Lake Baikal in Winter
The natives say nobody was ever lost in Lake Baikal. When a person is drowned there the waves invariably throw his body on shore.
The lake does not freeze until the middle of December, and sometimes later. Its temperature remains pretty nearly the same at all seasons, about 48° Fahrenheit. In winter it is crossed on the ice, the passage ordinarily occupying about five hours. The lake generally freezes when the air is perfectly still so that the surface is of glossy smoothness until covered with snow. A gentleman in Irkutsk described to me his feelings when he crossed Lake Baikal in winter for the first time. The ice was six feet thick, but so perfectly transparent that he seemed driving over the surface of the water. The illusion was complete, and not wholly dispelled when he alighted. “Starting from the western side, the opposite coast was not visible, and I experienced” said my friend, “the sensation of setting out in a sleigh to cross the Atlantic from Liverpool to New York.”
In summer and in winter communication is pretty regular, but there is a suspension of travel when the ice is forming, and another when it breaks up. This causes serious inconvenience, and has led the government to build a road around the southern extremity of the lake. The mountains are lofty and precipitous, and the work is done at vast expense. The road winds over cliffs and crags sometimes near the lake and again two thousand feet above it. Largo numbers of peasants, Bouriats, and prisoners have been employed there for several years, but the route was not open for wheeled vehicles at the time I crossed the lake.
One mode of cutting the road through the mountains was to build large bonfires in winter when the temperature was very low. The heat caused the rock to crack so that large masses could be removed, but the operation was necessarily slow. The insurrection of June, 1866, occurred on this road.
Formerly a winter station was kept on the ice half-way across the lake. By a sudden thaw at the close of one winter the men and horses of a station were swallowed up, and nothing was known of them until weeks afterward, when their bodies were washed ashore. Since this catastrophe the entire passage of the lake, about forty miles, is made without change of horses.
We left Posolsky and enjoyed a sunset on the lake. The mountains rise abruptly on the western and southeastern shores, and many of their snow covered peaks were beautifully tinged by the fading sunlight. The illusion regarding distances was difficult to overcome, and could only be realized by observing how very slowly we neared the mountains we were approaching. The atmosphere was of remarkable purity, and its powers of refraction reminded me of past experience in the Rocky Mountains. We had sunset and moon-rise at once. ‘Adam had no more in Eden save the head of Eve upon his shoulder.’
The boat went directly across and then followed the edge of the lake to Listvenichna, our point of debarkation. There was no table on board. We ordered the samovar, made our own tea, and supped from the last of our commissary stores. Our fellow passengers in the cabin were two officers traveling to Irkutsk, and a St. Petersburg merchant who had just finished the Amoor Company’s affairs. We talked, ate, drank, smoked, and slept during the twelve hours’ journey.
Congratulate us on our quick passage! On her very next voyage the steamer was eight days on the lake, the wind blowing so that she could not come to either shore. To be cooped on this dirty and ill-provided boat long enough to cross the Atlantic is a fate I hope never to experience.
There is a little harbor at Listvenichna and we came alongside a wharf. Maack departed with our papers to procure horses, and left me to look at the vanishing crowd. Take the passengers from the steerage of a lake or river steamer in America, dress them in sheepskin coats and caps, let them talk a language you cannot understand, and walk them into a cloud of steam as if going overboard in a fog, and you have a passable reproduction of the scene. A bright fire should be burning on shore to throw its contrast of light and shadow over the surroundings and heighten the picturesque effect.
Just as the deck hands were rolling our carriages on shore my companion returned, and announced our horses ready. We sought a little office near the head of the wharf where the chief of the ‘tamojna’ (custom house) held his court. This official was known to Mr. Maack, and on our declaring that we had no dutiable effects we were passed without search.
As before remarked all the country east of Lake Baikal is open to free trade. This result has been secured by the efforts of the present governor general of Eastern Siberia. Under his liberal and enlightened policy he has done much to break down the old restrictions and develop the resources of a country over which he holds almost autocratic power. It was about three in the morning when we started over the frozen earth. Two miles from the landing we reached the custom house barrier where a pole painted with the government colors stretched across the road. Presenting our papers from the chief officer we were not detained. On the steamer when we were nearing harbor our conversation turned upon the custom house. It was positively asserted that the officials were open to pecuniary compliments, much, I presume like those in other lands. The gentleman from the Amoor had considerable baggage, and prepared a five rouble note to facilitate his business. Evidently he gave too little or did not bribe the right man, as I left him vainly imploring to be let alone in the centre of a pile of open baggage, like Marius in the ruins of Carthage.
The road follows the right bank of the Angara from the point where it leaves the lake. The current here is very strong, and the river rushes and breaks like the rapids of the St. Lawrence. For several miles from its source it never freezes even in the coldest winters. During the season of ice this open space is the resort of many waterfowl, and is generally enveloped in a cloud of mist. At the head of the river rises a mass of rock known as Shaman Kamen (spirit’s rock). It is held in great veneration by the natives, and is believed to be the abode of a spirit who constantly overlooks the lake. When shamanism prevailed in this region many human sacrifices were made at the sacred rock. The most popular method was by tying the hands of the victim and tossing him into the ‘hell of waters’ below.
Many varieties of fish abound in the lake, and ascend its tributary rivers. The fishery forms quite a business for the inhabitants of the region, who find a good market at Irkutsk. The principal fish taken are two or three varieties of sturgeon, the herring, pike, carp, the askina, and a white fish called tymain. There is a remarkable fish consisting of a mass of fat that burns like a candle and melts away in the heat of the sun or a fire. It is found dead on the shores of the lake after violent storms. A live one has never been seen.
The distance to Irkutsk from our landing was about forty miles, and we hoped to arrive in time for breakfast. A snow storm began about dayliglit, so that I did not see much of the wooded valley of the river. We met a train of sixty or seventy carts, each carrying a cask of vodki. This liquid misery was on its way to the Trans-Baikal, and the soudna which brought a load of tea would carry vodki as a return cargo.
The clouds thinned and broke, the snow ceased falling, and the valley became distinct. While I admired its beauty, we reached the summit of a hill and I saw before me a cluster of glittering domes and turrets, rising from a wide bend in the Angara. At first I could discern only churches, but very soon I began to distinguish the streets, avenues, blocks, and houses of a city. We entered Irkutsk through its eastern gate, and drove rapidly along a wide street, the busiest I had yet seen in Asiatic Russia.
Just as the sun burst in full splendor through the departing clouds, I alighted in the capital of Oriental Siberia, half around the world from my own home.