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Down the Lena next, to Yakutsk, the great rendezvous of the fur traders, only one thousand miles more to the Pacific; and on the great plain of the fur traders near Yakutsk he at last overtook the Billings explorers on their way to America. Only one guinea was left in his pocket, and the Cossack commandant reported that the season was too far advanced for him to cross the Pacific.
He could proceed at once; and, no doubt, with twice the number or horses needed, would make the first and most difficult stage of the journey in the usual time, and with no great embarrassment from the rains. From Yakutsk to Irkutsk the greater part of the travel was by water in any case, and after that the land was flat for the most part and bridges were more numerous.
The remains were taken from their grave in the Lena Delta in March, 1883, and were retained at Yakutsk until the following winter, the season being too far advanced to admit of their immediate transportation. They arrived at New York February 20, 1884, where they were received with suitable honors.
Between the Yakut settlements on the Aldan and the town of Yakutsk, there was a good post-road really a road; so, harnessing shaggy white Yakut ponies to our Okhotsk dog-sledges, we drove swiftly westward, to the unfamiliar music of Russian sleigh-bells, changing horses at every post-station and riding from fifteen to eighteen hours out of the twenty-four.
At the head waters of the Lena, rafts and flatboats, similar to the old Mackinaw boats of American fur traders on the Missouri, were built and the cargo floated down to Yakutsk, the great rendezvous of Siberian fur traders. Here exiles acting as packers and Cossacks as overseers usually went on a wild ten days' spree.
He could arrive in Okhotsk late in September or early in October. Captain D'Wolf, who had been detained at Sitka during his absence by the same indifference that had operated against the completion of the Avos, would precede him and order that all be in readiness at Okhotsk both for the ships and his journey to Yakutsk.
From this place he went back to Irkutsh, to spend a part of the winter; proposing, in the spring, to return to Yakutsk, in order to proceed in the summer to Okotsk. Hitherto, Mr. Lediard had gone on prosperously, and flattered himself with the hopes of succeeding in his undertaking.
The Grand Duke, General Voranzoff, the governor of the town, and the chief of the merchants, with several officers, had collected to determine upon various proposals. "Gentlemen," said the Grand Duke, "you know our situation exactly. I have the firm hope that we shall be able to hold out until the arrival of the Yakutsk troops.
He decided, therefore, to postpone his trip to Yakutsk until later in the fall, and to do what he could in the meantime with the two vessels already at his disposal.
Late in February the Cossack Kolmagórof arrived from Petropavlovsk, Kamchatka, bringing three of the men who had been landed there by the Onward. In March I received by a special courier from Yakutsk another letter and more orders from Major Abaza.
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