Читать книгу The Secret Dispatch; or, The Adventures of Captain Balgonie онлайн

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Anon he came to a place where the forest was partially cleared, and there stood a little hut built of squared logs. The walls of this edifice were whitened artificially; but the roof was rendered whiter still by a coat of the fast-freezing snow. A single ray of smoky light streamed from the opening (which passed for a window) near the door, on which Podatchkine, without dismounting, struck three blows with the butt of his lance.

"Nicholas Paulovitch," he exclaimed, "are you within?"

The door was soon unfastened, and thereat appeared a figure, not unlike an Esquimaux, bearing a pine torch. He was a man of great stature and muscular development, clad in a caftan of coarse, thick, and warm material, girt by a broad belt in which a long and rusty knife was stuck; he had on bark shoes and long leggings of sheepskin, which, like Bryan O'Linn's breeches, had "the skinny side out and the hairy side in;" and he cultivated one long lock of grizzled hair behind his right ear in the old fashion of the Black Cossacks; but this appendage was concealed by the hood and tippet of fur which he wore. This man, however, did not belong to any of the nomadic military tribes, but was a species of Russian gipsy, a half-breed.