"No, I don't think that is worth while. There is nothing there worth stealing. The natives have got plenty of fish of their own, no doubt, and drift-wood too. Now let us be off." The birds were scarcer than usual, and they wandered a long distance before they had made up anything like their usual bag. "We have been eight hours out," Godfrey said, looking at his watch. "We may as well have a meal before we start back. It will take us two or three hours to get to the boat again. There will be no loss of time. It takes no longer cooking here than it would there, and we may as well carry the birds inside as out." They were engaged in eating their meal when Jack suddenly gave an angry growl, and looking up they saw a party of a dozen Samoyedes with bows and arrows at a distance of fifty yards behind them. They sprang to their feet. "Shall I shoot?" Luka asked. "No, no, Luka, their intentions may be friendly. Besides, though we might kill three or four of them they would riddle us with arrows. We had best meet them as friends." When the Samoyedes came up Luka gave them the ordinary salutation of friendship. "Where come from?" the man who seemed to be the leader of the natives asked suspiciously. "A long way from the east," Luka said, pointing in that direction. "Who are you?" "Ostjak," Luka said, knowing that the Samoyedes would have heard of that tribe, but would know nothing of his own. "Who this?" the native asked, pointing to Godfrey. "A friend of Ostjaks," Luka said, "come to hunt and shoot. I come with him." "This Samoyede country," the native said; "not want Ostjaks here." "We do no harm," Luka said. "We go west, far along, not want Samoyede country. Buy milk of Samoyedes. Good friends." The Samoyedes talked together, and then the leader said "Come!" Without any appearance of hesitation Godfrey and Luka set off with the natives. Their language, though differing from that of the northern Ostjaks, was sufficiently alike for them to be able to understand each other. "Do you think they mean to be friendly?" Godfrey asked in Russian. "I don't know," Luka replied. "Perhaps not made up their minds yet." "They are going down to the coast, that is a comfort, Luka; they are going to the west of our boats. I suppose they have an encampment there. I expect they heard my gun and have been following us at a distance until they saw us sit down." "Must have seen them," Luka said. "Only one may have been following us, and may have sent the others back to fetch up the rest from their tents. Well, it does not matter now they have got us. If they ask where we came from, as I expect they will, you had better tell them, Luka, we came in a boat. They will guess it without our telling, and will very likely look for it. It is better to make no concealment."