to carry provisions for two weeks and 100 cartridges.  The cavalry had guns as well as sabres, so that they might also fight on foot, and the artillery were supplied with axes, so that, if necessary, they might serve as carpenters, and all prepared to swim should the necessity arise.  With this small force Michelson followed Pugasceff amid the horde of insurrectionary tribes, surrounded on every side by people upon whose mercy he could not count, whose language he did not understand, and whose motto was death.  Yet he went amongst them in cold blood, as the sailor braves the terrors of the ocean.  On the 7th of May he was attacked by the father of the pretty Ulijanka, near the Szimszki factory, with 2,000 Baskirs, who were about to join Pugasceff.  Michelson dispersed them, captured their guns, and discovered from the Baskir captives that Beloborodoff, one of the dukes created by Pugasceff, was approaching with a large force of renegade Russian soldiers.  Michelson caught up with them near the Jeresen stream, and drove them into the Szatkin factory.  Riding all by himself, so close to them that his voice could be heard, he commenced by admonishing them to rejoin the standard of the Czarina.  He was fired at more than 2,000 times from the windows of the factory, but when they saw that he was invulnerable they suddenly threw open the gates and joined his forces.  From them he discovered the whereabouts of the mock Czar, who had at the time once more recovered himself, had captured three strongholds, Magitnaja, Stepnaja, and Petroluskaja, and was just then besieging Troiczka.  This place he took before the arrival of Michelson, who found in lieu of a stronghold nothing but ruins, dead bodies, and Russian officers hanging from the trees.  Pugasceff heard of the approach of his opponent, and, with savage cunning, laid a snare to capture the daring pursuer.  He dressed his soldiers in the uniform of the dead Russian soldiers, and sent messengers to Michelson in the name of Colonel Colon that be should join him beyond Varlamora.  Michelson only perceived the trick when his vanguard was attacked and two of his guns captured.

Although surrounded, he immediately fell upon the flower of Pugasceff’s guard, and cut his way through just where the enemy was strongest.  The net was torn asunder.  It was not strong enough.  Pugasceff fled before Michelson, and, with a few hundred followers, escaped into the interior of Siberia, near the lake of Arga.  All of a sudden Michelson found Szalavatka at his rear with Baskir troops who had already captured the Szatkin factory, and put to the sword men, women, and children.  Michelson turned back suddenly, and found the Baskir camp strongly intrenched near the river Aj.  The enemy had destroyed the bridges over the river, and confidently awaited the Imperial troops.  At daybreak Michelson ordered up forty horsemen and placed a rifleman behind the saddle of each, telling them to swim the river and defend themselves until the remainder of the troops