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Updated: May 4, 2025
"You might shoot them, Godfrey, if you could find a place where the bank is pretty high so as to look down on the water." "So I could; I did not think of that. I must try to-morrow." "If it hadn't been for my feet," Alexis said, "we should have been down on the Selenga to-morrow, and we had calculated on being able to buy food at one of the villages there."
We began driving as fast as we could, cherishing a faint hope of reaching Sryetensk by the 20th. I will tell you when we meet about my journey along the bank of the Selenga and across Transbaikalia. Now I will only say that Selenga is one continuous loneliness, and in Transbaikalia I found everything I wanted: the Caucasus, and the valley of the Psyol, and the Zvenigorod district, and the Don.
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.
It is an imposing edifice built like a Russian church in the middle of a large area surrounded by a high wall. Though it must have impressed the natives by its architectural effects it was powerless to change their faith. As it approaches Lake Baikal the Selenga divides into several branches, and encloses a large and very fertile delta.
One threads its way to the eastward, where it assists in forming the Amoor; the other through the Selenga, Lake Baikal, and the Yenesei, is finally swallowed up among the icebergs and perpetual snows of the far north. "One to long darkness and the frozen tide; One to the Peaceful Sea."
There were flocks of sheep, droves of cattle and horses, and stacks of hay and grain; everybody was apparently well fed and the houses were attractive. We had good horses, good drivers, and generally good roads for the first hundred versts. Sometimes we left the Selenga, but kept generally parallel to its course. The mountains beyond the valley were lofty and clearly defined.
There is such abundance of soil in Siberia that every farmer can have all he desires to cultivate. Many farms along the Selenga had a 'straggling' appearance, as if too large for their owners. Per contra, I saw many neat and well managed homesteads, with clean and comfortable dwellings.
"Now I feel ready for anything," Alexis said as they tramped along. "We have no weight to speak of to carry, and we have means of getting a meal occasionally. Now if we keep a little west of south we shall strike the Selenga river, which runs through Maimatchin, and then we shall be in China.
While halting at night the floor or a hard sofa is preferable to a soft bed. The journey ended, the reign of luxuries can begin. When we left Verkne Udinsk we crossed the Selenga before passing the municipal limits. Our ferry-boat was like the one at Stratensk, and had barely room on its platform for our tarantass.
Verkne Udinsk is at the junction of the Ouda and Selenga rivers, three hundred versts from Irkutsk and four hundred and fifty from Chetah. It presents a pretty appearance when approached from the east, when its largest and best buildings first catch the eye. It has a church nearly two hundred years old, built with immensely thick walls to resist occasional earthquakes.
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