y they are so big that I could scarcely lift a pair of
them with one hand. They make huge drinking-vessels out of these" (p.
230). [See I. p. 177.]

_Vair_, so often mentioned in mediaeval works, appears to have been a name
appropriate to the fur as prepared rather than to the animal. This appears
to have been the Siberian squirrel called in French _petit-gris_, the back
of which is of a fine grey and the belly of a brilliant white. In the
_Vair_ (which is perhaps only _varius_ or variegated) the backs and
bellies were joined in a kind of checquer; whence the heraldic checquer
called by the same name. There were two kinds, _menu-vair_ corrupted into
_minever_, and _gros-vair_, but I cannot learn clearly on what the
distinction rested. (See _Douet d'Arcq_, p. xxxv.) Upwards of 2000
_ventres de menuvair_ were sometimes consumed in one complete suit of
robes (Ib. xxxii.).

The traps used by the Siberian tribes to take these valuable animals are
described by Erman (I. 452), only in the English translation the
description is totally incomprehensible; also in Wrangell, I. 151.

NOTE 5.--The country chiefly described in this chapter is probably that
which the Russians, and also the Arabian Geographers, used to term
_Yugria_, apparently the country of the Ostyaks on the Obi. The
winter-dwellings of the people are not, strictly speaking, underground, but
they are flanked with earth piled up against the walls. The same is the
case with those of the Yakuts in Eastern Siberia, and these often have the
floors also sunk 3 feet in the earth. Habitations really subterranean, of
some previous race, have been found in the Samoyed country. (_Klaproth's
Mag. Asiatique, II. 66._)

CHAPTER XXI.

CONCERNING THE LAND OF DARKNESS.

Still further north, and a long way beyond that kingdom of which I have
spoken, there is a region which bears the name of DARKNESS, because
neither sun nor moon nor stars appear, but it is always as dark as with us
in the twilight. The people have no king of their own, nor are they
subject to any foreigner, and live like beasts. [They are dull of
understanding, like half-witted persons.[NOTE 1]]

The Tartars however sometimes visit the country, and they do it in this
way. They enter the region riding mares that have foals, and these foals
they leave behind. After taking all the plunder that they can get they
find their way back by help of the mares, which are all eager to get back
to their foals, and