The Red Cloud chief., 1889-10-18
THE SIBERIAN
Oreary Moss Plains That Are Inexpressi.
bly, Lonely and pesOlate.

bly, Lonely and Desolate.
No traveller, perhaps, has given Q more
complete and accurate accounto of the dreary
moss plains of Northern Siberia thar
George KEENAN,, whose description of the
region we quote at length. he says: ''The
northern coast of Siberia, between Cape
C~helyuskin and Behring Strait, is probably
the most barren and inhospitable part Of
the whole Russian Empire. For hundreds
OF niles back from the Arctic Ocean the
country consists almost entirely Of great
desoIate steppes, known to the Russians as
tUndras pronounced toorGras), which in
summer are Almost impossible wastes of
brownish arctic moss. saturated with water,
and in winter trackless deserts Of SNOW,
drifted and packed by polar gales into long,
hard, fU;ed waves The Siberian tundra
differs in many essential particulars from
all other tireless plains. In the first
place, it has a foundation of permanently
frozen ground. Underlying the great moss
tundras which border the Lena river
north Of Yakootsk there is everywhere
a thick stratum OF eternal frost, beginning
in the winter 1T the surface Of b earth
and in summer at q point twenty or thirty
inches below the surface and extending to
a depth of many hundred feet. What
scauty vegetation, therefore, the tundra
affords roots itself and finds its nourish-
ment in a thin layer Of uufrozen grounds
mere veneer:ng of arabic soil--esting upon
q ~subst-atum, five hundred or six hundred
feet in depth, of permanent and inpen-
etrable ice. This foundation Of ice is i'm
pe-vious, OF course, to water, and as the
snow meiss in summer the water c upiete-
ly saturates to as great a depth Us it can
penetrate, and, with the aid of the con-
tinuous daylight of June and July, stimu-
lates q dense, luxurious growth Of gray
arctic moss. The moss, in course Of time,
covers the entire PLAIN with q soft, yielding
cushion, in which q pedestrian viii sink to
the knee without finding any solid footing.
Moss has grown out of decaying moss year
after year, and century after century, until
the whole tundra for thousands Of square
miles is a vast spcngy bog. OF other vege-
ta:ion there is little or none. A clump Of
dwarf berry bushes, an occasional tuft
Of coarse swamp grass, or q patch of
storm and ~cold-defying kedrovnik, oiversi-
fes, perhaps. here and there, the vast,
b~rownish-Rray expanse, but, generally
speaking, the eye may sweep the whole
circle Of the horizon and see nothing but
the sky and moss. At all seasons and un-
der all circumstances this immense border
land Of moss tundras is land of desolatiou.
Throughout the entire winter it presents a
picture Of lnexpressible dreariness and
d~esolation- Even At noon, when the sea-
Like ex2anse of storm-driven snow is flushed
family by the red, gloomy light Of the low
hanging sun. it depresses b spirits and
chills the imagination with Its suggestions
of infinite dreariness and solitude; but .:
night, when It ceases to be bounded even BY
me horizon, because the horizon can no
longer be distinguished, when the pale.
green streame1 Of the aurora begin 10
sweep back and forth yer . dark segment
Of . circle in the north, lighting mp the
whole white world with tra6sitory flashes
Of ghostly radiance and adding mystery to
darkness and solitndNshen III Siberia
tundra not only becomes inexpfessibly
lonely and desolate, but takes On q strange,
hAlf-terrfble uneArthliness, which sWes and
yet fascinstes the Imagination. "-Chicago
Inter Ocoon