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604 LE ROY’S NARRATIVE OF FOUR RUSSIAN SAILORS.
Poflibly it may be afked, where did they find wicks for trimming their lamps? The
anfwer is at hand. On the wreck of the fhip, which they had colle€ted with much la-
bour for warming them in winter, was fome cordage found, and a {mall quantity of
hemp, the produce of old ropes, ufed on board fhip for caulking, or forcing with
{trength between the planks, to prevent leakage. When this was expended, they fub-
ftituted, what they but feldom wore, the linen of their fhirts and drawers. All who are
acquainted with the Ruffian coftume, know that there are few among them but what
wear drawers ; few of the country people wear any other hofe. With this hemp, and
this part of their cloathing, which among the common people is of a very coarfe quality,
did they twift wicks ; and from the time of their completing their firft lamp, to the
inftant of their going on fhip-board again, to return to their native land, they were never
without this light burning in their apartment.
The neceflity in which they found themfelves of appropriating fuch an effential part
of their cloathing as their fhirts and drawers to this purpofe, was reparable by their em-
ploying the fkins of the deer which they had killed in the ftead, fufficiently adequate in
itfelf as a fubftitute had they no other cloathing, a cafe which happened fhortly to be
theirs. Without mentioning other things which they were in need of, they faw their
fhoes and boots were worn out, and had no more: they were now but little removed
from the violent cold of winter, and muft again have refource to that ingenuity which
feldom leaves men when neceflity calls for its being employed. They pofleffed a quan-
tity of fkins of the rein-deer and the fox, which ferved them for bedding and cloathing,
and contrived to drefsthem. This is the method in which they manufactured them.
They foaked thefe fkins in foft water, and left them remaining in it for a day ; after-
wards, with very little pains, they feraped off the hair, and rubbed the leather, now
moiftened through, between their hands until almoft dry ; they then fmeared this over.
with the melted fat of the rein-deer: they repeated this, rubbing it as before. This
contrivance made the leather foft, pliant, and in fhort fo flexible, as to be fit for any
ufe to which they might choofe to apply it. As for thofe fkins laid afide for the pur-
pofe of making themfelves peliffes, they were fatisfied with letting them foften for one
day only in manufacturing them, proceeding afterwards in the fame manner as I have
before defcribed, excepting their not tearing off the hair. Thus they faw themfelves at
once poffeffed of all the materials neceflary for cloathing themfelves from top to toe.
Yet, however, one great difficulty remained to be overcome. ‘They had neither awl
to make their fhoes and boots with, nor needle to few their cloathing; but they had
iron, as we have noticed, and found out means very foon of remedying this need: in
Short, they forged as ufeful an awl and needle as thofe which are ufed by workmen in
thefe lines of bufinefs. It was in the beginning difficult for them to contrive how to
make the requifite hole in the needle, although at laft it was compaffed by the means of
the point of their knife, which for this purpofe they fharpened and made proper, after
having previoufly forged a fort of wire for a needle, and heated it red-hot. I have had
an opportunity of convincing myfelf of the truth of all I have faid on this matter. I have
attentively examined, through acommon magnifying-glafs, the eye of this needle. The
mode they ufed of rounding, polifhing, and pointing it, fo as to be very fharp, was by
rubbing it on ftones, of which there was an abundance: the only fault that it had was
im that the eye not being fo uniform and even as it fhould be, it was liable to cut the
nerves with which it was threaded ; but this was a failing they could not remedy.
Although unfurnifhed with fheers, for the purpofe of cutting the hides, yet were they
not without a fubftitute perfectly {wfficient for this ufe, in the knife which they had “i
: 13 we
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