“‘But thy son drove badly and upset us in the ditch.’

“‘Then,’ whispered the old scoundrel, coming close up with a look of indescribable cunning on his face, ’give my son no vodka—­give me all the vodka.’

“Being glad on any terms to get clear of the precious couple, I gave them both money for their vodka, and set off along the backwaters towards the place described by Leof and Big Peter.  I found them there before me, and we lost no time in embarking.  I found that they had the boat well provendered and equipped.  Indeed, the sight of their luxuries tempted us all to excess; but I reminded them that we were still in a country of game, and that we must save all our supplies till we were out in the ocean.  The Lena was swollen by the melting snows, and the boat made slow progress, especially as we had to follow the least frequented arms of the vast delta.  We found, however, plenty of fish—­specially salmon, which were in great quantities wherever, in the blind alleys of the backwaters, we put down the fish-spear.  We were not the only animals who rejoiced in the free and open life of the delta archipelago.  Often we saw bears swimming far ahead, but none of them came near our boat.

“One night when the others were sleeping I strayed away over the marshy tundra, plunging through the hundred yards of black mud and moss where the willow-grouse and the little stint were feeding.  I came upon a nest or two of the latter, and paused to suck some of the eggs, one of the birds meanwhile coming quite close, putting its head quaintly to the side as though to watch where its property was going, with a view to future recovery.  A little farther along I got on the real tundra, and wandered on in the full light of a midnight sun, which coloured all the flat surface of the marshy moorland a deep crimson, and laid deep shadows of purple mist in the great hollow of the Lena river.

“In a little I sat down, and, putting up the collar of my coat—­for the air was beginning to bite sharply—­I meditated on the chances of our life.  It did not seem that we had much more than one chance in a hundred, yet the hundredth chance was indubitably worth the risk—­better than inaction, and better than the suicide which would inevitably come with the weakening brain, after another winter such as that we had just passed through.

“Meditating so, I heard a noise behind me, and, turning, found myself almost face to face with a great she-bear, with two cubs of the year running gambolling about her.  I had not even so much as a fish-spear with me.  With my heart leaping like the piston-rod of an engine, I sat as still as though I had been a pillar of ice carved out of the hummock.  The cubs were within twenty paces, and the mother would have passed by but for the roystering youngsters.  They came galloping awkwardly up, and nosed all over me, rubbing themselves against my clothes with just such a purring noise as a cat might make.  There was no harm in them, but their whining caused the old bear to halt, then abruptly to turn round and come slowly toward me.