374 BY ORDER 01- THE CZAR.
On the next day the governor, a courteous official whose heart had not been hardened under his melancholy ex- periences, accompanied him in the early autumn morning ) not to the great fortress, but to a series of strong barrack- like buildings, surrounded by a high wall, not of a very powerful defensive character, but carefully guarded by numerous sentinels.
The governor conversed pleasantly in French, and rolled perpetual cigarettes ; advising Dick also to smoke during their round of the penal institution.
The broad courtyard was already occupied by a large company of prisoners, each fettered by the ankles, not with heavy chains, but sufficiently galling, alas, for a general march of little short of six months to the dreary wilds of Eastern or Western Siberia. They included men and women, the former in the usual convict's dress, a long loose coat of coarse grey cloth, the latter in thick woollen dresses with a kind of cape or shawl fastened about their shoulders and another over their heads, worn very much in the manner of a Lancashire operative. A portion of their route, the governor informed Dick, would be made by river, in enormous barges upon which were constructed prison cages, where the men and women were separated, but by road they travel in bands together. It was true, he said, that some died by the way, and that political prisoners who could afford it were permitted to ride and also to take with them baggage and their families, many of whom lived after some years of severe discipline in a comparatively free and com- fortable manner. He admitted that there were exceptions, but hoped that the exile in whom Chetwynd was taking so deep an interest might be one of those favored persons. It was not often, he said, that an Englishman was included among the exiles to Siberia, but during the last few years many foreigners had interested themselves unduly in Rus- sian politics. Fanatics from Italy, France and Germany,
