Note 4 — Chapter XXIV · THE LENA.

It was in one of these flat-bottomed boats that Mr. Hill descended the stream, in company with a Russian merchant, accomplishing the journey to Yakutsk in 21 days, with no worse mishaps by water than occasionally being driven on sand or mud banks, or into a forest of trees, all but submerged by the height of the spring floods.

Captain Cochrane chose a more independent course. Being furnished with a Cossack, he drove from Irkutsk to the Lena, and, having procured an open canoe and two men, paddled down the stream. Proceeding day and night, they usually made from 100 to 120 miles a day, finding hospitable villages at intervals of from 15 to 18 miles, as far as Kirensk, and so arrived on the eighth day at Vitimsk. It was now late in the autumn, and the ice began to come down the river, which sometimes compelled the natives to strip, and, up to their waists in water, to track the boat, and this with the thermometer below freezing-point. At length the captain, in consequence of the difficulties of boating, was requested at one of the villages to proceed on horseback, which he did, and, being unable at the next station to get either horses or boat, he had to shoulder his knapsack and walk; and so, by means of walking, riding, and paddling, he reached Olekminsk. From thence to Yakutsk is about 400 miles, which, excepting the two last stages, the captain completed in a canoe, arriving on the 6th October. The weather was cold, snow was falling, and on approaching Yakutsk the canoe was caught in the ice, so that he was compelled to make the remainder of his journey on foot.