From Pole to Pole: A Book for Young People

by Sven Anders Hedin

Next morning we stay for two hours at a station in Manchuria, on the boundary between Manchuria and Siberia, between China and Russia, and here our luggage is examined by the Russian customs officers. We put our watches back one and a half hours—that is the difference of time between Kharbin and Irkutsk. We are now travelling from east to west, in the same direction as the sun. If the train went as fast as the sun we should enjoy perpetual day; but the train lags behind, and we only gain an hour in the twenty-four.

The Trans-Siberian railway is the longest in the world, the distance from Dalny to Moscow being 5400 miles. The railway was completed just in time for the war, but as it had only one track, it taxed all the energy of the Russians to transport troops and war material to the battlefields in Manchuria. A second track is now being laid.

By using this railway a traveller can go from London to Shanghai in fourteen days, the route being to Dover, across the Channel to Calais, by rail to Moscow, from Moscow to Vladivostock by the Trans-Siberian railway, and from Vladivostock to Shanghai by sea. The sea voyage from London by the P. and O.—calling at Gibraltar, Marseilles, Port Said, Aden, Colombo, Penang, Singapore, and Hong Kong—takes about six weeks, which can be reduced to a month by travelling by train across Europe to Brindisi (at the south-eastern corner of Italy), and thence by steamer to Port Said, where the liner is joined. There is still a third route, across the Atlantic to the United States or Canada, by rail to San Francisco or Vancouver, and then by steamer to Shanghai via Japan. This journey can also be accomplished in a month.

THE TRANS-SIBERIAN RAILWAY.

On the last day of the year we pass through the Yablonoi Mountains and enter the region called Transbaikalia, because it lies on the farther, that is, the eastern, side of Lake Baikal. Here dwell Buriats, a Mongolian people—in winter in wooden huts surrounded by enclosures for domestic animals, in summer in tents. When we awoke on the morning of New Year's Day the train was passing along the southern shore of Lake Baikal, and one of the most enchanting scenes in the world was displayed to the eyes of the passengers. On the eastern shore the mountains stood clearly defined in the pure morning air, while the ranges to the west were lit up by the clear sunshine. Here and there the slopes were covered with northern pine and fir-trees. The line runs all the way along the lake shore, sometimes only a couple of yards from the water. This part of the Trans-Siberian railway was the most difficult and costly to make, and the last to be completed. During its construction traffic between the extremities of the line was provided for by great ferry-boats across the lake. The line winds in and out, following all the promontories and bays of the lake, and the train rolls on through narrow galleries where columns of rock are left to support a whole roof of mountain. Sometimes we run along a ledge blasted out of the side of the mountain, above a precipitous slope which falls headlong to the lake. We rush through an endless succession of tunnels, and on emerging from each are surprised by a new view of the mountainous shore.

Baikal, or the "Rich Lake," is the third inland sea of Asia, only the Caspian and the Sea of Aral being larger. Its height above sea-level is 1560 feet; the water is light-green in colour, sweet, and crystal clear, and abounds in fish, among them five species of salmon. There is also a kind of seal, and in general many of the animal forms of Baikal are allied to those of the salt sea. Baikal is the deepest lake in the world, soundings having been taken down to 5618 feet. Steamers cross the lake in various directions, and in winter sleighs are driven over the ice from shore to shore. At the beginning of January the whole of the deep lake is so cooled down that ice begins to form, and the lake is usually frozen over to the middle of April.

We stop an hour at Irkutsk to change trains. Irkutsk is the largest town in Siberia, and has 100,000 inhabitants; it stands on the bank of the river Angara, which flows out of Lake Baikal, and thus forms the outlet of all the rivers and streams which empty themselves into the lake, the largest of which is the Selenga. Although the Angara is five times as large as the Yenisei, it is called a tributary of the latter. The Yenisei rises in Chinese territory, and, running northwards right through Siberia, falls into the Arctic Ocean. It receives a large number of affluents, most of them from the east. Its banks are clothed with forest, and from Minusinsk downwards the river is navigable.

The Lena, the great river which passes through eastern Siberia north-east of Baikal, is not much smaller than the Yenisei. There stands the town of Yakutsk, where the temperature falls in winter down to-80°, and rises in summer to 95°. North of Yakutsk, on the river Yana, lies Verkhoiansk, the coldest place in the world, the centre of low temperature or pole of cold.

In area Siberia is larger than the whole of Europe, but the population in this immense country is no greater than that of Greater London, i.e. about seven millions. Of these 60 per cent are Russians, 20 per cent Kirghizes, and the remainder is made up of Buriats, Yakuts, Tunguses, Manchus, Samoyeds, Ostiaks, Tatars, Chukchis, etc. No small part of the Russian population consists of convicts transported to Siberia, whose hard lot is to work under strict supervision in the gold mines. Their number is estimated at 150,000. Before the railway was made they had to travel tremendous distances on foot. They marched ten miles a day in rain and sunshine, storm and snow, through the terribly cold and gloomy Siberia. Before and behind them rode Cossacks, who would not let them rest as they dragged their chains through the mud and mire of the road. Frequently women and children followed of their own free will to share their husbands' and fathers' fate during their forced labour in the mines. Now there is a great improvement. The labour, indeed, is just as hard, but the journey out is less trying. The unfortunate people are now forwarded in special prison vans with gratings for windows. They are like travelling cells, and can often be seen on side tracks at a station.