Our pain and anxiety continued. We were in want of water. The only little brook that we found was entirely frozen up, and we were obliged to quench our thirst with the snow. The want of wood was another difficulty. Not a tree had we seen during the whole journey, and we frequently went a werst out of our way, perhaps for a paltry shrub not a foot long. We gathered all that we saw, for fear of finding none as we proceeded farther; but they were so small and so few as not to enable us to cook our victuals. To warm ourselves was out of the question. In the mean time the cold was extremely rigorous, and from the slow pace that we travelled, we were nearly frozen. Almost at every instant we were also under the necessity of stopping to unharness the dogs, that expired one after another. I cannot describe what my feelings were in this situation. My mind suffered still more than my body. The inconveniences that were common to us, I patiently shared with my companions; their example and my youth gave me courage to support them. But when I thought of my dispatches, my constancy forsook me. They were continually in my hands, and I never touched them without shuddering. My anxiety to execute my trust, the view of the many obstacles I had to surmount, the uncertainty of succeeding, all these ideas united to torment me. I endeavoured to dispel them; a moment after some new obstacle brought them to my mind with additional force. Upon leaving Gavenki, we had quitted the eastern coast, and the western presented itself to our view two wersts from Pousteretsk. We had crossed therefore the whole width of this part of Kamtschatka, which is not less than two hundred wersts, or fifty leagues. We travelled this extent of country more on foot than in our sledges. Our dogs were so weak, that we were willing to fatigue ourselves in order to relieve them, but they were seldom the more alert on this account. Our conductors could not make them go on without harnessing themselves in like manner to the sledge, and thus assist them to draw us along; we encouraged them also by throwing them a handkerchief folded up in the shape of a fish. They followed this bait, which disappeared the moment they approached near enough to lay hold of it.