ustache and swagger.

On Monday, the day following our arrival, to all those who cared to
avail themselves of it, a regular day's outing was granted. We started
early, so as to have a long day before us. We had permission to fish to
our heart's content, in waters where fish is specially abundant and
good. It was rather a long pull to the shore, and shallow water there
when we reached it, for we had gone a considerable distance up a small
river. The town (so it is called) of Alexandrovsk--at the same time the
village of "Tighee" (Torpoint) would make four such towns--was passed on
our way up. We pushed on into the interior as far as we could drag our
larger boats, and selected our encampment on a spit of beach, near the
dwellings of some natives. These huts were of tent shape and constructed
of bark, and covered with the skins of the reindeer, numbers of which
animals we can see grazing in the vicinity.

The inhabitants of this little-known part of the great asiatic
continent, are mongolian Tartars. They are possessed of a rather
forbidding cast of feature, have great square, flat faces, the nose
scarcely distinguishable, and swallowed up in the flattening process
(this though, by the way, is an index of beauty amongst them), low
foreheads, and dreamy-looking obliquely-set eyes. Their head-gear is
much after the Chinese style, except, that in addition to the queue,
they allow the remainder of the hair to develop itself, which it does in
the wildest and most elfish manner. For dress, the untanned skins of the
animals caught in the chase, with the hair outboard, answers all their
requirements. At first one experiences a great difficulty in
distinguishing the sexes, for the ordinary bearings by which we sight
"danger" ahead are entirely wanting. Stay, are they _all_ absent?
Scarcely, for the vanity inherent in woman displays itself even here.
These ladies have large _iron_ rings in their ears, and through the
cartilage of the nose a similar pendant is hung, on which is an
additional ornament of a green stone, much resembling the mineral
malachite. Their dress is a very capacious, continuous garment of the
yellow skin of the hair seal, seamed with sinews, and very rudely put
together. Hundreds of yelping dogs lay about in all possible attitudes
of laziness, whilst a few other village pets, _e.g._, a great
bald-headed eagle, of a most bloodthirsty and ferocious aspect, and a
couple of large brown bears with uncomfortable loo