“The fear of leaving my undertaking half unfinished,” says Middendorff, “had hitherto encouraged me to persevere. The great distance from any human habitation, the rapid stream, against which we had now to contend, and the advanced season, with its approaching dark nights and frosts, made our return an imperative necessity, and I could have but little reliance on our remaining strength. The insufficient food and the fatigues of our journey, often prolonged to extreme exhaustion, had reduced our vigor, and we all began to feel the effects of our frequent wading through cold water, when, as often happened, our boat had grounded upon a shallow, or when the flat mud-banks of the river gave us no other alternative for reaching the dry land. It was now also the second month since we had not slept under a tent, having all the time passed the nights behind a screen erected on the oars of the boat, as a shelter against the wind. Provided with a good load of drift-wood, collected on the shore of the Polar Ocean, we began our return voyage on August 26. The borders of the river were already incrusted with ice. Wading became extremely irksome, the river having meanwhile fallen above six feet, and the shallows frequently forcing us to step into the water and pull the boat along. “Fortunately the wind remained favorable, and thus by rowing to the utmost of our strength, and with the assistance of the broad sails of our ‘Tundra,’ we surmounted two rapids which, encased between abrupt rocks, seemed to defy our utmost efforts. “On the 31st, a malicious gust of wind, bursting out of a narrow gorge, threw our boat against the rocks and broke the rudder. The frost and wet, together with the shortness of our provisions, tried us sorely. Not a day passed without sleet and snow. “On September 5, while endeavoring to double during a violent storm a rocky island at the northern extremity of Lake Taimur, one wave after another dashed into the boat, which I could only save by letting her run upon a sand-bank. The violent wind, with a temperature of only +27° at noon, covered our clothes with solid ice-crusts. We were obliged to halt four days till the storm ceased; our nets and my double-barrelled gun proved daily more and more unsuccessful, so that hunger combined with cold to render our situation almost intolerable. On the 8th, while on the lookout for ptarmigan, I saw through my telescope a long stripe of silver stretching over the lake, and, returning to my comrades, informed them that we must absolutely set off again the next morning, regardless of wind and weather.