Tent Life in Siberia: A New Account of an Old Undertaking; Adventures among the Koraks and Other Tribes In Kamchatka and Northern AsiaKennan, George
History
Tent Life in Siberia: A New Account of an Old Undertaking; Adventures among the Koraks and Other Tribes In Kamchatka and Northern Asia
Kennan, George
Kamchatka Peninsula (Russia) -- Description and travel; Kennan, George, 1845-1924; Siberia, Eastern (Russia) -- Description and travel
The people themselves I have already described as a quiet,
inoffensive, hospitable tribe of semi-barbarians, remarkable only
for honesty, general amiability, and comical reverence for legally
constituted authority. Such an idea as rebellion or resistance to
oppression is wholly foreign to the Kamchadal character _now_,
whatever it may have been in previous ages of independence. They will
suffer and endure any amount of abuse and ill-treatment, without any
apparent desire for revenge, and with the greatest good-nature and
elasticity of spirit. They are as faithful and forgiving as a dog. If
you treat them well, your slightest wish will be their law; and they
will do their best in their rude way to show their appreciation of
kindness, by anticipating and meeting even your unexpressed wants.
During our stay at Lesnoi the Major chanced one day to inquire for
some milk. The _starosta_ did not tell him that there was not a cow
in the village, but said that he would try to get some. A man was
instantly despatched on horseback to the neighbouring settlement of
Kinkil, and before night he returned with a champagne-bottle under his
arm, and the Major had milk that evening in his tea. From this time
until we started for Gizhiga--more than a month--a man rode twenty
miles every day to bring us a bottle of fresh milk. This seemed to be
done out of pure kindness of heart, without any desire or expectation
of future reward; and it is a fair example of the manner in which we
were generally treated by all the Kamchadals in the peninsula.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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