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We frequently met or passed small trains of two-wheeled carts, some laden with merchandise and others carrying Bouriat or Russian families. Most of these carts were drawn by bullocks harnessed like horses between shafts. Occasionally I saw bullocks saddled and ridden as we ride horses, though not quite as rapidly.
When the smotretal announced that all was ready we proceeded to the river and found it anything but inviting. The Bouriat yemshick pronounced it safe, and as he was a responsible party we deferred to his judgment. While we waited a girl rode a horse through the stream without hesitation. We had four horses harnessed abreast and guided by the yemshick.
The station-masters were Russian, but frequently all their employees were of Mongol blood. Some part of the carriage gave way on the road, and it was necessary to repair it at a station. A Bouriat man-of-all-work undertook the job and performed it very well. While waiting for the repairs I saw some good specimens of iron work from the hands of native blacksmiths.
We slept most of the first night, and timed our arrival at Selenginsk so as to find the school in session. During a brief halt while the smotretal prepared our breakfast, Maack visited the school-master at his post of duty. Over the hills behind a lake about a day's ride from Selenginsk there is a Bouriat village of a sacred character.
The major then addressed his Bouriat interpreter in Russian. This interpreter turned to a Mongol-Chinese official at his side and spoke to him in Mongol. The latter translated into Chinese for the understanding of his chief. The replies of the sargootchay returned by the same route. I have a suspicion that very little of what we really said ever reached its destination.
The boat was a long time coming, and while we waited its arrival a drunken Bouriat made himself unpleasantly familiar. As often as I changed my position he would come to my side and endeavor to rest his dirty arm on my shoulder. I finally walked through a pile of brushwood and crooked sticks, which was too much for the native with his weak knees and muddy brain.
A few are half Mongol and half Russian, caused no doubt by their owners being born and reared under Muscovite protection. I saw many pleasing and intelligent countenances, but few that were pretty according to Western notions. There is a famous Bouriat beauty of whose charms I heard much and was anxious to gaze upon.
Two others were temporarily attached ahead under control of a Bouriat. As we drove into the river the horses shrank from the cold water and ice that came against their sides. One slipped and fell, but was soon up again. The current drifted us with it and I thought for a moment we were badly caught. The drivers whipped and shouted so effectively that we reached the other side without accident.
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