ice, until they anchored outside
the village of Khabarova. The "village" consisted of a few huts and
tents of Russian and Samoyedes pasturing their reindeer on the Vaygets
Island. On the bleak northern shores stood a little wooden church,
which the explorers visited with much interest. It seemed strange to
find here brass bas-reliefs representing the Christ, St. Nicholas,
Elijah, St. George and the Dragon, and the Resurrection; in front of
each hung a little oil lamp. The people were dressed entirely in
reindeer skin from head to foot, and they had a great collection of
walrus tusks and skins such as Othere had brought centuries before
to King Alfred.

Nordenskiold's account of a short drive in a reindeer sledge is amusing.
"Four reindeer were put side by side to each sledge," he says. "Ivan,
my driver, requested me to hold tight; he held the reins of all four
reindeer in one hand, and away we went over the plain! His request
to keep myself tight to the sledge was not unnecessary; at one moment
the sledge jumped over a big tussock, the next it went down into a
pit. It was anything but a comfortable drive, for the pace at which
we went was very great."

On 1st August the _Vega_ was off again, and soon she had entered the
Kara Sea, known in the days of the Dutch explorers as the "ice-cellar."
Then past White Island and the estuary of the great Obi River, past
the mouth of the Yenisei to Dickson Island, lately discovered, she
sailed. Here in this "best-known haven on the whole north coast of
Asia they anchored and spent time in bear and reindeer hunting." "In
consequence of the successful sport we lived very extravagantly during
these days; our table groaned with joints of venison and bear-hams."

They now sailed north close bound in fog, till on 20th August "we
reached the great goal, which for centuries had been the object of
unsuccessful struggles. For the first time a vessel lay at anchor off
the northernmost cape of the Old World. With colours flying on every
mast and saluting the venerable north point of the Old World with the
Swedish salute of five guns, we came to an anchor!"

[Illustration: NORDENSKIOLD'S SHIP, THE _VEGA_, SALUTING CAPE
CHELYUSKIN, THE MOST NORTHERLY POINT OF THE OLD WORLD. From a drawing
in Hovgaard's _Nordenskiold's Voyage_.]

The fog lifting for a moment, they saw a white Polar bear standing
"regarding the unexpected guests with surprise."

When afterwards a member of the expedition was