KASANSKOI.
TRADER’S HOUSE AT KASANSKOI.
After I had thoroughly explored the adjoining country, one morning I got out a small steam-launch belonging to the Phœnix, and, with a Russian who spoke a little German as fireman and interpreter, went down the river as far as the four or five log-houses and huts which constituted the settlement of Kasanskoi. As at Karaoul, the dogs gave us a hearty welcome, though, fortunately, they were all chained up this time, as they looked anything but gentle creatures, and tried hard to get at us. The largest of the houses was really not a bad-looking sort of place, certainly far better than one would have expected to find. The proprietor came out and politely invited us to enter. We accepted his invitation, and, following him in, found ourselves in a large kind of kitchen, in which several members of the family were busily engaged in various household duties. But for the quaint costume of the man, and the fact that the women were smoking cigarettes, there was nothing particularly striking about the place. I could not, however, help immediately noticing how wonderfully clean it was: the walls rivalled the boards of the floor in whiteness, the table shone like a looking-glass, and everything showed the handiwork of a careful housewife. The stove was alight, and the heat was excessive, yet, curiously, there was not the slightest feeling of ill ventilation. Immediately on entering I noticed (as my “Murray” told me I should in all Russian dwellings) the inevitable sacred picture in a corner of the room, and, in accordance with the advice he gives, I immediately took off my hat, so as to be quite en règle. The Russians, or rather the Northern Siberians, are certainly a most phlegmatic race, if they are all like the few I have already met. One would have thought that in this remote place the entrance of a stranger would have excited just the least little show of interest—but no, they hardly uttered a word; they just looked up for a second from their work, and then resumed it without the slightest comment, as if I had been an ordinary everyday visitor from a neighbouring house. Since they paid so little attention, I was equally cool, and walked round about the room, looking at everything as though I had been in a museum; and then got out my sketch-book, and, sitting down, started a portrait of my host. He seemed to understand what I wanted of him, and kept as rigid as a statue while I was doing it.
MINE HOST AT KASANSKOI.
Even when it was finished, no one evinced the slightest curiosity to see the result. In any other part of the world one would have been pestered by people crowding round and all wanting to finger one’s sketch-book; but here, in this far-away Siberian home, where, to say the least of it, sketching is not an everyday sight, stolid indifference was stronger than idle curiosity. I determined to take advantage of it, and, since my being there did not seem to disturb them a little bit, I got out the launch, and returned there the next day with my paint-box and largest sketching-block.
SWEET SEVENTEEN.