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Rh or Mongolian city, but Kiákhta did not differ essentially from other Siberian settlements of its class.

After a moment's pause he asked suddenly, as if struck by a new thought, "Have you ever eaten a Chinese dinner?"

"Never," I replied.

"Well," he said, "then there is one new experience that I can give you. I'll get up a Chinese dinner for you in Maimáchin day after to-morrow. I know a Chinese merchant there who has a good cook, and although I cannot promise you upon such short notice a dinner of more than forty courses, perhaps it will be enough to give you an idea of the thing."

We thanked him, and said that although we had had little to eat since entering the Trans-Baikál except bread and tea, we thought that a dinner of forty courses would be fully adequate to satisfy both our appetites and our curiosity.

From the house of Mr. Lúshnikof we went to call upon the Russian boundary commissioner, Mr. Sulkófski, who lived near at hand and who greeted us with as much informal good-fellowship as if we had been old friends. We were very often surprised in these far-away parts of the globe to find ourselves linked by so many persons and associations to the civilized world and to our homes. In the house of Mr. Lúshnikof, for example, we had the wholly unexpected pleasure of talking in English with Mrs. Hamilton, a cultivated Scotch lady, who had come to Kiákhta across China and Mongolia and had been for several years a member of Mr. Lúshnikof's family. In the person of the Russian boundary commissioner we were almost as much surprised to find a gentleman who had met many officers of the Jeannette arctic exploring expedition — including Messrg. Melville and Danenhower; who had seen the relief steamer Rodgers in her winter quarters near Bering Strait; and who was acquainted with Captain Berry of that vessel and with the Herald correspondent, Mr. Gilder.