Page:Siberia and the Exile System Vol 1.djvu/184

162 From the library I strolled eastward along the bank of the Írtish to the pendulum ferry by which communication is maintained between Semipalátinsk and a Kírghis suburb on the other side of the river. The ferry-boat starts from a wooded island in mid-stream, which is reached either by crossing a foot-bridge, or by fording the shallow channel that separates it from the Semipalátinsk shore. Just ahead of me were several Kírghis with three or four double-humped camels, one of which was harnessed to a Russian teléga. Upon reaching the ford the Kírghis released the draught camel from the teléga, lashed the empty vehicle, wheels upwards, upon the back of the grunting, groaning animal, and made him wade with it across the stream. A Bactrian camel, with his two loose, drooping humps, his long neck, and his preposterously conceited and disdainful expression of countenance, is always a ridiculous beast, but he never looks so absurdly comical as when crossing a stream with a four-wheeled wagon lashed bottom upward on his back. The shore of the Írtish opposite Semipalátinsk is nothing more than the edge of a great desert-like steppe which stretches away to the southward beyond the limits of vision. I reached there just in time to see the unloading of a caravan of camels which had arrived from Tashkénd with silks, rugs, and other Central Asiatic goods for the Semipalátinsk market.

Late in the afternoon I retraced my steps to the hotel, where I found Mr. Frost, who had been sketching all day in the Tatár or eastern end of the town. The evening was hot and sultry, and we sat until eleven o'clock without coats or waistcoats, beside windows thrown wide open to catch every breath of air, listening to the unfamiliar noises of the Tatár city. It was the last night of the great Mohammedan fast of Ramazan, and the whole population seemed to be astir until long after midnight. From every part of the town came to us on the still night air the quick staccato throbbing of watchmen's rattles, which sounded like the rapid beating