railway, and to the ordinary uncultivated Russian there is not much hardship in this form of exile; but it is rather severe upon all those who are physically weak or accustomed to an intellectual life. Many of the political exiles of this class band together and form co-operative societies to protect the interests of their members in some of the larger Siberian towns. They use this organization as a means of obtaining work for each other, and as a sort of labour bureau. It also assists necessitous cases, and acts as a bank where they can lodge their savings. The exile association of Krasnoyarsk in 1907 had funds equivalent to £400, all of which had been accumulated by the members of that society, working in different occupations.
The movement for the reform of the exile system has undergone a chequered career. In the year 1900 an Imperial Manifesto abolished punishment by exile for all kinds of convicts and political prisoners, and for a time it seemed as if the whole system would die out. But in 1904, in the great period of reaction through which Russia passed at the end of the Russo-Japanese War, culminating in the revolution, this punishment was re-established for political offences. In spite of this reaction, however, an improvement, brought about by purely administrative means, took place in another direction. As I mentioned above, the worst classes of criminal convicts gradually came to be confined to certain parts of Siberia, more especially the eastern parts, while the western and central parts of Siberia have been set apart for the politicals only. While there has been a great decrease in the number of the criminal exiles, there has been no abatement in that of the political exiles to
