outside. Digging to the
surface, the depth proved much greater than expected.

Quite exhausted with their labor, they gained the open air, and found
the storm had not ceased. Alarmed for their companions they tried to
reach them, but the hole where they ascended was completely filled.
The snow drifted rapidly, and they were obliged to change their
position often to keep near the surface. When the poorga ended they
estimated it had left fifty feet of snow in that spot.

Again endeavoring to rescue their companions, and in their weak
condition finding it impossible, they sought the nearest camp. In the
following summer the remains of men and dogs were found where the
melting snow left them. They had huddled close together, and probably
perished from suffocation.

[Illustration: TAIL PIECE, REINDEER]

CHAPTER VIII.

We remained four days at Ghijiga and then sailed for Ohotsk. For two
days we steamed to get well out of the bay, and then stopped the
engines aird depended upon canvas. A boy who once offered a dog for
sale was asked the breed of the pup.

"He _was_ a pointer," replied the youth; "but father cut off his ears
and tail last week and made a bull-dog of him."

Lowering the chimney and hoisting the screw, the Yariag became a
sailing ship, though her steaming propensities remained, just as the
artificial bull-dog undoubtedly retained the pointer instinct. The
ship had an advantage over the animal in her ability to resume her old
character at pleasure.

On the fourth day, during a calm, we were surrounded by sea-gulls like
those near San Francisco. We made deep sea soundings and obtained
specimens of the bottom from depths of two or three hundred fathoms.
Near the entrance of Ghijiga Bay we brought up coral from eighty
fathoms of water, and refuted the theory that coral grows only in the
tropics and at a depth of less than two hundred feet. The specimens
were both white and red, resembling the moss-like sprigs often seen in
museums. The temperature of the water was 47 deg. Fahrenheit. Captain Lund
told me coral had been found in the Ohotsk sea in latitude 55 deg. in a
bed of considerable extent.

Every day when calm we made soundings, which were carefully recorded
for the use of Russian chart makers. Once we found that the
temperature of the bottom at a depth of two hundred fathoms, was at
the freezing point of water. The doctor proposed that a bottle of
champagne should be cooled in the marine re