CHAPTER XXIV.
Chetah stands on the left bank of the Ingodah, nearly three hundred miles above Stratensk, and is the capital of the Trans-Baikal province. For many years it was a small town with a few hundred inhabitants, but the opening of the Amoor in 1854 changed its character. Below this point the Ingodah is navigable for boats and rafts, and during the early years of the Amoor occupation much material was floated down from Chetah. In 1866 its population, including the garrison, was about five thousand. Many houses were large and well fitted, and all were of wood. The officers lived comfortably, but complained of high rents.
The governor’s mansion is the largest and best, and near it is the club-house where weekly soirees are held. I attended one of these and found a pleasant party. There was music and dancing, tea-drinking and card-playing, gossip and silence at varied and irregular intervals. Some of the officers read selections from Russian authors, and others recited pieces of prose and poetry. There were dialogues, evidently humorous to judge by the mirth they produced, and there was a paper containing original contributions. The association appeared prosperous, and I was told that its literary features were largely due to the efforts of the governor.
There is agastinni-dvoror row of shops and a market-place surrounded with huckster’s stalls, much like those near Fulton Ferry. Desiring to replace a broken watch-key I found a repair shop and endeavored to make my inquiries in Russian. “Monsieur parle le Francais, je crois,” was the response to my attempt, and greatly facilitated the transaction of business. Before I left New York an acquaintance showed me a photograph of a Siberian, who proved to be the watchmaker thus encountered.
Walking about the streets I saw many prisoners at work under guard, most of them wearing fetters. Though I became accustomed during my Siberian travels to the sight of chains on men, I could never hear their clanking without a shudder. The chains worn by a prisoner were attached at one end to bands enclosing his ankles and at the other to a belt around his waist. The sound of these chains as the men walked about was one of the most disagreeable I ever heard, and I was glad to observe that the Russians did not appear to admire it. The prisoners at Chetah were laboring on the streets, preparing logs for house-building, or erecting fences. Most of the working parties were under guard, but the overseers did not appear to push them severely. Some were taking it very leisurely and moved as if endeavoring to do as little as possible in their hours of work. I was told that they were employed on the eight hour system. Their dress was coarse and rough, like that of the peasants, but had no marks to show that its wearer was a prisoner.
PRISONERS AT CHETAH.
PRISONERS AT CHETAH.
There were between three and four thousand prisoners in the province of the Trans-Baikal. About one-sixth of them were at Chetah and in its vicinity. The prisoners were of two classes—political and criminal—and their punishment varied according to their offence. Some were sentenced to labor in chains, and others to labor without chains. Some could not go out without a guard, while others had more freedom. Some were sentenced to work in prison and others were imprisoned without labor. Some were exiled to Siberia but enjoyed the liberty of a province, a particular district, or a designated town or village. Some were allowed a certain amount of rations and others supported themselves. In fact there were all grades of prisoners, just as we have all grades in our penitentiaries.
The Polish revolution in 1863 sent many exiles to the country east of Lake Baikal. Among the prisoners at the time of my journey there was a Colonel Zyklinski confined in prison at a village north of Chetah. He had a prominent part in the Polish troubles, and was captured at the surrender of the armies. He served in America under M’Clellan during the Peninsular campaign, and was in regular receipt of a pension from our government.
The Trans-Baikal Province is governed by Major General Ditmar, to whom I brought letters of introduction. When Borasdine returned from his visit he brought invitation to transfer our quarters to the gubernatorial mansion, where we went and met the governor. I found him an agreeable gentleman, speaking French fluently, and regretting the absence of Madame Ditmar, in whose praise many persons had spoken. At dinner I met about twenty persons, of whom more than half spoke French and two or three English.
A military band occupied the gallery over the dining-room. When General Ditmar proposed “the United States of America,” my ears were greeted with one of our national airs. It was well played, and when I said so they told me its history. On hearing of my arrival the governor summoned his chief musician and asked if he knew any American music. The reply was in the negative. The governor then sent the band-master to search his books. He soon returned, saying he had found the notes of “Hail Columbia.”
“Is that the only American tune you have?” asked the general.
“Yes, sir.”
“Have your band learn to play it by dinner time.”
The order was obeyed, and the American music accompanied the first regular toast. It was repeated at the club-rooms and on two or three other occasions during my stay in Chetah, and though learned so hastily it was performed as well as by any ordinary band in our army.
The principal rooms in General Ditmar’s house had a profusion of green plants in pots and tubs of different sizes. One apartment in particular seemed more like a greenhouse than a room where people dwelt. Whether so much vegetation in the houses affects the health of the people I am unable to say, but I could not ascertain that it did. The custom of cultivating plants in the dwellings prevails through Siberia, especially in the towns. I frequently found bushes like small trees growing in tubs, and I have in mind several houses where the plants formed a continuous line half around the walls of the principal rooms. The devotion to floriculture among the Siberians has its chief impulse in the long winters, when there is no out-door vegetation visible beyond that of the coniferous trees. I can testify that a dwelling-which one enters on a cold day in midwinter appears doubly cheerful when the eye rests upon a luxuriance of verdure and flowers. Winter seems defeated in his effort to establish universal sway.
The winters in this region are long and cold, though very little snow falls. Around Chetah and in most of the Trans-Baikal province there is not snow enough for good sleighing, and the winter roads generally follow the frozen rivers. Horses, cattle, and sheep subsist on the dead and dry grass from October to April, but they do not fare sumptuously every day.
North and south of the head-waters of the Ingodah and Orion there are mountain ranges, having a general direction east and west. Away to the north the Polar sea and the lakes and rivers near it supply the rain and snow-clouds. As they sweep toward the south these clouds hourly become less and their last drops are wrung from them as they strike the slopes of the mountains and settle about their crests. The winter clouds from the Indian Ocean and Caspian Sea rarely pass the desert of Gobi, and thus the country of the Trans-Baikal has a climate peculiar to itself.
During my stay at Chetah a party was organized to hunt gazelles. There were ten or fifteen officers and about twenty Cossacks, as at Blagoveshchensk. Up to the day of the excursion the weather was delightful, but it suddenly changed to a cloudy sky, a high wind, and a freezing temperature. The scene of action was a range of hills five or six miles from town. We went there in carriages and wagons and on horseback, and as we shivered around a fire built by the Cossacks near an open work cabin, we had little appearance of a pleasure party.
ON THE HILLS NEAR CHETAH.
ON THE HILLS NEAR CHETAH.
The first drive resulted in the death of two rabbits and the serious disability of a third. One halted within twenty steps of me and received the contents of my gun-barrel. I reloaded while he lay kicking, and just as I returned the ramrod to its place the beast rose and ran into the thick bushes. I hope he recovered and will live many years. He seemed gifted with a strong constitution, and I heard several stories of the tenacity of life displayed by his kindred.
The rabbit or hare (lepus variabilis) abounds in the valley of the Amoor and generally throughout Siberia. He is much larger than the New England rabbit I hunted in my boyhood, and smaller than the long-eared rabbit of the Rocky Mountains and California. He is grey or brown in summer and white in winter, his color changing as cold weather begins. No snow had fallen at Chetah, but the rabbits were white as chalk and easily seen if not easily killed. The peasants think the rabbit a species of cat and refuse to eat his flesh, but the upper classes have no such scruples. I found him excellent in a roast or stew and admirably adapted to destroying appetites. Our day’s hunt brought us one gazelle, six rabbits, one lunch, several drinks, and one smashed wagon.
I saw at Chetah a chess board in a box ten inches square with a miniature tree six inches high on its cover. The figure of a man in chains leaning upon a spade near a wheelbarrow, stood under the tree. The expression of the face, the details of the clothing, the links of the chains, the limbs of the tree, and even the roughness of its bark, were carefully represented. It was the work of a Polish exile, who was then engaged upon something more elaborate. Chessmen, tree, barrow, chains, and all, were made from black bread! The man took part of his daily allowance, moistened it with water, and kneaded it between his fingers till it was soft like putty. In this condition he fashioned it to the desired shape.
When I called upon the watchmaker he told me of an American recently arrived from Kiachta. Two hours later while writing in my room I heard a rap at my door. On opening I found a man who asked in a bewildered air, “Amerikansky doma?”
“Dah,” I responded.
“Parlez vous Francais?” was his next question. “Oui, Monsieur, Francais ou Anglais.”
“Then you are the man I want to find. How do you do?”
It was the American, who had come in search of me. He told me he was born in England and was once a naturalized citizen of the United States. He had lived in New York and Chicago, crossed the Plains in 1850, and passed through all the excitements of the Pacific coast, finishing and being finished at Frazer’s River. After that he went to China and accompanied a French merchant from Shanghae across the Mongolian steppes to Kiachta. He arrived in Chetah a month before my visit, and was just opening a stock of goods to trade with the natives.
He was about to begin matrimonial life with a French lady whose acquaintance he made in Kiachta. He had sent for a Catholic priest to solemnize the marriage, as neither of the high contracting parties belonged to the Russian church. The priest was then among the exiles at Nerchinsk Zavod, three hundred miles away, and his arrival at Chetah was anxiously looked for by others than my new acquaintance. The Poles being Catholics have their own priests to attend them and minister to their spiritual wants. Some of these priests are exiles and others voluntary emigrants, who went to Siberia to do good. The exiled priests are generally permitted to go where they please, but I presume a sharp watch is kept over their actions. When there is a sufficient number of Poles they have churches of their own and use exclusively the Romish service.
The Germans settled in Russia, as well as Russians of German descent, usually adhere to the Lutheran faith. The Siberian peasants almost invariably speak of a Lutheran church as a ‘German’ one, and in like manner apply the name ‘Polish’ to Catholic churches. The government permits all religious denominations in Siberia to worship God in their own way, and makes no interference with spiritual leaders. Minor sects corresponding to Free Lovers, Shakers, and bodies of similar character, are not as liberally treated as the followers of any recognized Christian faith. Of course the influence of the government is for the Greek Church, but it allows no oppression of Catholics and Lutherans. So far as I could observe, the Greek Church in Siberia and the Established Church in England occupy nearly similar positions toward dissenting denominations.
Three days after my arrival General Ditmar started for Irkutsk, preceded a few hours by my late traveling companion. In the afternoon following the general’s departure I witnessed an artillery parade and drill, the men being Cossacks of the Trans-Baikal province. The battery was a mounted one of six guns, and I was told the horses were brought the day before from their summer pastures. The affair was creditable to officers and men, the various evolutions being well and rapidly performed. The guns were whirled about the field, unlimbered, fired, dismounted, and passed through all the manipulations known to artillerists.
At the close of the review the commanding officer thanked his men and praised their skill. He received the response, simultaneously spoken, “We are happy to please you,” or words of like meaning. At every parade, whether regular or Cossack, this little ceremony is observed. As the men marched from the field to their quarters they sang one of their native airs. These Cossacks meet at stated intervals for drill and discipline, and remain the balance of the time at their homes. The infantry and cavalry are subject to the same regulation, and the musters are so arranged that some part of the Cossack force is always under arms.
After the review I dined with a party of eighteen or twenty officers at the invitation of Captain Erifayeff of the governor’s staff. The dinner was given in the house where my host and his friend, Captain Pantoukin, lived,en garcon. The Emperor of Russia and the President of the United States were duly remembered, and the toasts in their honor were greeted with appropriate music. In conversation after dinner, I found all the officers anxious to be informed concerning the United States. The organization of our army, the relations of our people after the war, our mode of life, manners, and customs, were subjects of repeated inquiry.
On the morning of the 26th October, Captain Molostoff, who was to be my companion, announced his readiness to depart. I made my farewell calls, and we packed our baggage into my tarantass, with the exception of the terrible trunk that adhered to me like a shadow. As we had no Cossack and traveled without a servant, there was room for the unwieldy article on the seat beside the driver. I earnestly advise every tourist in Siberia not to travel with a trunk. The Siberian ladies manage to transport all the articles for an elaborate toilet without employing a single ‘dog house’ or ‘Saratoga.’ If they can do without trunks, of what should not man be capable?
Our leave-taking consumed much time and champagne, and it was nearly sunset before we left Chetah. It is the general custom in Siberia to commence journeys in the afternoon or evening, the latter extending anywhere up to daybreak. As one expects to travel night and day until reaching his destination, his hour of starting is of no consequence. Just before leaving he is occupied in making farewell calls, and is generally ‘seen off’ by his friends. In the evening he has no warm bed to leave, no hasty toilet to make, and no disturbed household around him. With a vehicle properly arranged he can settle among his furs and pillows and is pretty likely to fall asleep before riding many miles. I was never reconciled to commencing a journey early in the morning, with broken sleep, clothing half arranged, and a ‘picked-up’ breakfast without time to swallow it leisurely.
On leaving Chetah we crossed a frozen stream tributary to the Ingodah, and proceeded rapidly over an excellent road. We met several carts, one-horse affairs on two wheels, laden with hay for the Chetah market. One man generally controlled three or four carts, the horses proceeding in single file. The country was more open than on the other side of Chetah, and the road had suffered little in the rains and succeeding cold. For some distance we rode near two lines of telegraph; one was a temporary affair erected during the insurrection of 1866, while the other was the permanent line designed to connect America with Europe by way of Bering’s Straits. The poles used for this telegraph are large and firmly set, and give the line an appearance of durability.
The Captain was fond of dogs and had an English pointer in his baggage. During the day the animal ran near the carriage, and at night slept at his master’s feet. He was well inclined toward me after we were introduced, and before the journey ended he became my personal friend. He had an objectionable habit of entering the tarantass just before me and standing in the way until I was seated. Sometimes when left alone in the carriage he would not permit the yemshicks to attach the horses. On two or three occasions of this kind the Captain was obliged to suspend his tea-drinking and go to pacify his dog. Once as a yemshick was mounting the box of the tarantass, ‘Boika’ jumped at his face and very nearly secured an attachment to a large and ruddy nose. Spite of his eccentricities, he was a good dog and secured the admiration of those he did not attempt to bite.
We passed the Yablonoi mountains by a road far from difficult. Had I not been informed of the fact I could have hardly suspected we were in a mountain range. The Yablonoi chain forms the dividing ridge between the head streams of the Amoor and the rivers that flow to the Arctic Ocean.
On the south we left a little brook winding to reach the Ingodah, and two hours later crossed the Ouda, which joins the Selenga at Verkne Udinsk. The two streams flow in opposite directions. One threads its way to the eastward, where it assists in forming the Amoor; the other through the Selenga, Lake Baikal, and the Yenesei, is finally swallowed up among the icebergs and perpetual snows of the far north.
“One to long darkness and the frozen tide;One to the Peaceful Sea.”
“One to long darkness and the frozen tide;One to the Peaceful Sea.”