JAKUTS.
The Jakuts are the most energetic of these races, having reached a higher civilization than the others in the same latitude, with the exception of Iceland, Finland, and Norway. They are a pastoral people, hospitable, possess considerable mechanical skill, and are so shrewd and cunning that no Russian can compete with them.
“Even in Siberia,” Wrangell says, “they are called ‘men of iron.’ Often have I seen them sleeping at a temperature of 4° in the open air, and with a thick ice rind covering their almost unprotected bodies.”
Though reserved and unsocial, they are kind to strangers that need assistance. They are the universal carriers to the east of the Lena. Bidding defiance to the cold and the storm, fearing neither the gloom of the forest nor the dangers of the icy stream, yet they are not emancipated from the old belief in Schamanism—the dread of evil spirits. They number about 200,000, and form the principal part of the population of the vast and dreary province of Jakutsk.