems to be an overflow from the river, which here
divides into several channels, and looks as if one day in the remote
past it would fain have ended its wanderings, and turned off eastwards
through the sea-coast range into Castries Bay. The distance from the
head of the Kizi Lake to Castries Bay is only 8½ miles. The lake
occupies an area of 93 square miles, being 25 miles long and 12 broad.
Of the two islets in the lake, one is a rock about 50 feet in diameter.
The crevices are full of fox-holes, and the Gilyaks regard it as
sacred, assembling there from time to time for their Shaman rites.
[7] Réclus quotes Von Middendorf to the effect that on the map of
Remezov, which appeared in the seventeenth century, a town is marked
on this spot as the limits of the conquests of the Tsar Alexander of
Macedon, who hid his arms and left there a bell. Such was the tradition
of the Cossacks. Again, Ravenstein quotes Witsen to the effect that
Russian warriors, 30 or 40 years ago, found a bell weighing 660 lbs.
at a place which seems to have been dug round, and near which stood
several stones bearing Chinese inscriptions; and he adds that a
manuscript of 1678, in the library of the Siberian department, mentions
the same facts. My fellow-passengers spoke of the monuments as dating
back to the time of Ghengis Khan, and erected to mark the limit of his
conquests. Once more, Mr. Ravenstein asserts that one of the emperors
of the Yuen dynasty (which flourished in China from 1234 to 1368,
A.D.) went by sea to the mouth of the Amur, in commemoration of which
he built at Tyr the monastery of “Eternal Repose.” To come to our own
times, Mr. Collins relates that the inscriptions on the monuments were
translated by the Archimandrite Avvakum, who for several years was
connected with the Russian Mission at Peking, and who descended the
Amur about 1857 as interpreter to Count Putiatin’s embassy, then on its
way to China. Mr. Collins obtained from an officer a translation from
the Russian into English of the Archimandrite’s interpretation.
[8] Mr. Collins speaks of excavations, or pits, within and without
the remains of a wall, and mentions also his finding the monuments
decorated with wreathed garlands of finely-worked splint, or the
stripping of a tree, bound together at intervals with willow twigs.
The bases of the monuments also were dressed with shavings of wood,
worked to represent flowers, thickly planted around in the earth.
These he conjectured to have been, as they probably were, offerings of
the natives, who still use the place, I understood, for Shamanistic
practices.
[9] A mile below the town there are sandbanks, and a bar which prevents
the entrance of ships drawing more than 13 feet of water. In fact, from
the Continent to the Island of Sakhalin are sandbanks, among which
wind the navigable channels, which are liable to change during heavy
tempests, so that the pilots are obliged to trace them, sounding-rod in
hand. I heard, too, that for strategic purposes some of these channels
at the mouth of the river could be filled up, or diverted.