The hills around Nicolayevsk are covered with forests of small pines.  Timber for house building purposes is rafted from points on the Amoor where trees are larger.  Formerly the town was in the midst of a forest, but the vicinity is now pretty well cleared.  Going back from the river, the streets begin grandly, and promise a great deal they do not perform.  For one or two squares they are good, the third square is passable, the fourth is full of stumps, and when you reach the fifth and sixth, there is little street to be found.  I never saw a better illustration of the road that commenced with a double row of shade trees, and steadily diminished in character until it became a squirrel-track and ran up a tree.  There is very little agriculture in the vicinity, the soil and climate being unfavorable.  The chief supply of vegetables comes from the settlements on the south bank of the river up to Lake Keezee, and along the shores of the lake.  All the ordinary garden vegetables are raised, and in some localities they attain goodly size.

Every morning there was a lively scene at the river’s edge in front of the town.  Peasants from the farming settlements were there with articles for sale, and a vigorous chaffering was in progress.  There were soldiers in grey coats, sailors from the ships in the harbor, laborers in clothing more or less shabby, and a fair sprinkling of aboriginals.  To an American freshly arrived the natives were quite a study.  They were of the Mongol type, their complexions dark, hair black, eyes obliquely set, noses flat, and cheek bones high.  Most of them had the hair plaited in a queue after the Chinese fashion.  Some wore boots of untanned skin, and a few had adopted those of Russian make.  They generally wear blouses or frocks after the Chinese pattern, and the most of them could be readily taken for shabby Celestials.

Their hats were of two kinds, some of felt and turned up at the sides, and others of decorated birch bark shaped like a parasol.  These hats were an excellent protection against sun and rain, but could hardly be trusted in a high wind.  All these men were inveterate smokers, and carried their pipes and tobacco pouches at their waists.  Most had sheath knives attached to belts, and some carried flint, steel, and tinder.  They formed picturesque groups, some talking with purchasers and others collected around fires or near their piles of fish.

[Illustration:  BOAT LOAD OF SALMON.]

As I stood on the bank, a Gilyak boat came near me with a full cargo of salmon.  The boat was built very high at bow and stern, and its bottom was a single plank, greatly curved.  It was propelled by a woman manipulating a pair of oars with blades shaped like spoon-bowls, beaten flat, which she pulled alternately with a kind of ‘hand-over-hand’ process.  This mode of rowing is universal among the Gilyaks, but does not prevail with other natives along the Amoor.

Whenever I approached a group of Gilyaks I was promptly hailed with ’reba! reba!’ (fish! fish!) I shook my head and uttered nierte (no,) and our conversation ceased.  The salmon were in piles along the shore or lying in the native boats.  Fishing was not a monopoly of the Gilyaks, as I saw several Russians engaged in the business.  They appeared on the best terms with their aboriginal neighbors.