to the interior. On the child being laid in, this folding cover is fastened with straps, which prevents the infant from falling out, or throwing off the reindeer skin in which it is enveloped. The face of the babe was uncovered, so as not to impede respiration.

During journeys, this hamper-cradle, with the child inside, is thrown over the shoulders of one of the parents, and secured by a leathern strap, in which way it is carried a great distance.

The willow shavings of the pillow are exceedingly soft. They are obtained by passing the edge of the knife lightly over the surface of young branches, so as to produce tiny threads or fibres, which, when collected in sufficient quantity, serve the Ostiaks as towels. With these they wipe their face and hands when they wash; and wipe their new-born children after bathing them in cold water in summer, or rubbing their tender limbs with snow in winter.

The Ostiak mothers are accustomed to nurture their children themselves, and do not imitate the example of Russian mothers, who, as I have before stated, feed them with cow's milk. In other parts, as in the colony at Irkutzk, the

new-born child of a Russian is given to a Takouta woman to nurse; and when old enough, learns to read and write, after which he is brought up to the fur trade, and his education is finished.

The days in October grew very short. At four o'clock it was completely dark. I felt this diminution of the light of day very much, and the more so from not being able to work on canvas by candle-light-a work of which I am extremely fond, and which was almost my sole amusement here.

Madame X brought us a hare which she said she had herself shot, that she might have the pleasure of presenting it to us. In the environs of Berezov there are immense numbers of hares, but the Russians do not eat them, as they hold the flesh of the hare to be unclean, and consequently this excellent game is never seen on their tables. Nobody kills them, and therefore they absolutely swarm.

On my giving the hare to our landlady to roast for our dinner, I saw her shrug her shoulders, at the same time making a wry face and spitting on the floor, as if a most disgusting

thing had been placed in her hand. This, however, did not make us enjoy our dinner the less when the hare was served.

When it grew perfectly dark, and our canvas work could no longer be continued, we laid it reluctantly aside, and went out for a walk. Josephine, however, discouraged partly by cold and partly by darkness, soon returned home; but as I wanted exercise, and solitude perhaps still more, I continued my walk further.

I went as far as the Zarutchaï Church, situated, as I formerly mentioned, beyond the precincts of the town, and separated from it by a deep ravine. This is a most retired and lonely spot, with a cemetery, surrounded by a venerable. wood of larch trees, which having survived hundreds of years, a long epoch of importance and renown, and having once, as tradition says, formed a sacred grove of the Ostiaks, seemed not unlike mighty potentates when shorn of all their power and dignity, and with nothing around them but crumbling tombs, pensively musing over the vanity of worldly glory.

The living generation, as though from respect for the last resting-place of those who were

sleeping, and who were not to awake until the sound of the Archangel's trumpet, deemed it right to remove their own habitations to some distance, though raising here an edifice for prayer and contrition, to be, as it were, a solemn threshold, beyond which, through the medium of death, their mortal life entered on immortality.

Night, silence, solitude, and the rivulet with its indistinct murmuring at the foot of the hill, all appeared like a sombre veil of mourning over the snow-white garment of the place. The full moon, now above the horizon, bathing her orb in the dark-blue abyss, gleamed from on high on this secluded scenery of the nether world. The pale lunar light shed on every object, imparted to the picture an unusual and most solemn aspect, more particularly when its rays fell on the bare towering trunks and leafless branches of the ancient larch trees-monuments of the past, amidst vestiges of a new civilization, amidst tombs composed of stone, of marble, and of iron, with the church watching over all. The scene, at that solemn hour, seemed to open to me a glimpse of the secret

purposes of the creation, speaking in a tongue unintelligible but to the spirit, but full of significance.

Oh! how marvellous was the light of that night, with its rainbow colours reflected from the mica-slate windows of the church, and from that gold cross raised high on its cupola ! How the strongest rays of light were concentrated around it, insomuch that it alone was seen above, as in the clouds, shedding the brightest light on all this earth around. The view sunk deep into my soul, awakening an infinity of associations and feelings which it is difficult to give an account of. My thoughts plunged into this abyss, seeking after the unfathomable future; but I soon perceived how incompetent I was to pursue the subject, and how it teemed with mystery and doubt. Soon indeed I felt that my reflections were becoming confused. I fell on my knees, tears gushed in a torrent down my cheeks, and my feelings burst forth in prayer. Then I learnt how feeble and yet how presumptuous is man, and was taught to seek all my light and all my solace only from on high.