CHAPTER XVI
DEPORTATION BY ÉTAPE
IN Tomsk, and during our journey from that city to Irkútsk, we had for the first time a satisfactory opportunity to study the life of Siberian exiles on the road. Marching parties of convicts three or four hundred strong leave Tomsk for Irkútsk weekly throughout the whole year, and make the journey of 1040 miles in about three months. Étapes, or exile station-houses, stand along the road at intervals of from twenty-five to forty miles; and at every étape there is a "convoy command" consisting of a commissioned officer known as the "nachálnik of the convoy," two or three under-officers, and about forty soldiers. As the distance from one étape to another is too great to be walked in a single day by prisoners in leg-fetters, buildings known as polu-étapes, or "half-étapes," have been constructed midway between the true étapes for the shelter of the convicts at night. These half-way houses are generally smaller than the regular étapes, as well as somewhat different from the latter in architectural plan, and they have no "convoy commands." Marching parties are expected to make about 500 versts, or 330 miles, a month, with twenty-four hours of rest every third day. If a party leaves Tomsk Monday morning, it reaches a polu-étape Monday night, arrives at the first regular étape Tuesday night, and rests in the latter all day Wednesday. Thursday morning it resumes its journey with another convoy, Thursday night it
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