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4
and conveyed to Petropavlovsky on board of a small government schooner.

The distance from Elovka to Tigil is two hundred versts. We employed four days to pass over the mountains, four days of continual heavy rain with a cutting nor-west wind and no shelter whatever. The road was horrible, steep, muddy and swampy. Some of our horses were so exhausted that we were obliged to abandon them.

Finally we reached Tigil in a pretty poor condition. Our stock had suffered considerably and in spite of careful packing, our provisions were wet through. Many of our pack horses having been thrown down whilst crossing streams, hard bread and tea were literally swimming in the boxes and sugar had melted. Our personal loss was great: the few toilet articles we had taken with us had turned into jelly.

The weather continuing to be very bad, we were compelled to remain in Tigil three days for a general drying and the renewal of our stock of provisions.

We thus traversed a distance of 1.200 versts on bad roads, by terrible weather, in eighteen days including 24 hours spent at Kluchi. Our travel was considered extraordinarily rapid by the inhabitants.

The night of our arrival in Tigil a