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country has the severest climate in the world, with an
extreme temperature varying between + 103° and – 93°
Fahrenheit. The winter commences early. The smaller
rivers and the numberless lakes—of which there are said to
be 100,000—begin to freeze in September. In the first or
second week of October the whole country is covered with
snow. The cold increases day by day. The mean
temperature of October and November varies between + 5°
and – 22° Fahr.; in the months of December, January
and February between – 13° and – 40° Fahr.; and in March
and April between + 14° and – 22° Fahr. In the middle
of the winter the temperature may remain for weeks
together below the freezing-point of mercury, and at times
will sink to 80° below zero Fahr. Such a low temperature
gives a keen and penetrating sharpness to the air, and all life
seems to have congealed. The Yakut winter does not rage
and roar, as does that of northern Europe, but suppresses
all motion. Neither the sun, which only for a few hours
appears above the horizon, nor the earth, which is frozen
to an unknown depth and in the summer melts only two
or three feet, can withstand its power. The constantly
growing cold compresses the air more and more, until it
finally threatens, as it were, to suffocate all life beneath
its weight. The strongest currents of air from the Arctic
sea, from the Pacific, or from the immense continental
regions lying to the south are unable to move this inert and
compressed mass of air. The heaviest storms powerlessly
rebound from it and, so to speak, become bound at its feet,
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