So short, and quiet, and sweet were the hours, that the time of rest passed by without the thought of sleep.  Suddenly, however, they were roused to a sense of their situation, and leaving their wearied and exhausted companions still asleep, they moved with doubt and dread to the water’s side.  Life was now doubly dear to both, and their fancy painted the coming forth of an empty net as the termination of all hope.  But the net came heavily and slowly to land.  It was full of fish.  They were on the well-stocked Vchivaya.  More than three hundred fish, small and great, were drawn on shore; and then they recast the net.

“Up, man and beast!” thundered Ivan, as, after selecting two dozen of the finest, he abandoned the rest to the dogs.

The animals, faint and weary, greedily seized on the food given them, while Sakalar and the Kolimsk men could scarcely believe their senses.  The hot coals were at once brought into requisition, and the party were soon regaling themselves on a splendid meal of tea and broiled fish.  I should alarm my readers did I record the quantities eaten.  An hour later, every individual was a changed being, but most of all the lovers.  Despite their want of rest, they looked fresher than any of the party.  It was determined to camp at least twenty hours more in that spot; and the Kolimsk men declared that the river must be the Vchivaya, they could draw the seine all day, for the river was deep, its waters warmer than others, and its abundance of fish such as to border on the fabulous.  They went accordingly down to the side of the stream, and then the happy Kolina gave free vent to her joy.  She burst out into a song of her native land, and gave way to some demonstrations of delight, the result of her earlier education, that astonished Sakalar.  But when he heard that during that dreadful night he had found a son, Sakalar himself almost lost his reason.  The old man loved Ivan almost as much as his own child, and when he saw the youth in his yourte on his hunting trips, had formed some project of the kind now brought about; but the confessions of Ivan on his last visit to Mioure had driven all such thoughts away.

“Art in earnest, Ivan?” said he, after a pause of some duration.

“In earnest!” exclaimed Ivan, laughing; “why, I fancy the young men of Mioure will find me so, if they seek to question my right to Kolina!”

Kolina smiled, and looked happy; and the old hunter heartily blessed his children, adding that the proudest, dearest hope of his heart was now within probable realization.

The predictions of the Kolimsk men were realized.  The river gave them as much fish as they needed for their journey home; and as now Sakalar knew his way, there was little fear for the future.  An ample stock was piled on the sledges, the dogs had unlimited feeding for two days, and then away they sped toward an upper part of the river, which, being broad and shallow, was no doubt frozen on the surface.  They found it as they expected, and even discovered that the river was gradually freezing all the way down.  But little caring for this now, on they went, and after considerable fatigue and some delay, arrived at Kolimsk, to the utter astonishment of all the inhabitants, who had long given them up for lost.