hotels or boarding-houses in Kará except those' provided by the Government for burglars, counterfeiters, and murderers; and that he expected us, of course, to accept his hospitality and make ourselves at home in his house. This was not at all in accordance with our wishes or plans. 
MAJOR PÓTULOF. We had hoped to find some place of abode where we should not be constantly under official surveillance; and I did not see how we were secretly to make the acquaintance of the political convicts if we consented to become the guests of the governor of the prisons. As there did not, however, seem to be any alternative, we accepted Major Pótulof's invitation, and in ten minutes were comfortably quartered in a large, well-furnished house, where our eyes were gladdened by the sight of such unfamiliar luxuries as long mirrors, big soft rugs, easy-chairs, and a piano.
The Kará prisons and penal settlements at the time of our visit contained, approximately, 1800 hard-labor convicts.[1] Of this number about one-half were actually in close
- ↑ According to the annual report of the Chief Prison Administration the number of convicts in the Kará prisons and penal settlements on the 1st of January, 1886,—about two months after our visit,—was 2507. This number, however, included 600 or 800 women and children who had come to the mines voluntarily with their husbands and fathers. (See Report of the Chief Prison Administration for 1886, pp. 46, 47. St. Petersburg: Press of the Ministry of the Interior, 1888.)
