“But before quitting this fatal spot,” exclaimed this poor fellow with a shudder of abhorrence, “I heaped maledictions on the crests of those mountains that rose before me to dispute my way like a battalion of Russian gendarmes, and there shut out from my longing eyes the sight of some other land that was to give me life and liberty.”
“But this empire,” I replied, “is not so hard, since it has not punished you for your rebellion.”
“That is true,” he said; “they have not only pardoned me on account of the sufferings I had endured, but they have even given me more liberty, knowing full well,” he added sorrowfully, “that I should never renew so rash an attempt.”
I then asked him what miraculous intervention enabled him to get back alive.
“I was indebted for that to my robust constitution. I managed to live upon roots, and gum from the trees, and that little red fruit with which the Siberians make a sort of wine.[16] I was so weak that I could march only very slowly, but the rain having ceased, I began to gain a little more strength, notwithstanding the miserable nourishment I was forced to subsist on. When I arrived as far as the little river I mentioned, I took it into my head to construct a small raft, that I might float down the current, and thereby diminish my fatigues. I succeeded, after a great deal of trouble, and when I ventured on this contrivance, I believed I was saved.
“But a few days after I had been borne along in this fragile craft, seeing a favourable spot to obtain a fresh supply of roots and fruit, I attached my float to the shore, and went in search of them. I had not gone far before I found myself in presence of an enormous bear of appalling ferocity. My rifle was on the raft, and I had only my big knife at my girdle, and although I had heard of the artifice practised by the Siberians in slaying this ferocious beast, I shrank at first from exposing myself to such a danger. I tried to flee, but it was useless; I began climbing up a tree, but the bear followed me everywhere. At last, seeing no escape and no means of avoiding a struggle, I summed up all my courage as a last expedient, and stood facing the beast, waiting the onslaught with a firm foot, determined to sell my life as dearly as possible. The formidable brute came up with a slouching gait, and rose on his hind quarters to seize me with his forepaws; just at this critical moment, according to the Siberian mode of attack, I leapt suddenly into his forepaws, as one human being would into the enthusiastic embrace of another and, raising instantly my right hand, plunged my knife into his back to the right of the backbone and to the depth of the heart. My grim antagonist fell dead on the spot, and with a few scratches on my shoulders I escaped.