"I should think we ought to see the land to-night, Luka; three days at eighty miles a day is two hundred and forty miles. If we don't see it by evening, we must head a little more to the south. Of course we cannot depend very accurately on our steering, and we may have been going a trifle north of west all this time. But it is all right, for the coast we are making for keeps on trending north, and we are certain to hit it sooner or later."
At six o'clock they had a meal which Luka had been cooking, and then Godfrey said, "Now I will have my six hours' sleep." He stood up to change places and let Luka come astern to steer, when he exclaimed, "Look, is that a cloud ahead of us, or is it land?"
"Land!" Luka said after gazing at it attentively. "It is high land."
All idea of sleep was given up. Godfrey seized his paddle again, and in four hours they were within a mile of the land. It differed widely from the low coast they had so long been passing. Steep hills rose from the very edge of the shore, clad in many places with pine forests. They were not long before they found a suitable place to land, and soon had the canoe ashore and the tent erected, for the nights were already becoming unpleasantly cold. Luka went into the woods, and soon returned with some dried branches and a quantity of pine cones. Godfrey cut three sticks and made a tripod, from which the small kettle was suspended, and fish and meat were soon grilling over the fire. As soon as the kettle boiled a handful of tea was dropped into it, and it was taken off the fire. The three companions made an excellent meal, then Luka and Godfrey lighted their pipes and sat smoking by the fire for half an hour, and then lay down in the tent for a sound sleep.
When Godfrey woke he found that Luka was already up. He had stirred up the embers, put on fresh wood, filled the kettle and hung it over the fire, and had then evidently sauntered off into the wood. Godfrey, after the luxury of a rapid bathe, began to prepare breakfast, and by the time it was ready Luka came down with a dozen squirrels he had shot.
"Lots of them in the wood," he said; "if stop here three or four days, get lots of skins."
"I don't think they would be much good to us, Luka, though those you shot will be useful for food; but I have been obliged to stand with my head over the smoke of the fire to keep off these rascally mosquitoes, and my face was so swelled with their bites when I woke that I could hardly see out of my eyes till I bathed my face with cold water. The sooner we are off the better, if we don't want to be eaten alive."
Accordingly, as soon as the meal was finished they packed up and continued their voyage. After eight hours' paddling they came upon the mouth of a river.
"This must be the Seriberka," Godfrey said. "That is the only river marked in the map anywhere about here. We will paddle a mile or two up and fill our kettles. If it is that river, we shall come upon an island a few miles off the coast, in another twenty or thirty miles. See, Luka, how near we are getting to the end of the map. We are not very much more than a hundred miles from this line; that is the division between Russia and Norway. Once we land on the other side of that line we are free."