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In that dreary climate, instead of the animated picture of a Tartar camp, the smoke that issues from the earth, or rather from the snow, betrays the subterraneous dwellings of the Tongouses, and the Samoides: the want of horses and oxen is imperfectly supplied by the use of reindeer, and of large dogs; and the conquerors of the earth insensibly degenerate into a race of deformed and diminutive savages, who tremble at the sound of arms.
The circumstance that they abound in the frozen drift of the great northern plain of Asia, and are occasionally exposed in consequence of the wearing of the large rivers traversing Siberia, has led to the superstition among the Tongouses, that the Mammoths live under ground, and die whenever, on coming to the surface, the sunlight falls upon them.
He therefore asked permission to accompany the ambassador Golowkin, who was going to China overland; and the necessary credentials obtained, he started alone for Siberia, making acquaintance with the Samoyèdes, the Tongouses, Bashkirs, Yakontes, Kirghizes, and other of the Finnic and Tartar hordes which frequent these vast steppes, finally arriving at Yakutsk, where he was soon joined by Golowkin.
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