Chapter XIII
On leaving Mihalofski we took the merchant and two priests and dropped them fifteen miles above, at a village where a church was being dedicated. The people were in their holiday costume and evidently awaited the priests. The church was pointed out, nestling in the forest just back of the river bank. It seemed more than large enough for the wants of the people, and was the second structure of the kind in a settlement ten years old. I have been told, but I presume not with literal truth, that a church is the first building erected in a Russian colony.
At night we ran until the setting of the moon, and then anchored. It is the custom to anchor or tie up at night unless there is a good moon or very clear starlight. An hour after we anchored the stars became so bright that we proceeded and ran until daylight, reaching Mariensk at two in the morning. I had designed calling upon two gentlemen and a lady at Mariensk, but it is not the fashion in Russia to make visits between midnight and daybreak. Borasdine had the claim of old acquaintance and waked a friend for a little talk.
This town is at the entrance of Keezee lake, and next to Nicolayevsk is the oldest Russian settlement on the lower Amoor. It was founded by the Russian American Company in the same year with Nicolayevsk, and was a trading post until the military occupation of the river. Difficulties of navigation have diminished its military importance, the principal rendezvous of this region being transferred to Sofyesk.
On an island opposite Mariensk is the trace of a fortification built by Stepanoff, a Russian adventurer who descended the Amoor in 1654. Stepanoff passed the winter at this point, and fortified himself to be secure against the natives. He seems to have engaged in a general business of filibustering on joint account of himself and his government. In the winter of his residence at this fortress he collected nearly five thousand sable skins as a tribute to his emperor—and himself.
Morning found us at Sofyesk taking a fresh supply of wood. This town was founded a few years ago, and has a decided appearance of newness. There is a wagon road along the shore of Keezee lake and across the hills to De Castries Bay. Light draft steamboats can go within twelve miles of De Castries. Surveys have been made with the design of connecting Keezee Lake and the Gulf of Tartary by a canal. A railway has also been proposed, but neither enterprise will be undertaken for many years. I passed an hour with the post commander, who had just received a pile of papers only two months from St. Petersburg, the mail having arrived the day before.
The steamer Telegraph lay at the landing when we arrived; among her passengers was a Manjour merchant, who possessed an intelligent face, quite in contrast with the sleepy Gilyaks. He wore the Manjour dress, consisting of wide trowsers and a long robe reaching to his heels; his shoes and hat were Chinese, and his robe was held at the waist with a silk cord. His hair was braided in the Chinese fashion, and he sported a long mustache but no beard.