nd
occasionally coming loose from its fastenings. No man showed any sign
of hurrying, but all acted as if there were nothing in the world as
cheap as time. One day I watched the wooding operation from beginning
to end. It took an hour and a half and twelve men to bring about four
cords of wood on board. There was but one man displaying any activity,
and _he_ was falling from the plank into the river.

[Illustration: WOODING UP.]

The Russian measure of wood is the _sajene_ (fathom.) and a sajene of
wood is a pile a fathom long, wide, and high. The Russian marine
fathom measures six feet like our own, but the land fathom is seven
feet. It is by the land fathom that everything on solid earth is
measured. A stick seven feet long is somewhat inconvenient, and
therefore they cut wood half a fathom in length.

We landed our first freight at Nova Mihalofski, a Russian village on
the southern bank of the river. The village was small and the houses
were far from palatial. The inhabitants live by agriculture in summer,
sending their produce to Nicolayevsk, and by supplying horses for the
postal service in winter. I observed here and at other villages an
example of Russian economy. Not able to purchase whole panes of window
glass the peasants use fragments of glass of any shape they can get.
These are set in pieces of birch bark cut to the proper form and the
edges held by wax or putty. The bark is then fastened to the window
sash much as a piece of mosquito netting is fixed in a frame.

Near Springfield, Missouri, I once passed a night in a farmer's house.
The dwelling had no windows, and when we breakfasted we were obliged
to keep the door open to give us light, though the thermometer was at
zero, with a strong wind blowing. "I have lived in this house
seventeen years," said the owner; "have a good farm and own four
niggers." But he could not afford the expense of a window, even of the
Siberian kind!

Ten or fifteen miles above this village we reached Mihalofski,
containing a hundred houses and three or four hundred inhabitants.
From the river this town appeared quite pretty and thriving; the
houses were substantially built, and many had flower gardens in front
and neat fences around them. Between the town and the river there were
market gardens in flourishing condition, bearing most of the
vegetables in common use through the north. The town is along a ridge
of easy ascent, and most of the dwellings are thirty or forty fe