devoted four or five hours every night to the political exiles. Now and then some peasant would perhaps see us going to an exile's house; but as many of the politicals were known to be scientific men, and as we were travelling with a "scientific aim," no particular significance was attached to the circumstance. Everybody knew that we spent a large part of our time in visiting schools, collecting flowers, sketching, taking photographs, and hobnobbing with the local authorities; and the idea that we were particularly interested in the political exiles rarely occurred, I think, to any one. As we went eastward into a part of Siberia where the politicals are more closely watched, we varied our policy somewhat to accord with circumstances; but the rules that we everywhere observed were to act with confidence and boldness, to make ourselves socially agreeable to the local authorities, to attract as much attention as possible to the side of our life that would bear close inspection, and to keep the other side in the shade. We could not, of course, conceal wholly from the police our relations with the political exiles; but the extent and real significance of such relations were never, I think, suspected. At any rate, the telegraphic sword of Damocles did not fall upon us, and until we reached the Trans-Baikál we did not even receive a "warning."
Our work in all parts of Siberia was greatly facilitated by the attitude of honest and intelligent officials towards the system that we were investigating. Almost without exception they were either hostile to it altogether, or opposed to it in its present form; and they often seemed glad of an opportunity to point out to a foreign observer the evils of exile as a method of punishment, and the frauds, abuses, and cruelties to which, in practice, it gives rise. This was something that I had neither foreseen nor counted upon; and more than once I was surprised and startled by the boldness and frankness of such officials, after they had become satisfied that they could safely talk to me without reserve.
