an hour the current hurried along the block of ice which bore Michael and Nadia. They feared every moment that it would give way beneath them. Swept along in the middle of the current, it was unnecessary to give it an oblique direction until they drew near the quays of Irkutsk. Luuk de Jong Jersey Michael, his teeth tight set, his ear on the strain, did not utter a word. Never had Män Barbour Lifestyle Jackor he been so near his object. He felt that he was about to attain it!
Towards two in the morning a double row of lights glittered on the dark horizon in which were confounded the two banks of the Angara. On the right hand were the lights of Irkutsk; Baggio Husidic Jersey on the left, the fires of the Tartar camp.
Michael Strogoff was not more than half a verst from the town. “At last!” he murmured.
But suddenly Nadia uttered a cry.
At the cry Michael stood Charlie Lyon Jersey up on the ice, which was wavering. His hand was extended up the Angara. His face, on which a bluish light cast a peculiar hue, became almost fearful to look at, and then, as if his eyes Tottenham Hotspurs Dame had been opened to the bright blaze spreading across the river, “Ah!” he exclaimed, “then Heaven itself is against us!”
Chapter XII
Irkutsk
Irkutsk, the capital of Eastern Siberia, is a populous town, containing, in ordinary times, thirty thousand inhabitants. On the right side of Leo Stolz Jersey the Angara rises a hill, on which are built numerous churches, a lofty cathedral, and dwellings disposed in picturesque disorder.
Seen at a distance, from the top of the mountain which rises at about twenty versts off along the Siberian highroad, this town, with its cupolas, its bell-towers, its steeples slender as Spain Dame Fodboldtrøjer minarets, its domes like pot-bellied Chinese jars, presents something of an oriental aspect. But this similarity vanishes as the traveler enters.
The town, half Byzantine, half Chinese, becomes European as soon as he sees its macadamized roads, bordered with pavements, traversed by canals, planted with gigantic birches, its houses of brick and wood, some of which have several stories, the numerous equipages which drive along, not only tarantasses but broughams and coaches; lastly, its numerous inhabitants far advanced in civilization, to Mix Diskerud Jersey whom the latest Kevin De Bruyne Tröja Paris fashions are not unknown.
Being the refuge for all the Siberians of the province, Irkutsk was at this time very full. Stores of every kind had been collected in abundance. Irkutsk is the emporium of the innumerable kinds of merchandise which are exchanged between China, Central Asia, and Ned Grabavoy Jersey Europe. The authorities had therefore no fear with regard to admitting the peasants of Tom Starke Jersey the valley of the Angara, and leaving a desert between the invaders and the town.
Irkutsk is the residence of the governor-general of Eastern Siberia. Below Algeria Pelipaita him acts a civil governor, in whose hands is the administration of the province; a head of police, who has much to do in a town where exiles abound; and, lastly, a mayor, chief of the merchants, and a person of some importance, from his immense fortune and the influence which he exercises over the people.
The garrison of Irkutsk was at that time composed of links:
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