Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - VIII. The Province of Yakutsk
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being cooled down and assimilated in their turn into the
colossal frost-mass, which is sufficient to cool all Siberia
during the whole year. This incubus, as with justice it
may be termed, lies immovable over the whole country for
weeks and months, and if the dry and compressed air did
not itself somewhat hinder the radiation of heat, all life
would perish beneath the colossus.
All moisture is pressed out of the atmosphere by this
terrible cold, becomes crystallized, and fills the air as a
thin, frosty fog, making the moon appear as if surrounded by
a silvery ring. And when a faint milky or silvery
phosphorescence shines from the polar ice, and the many-coloured
flames of the aurora borealis suddenly appear, then the frost
is reaching its climax. Perhaps from an instinctive knowledge
of the approach of still greater cold, or more probably
frightened at the sight of this phenomenon, the Yakut
sledge-dogs unite in raising a protracted and hideous howl,
which ceases only when the last flames of the northern lights
have disappeared. Then every living sound ceases and
silence as of the grave prevails, the Yakuts shovel more
snow about their huts, and even the smoke has hard work
to go up through the chimney and rises only a few feet
above the roof.
But the stillness is only apparent. The snow does not
creak, it grates and squeaks under foot, and rings like
metal; the breath congeals and falls to the ground in the
shape of fine ice-crystals. The deep silence of the night
is broken only by weird and hideous sounds resembling
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