The sun shone brightly on the domes and cupolas of Irkutsk when they burst on the view; the effect of the dazzling white walls and bright green roofs of the churches was strikingly beautiful. Before entering the town, our yemschik descended from the box, and tied up the bells of the horses, in deference to a municipal law of the town, and in mercy to the inhabitants.
The streets of Irkutsk are straight, wide, and well kept. Indeed the main streets are too wide, and have always a more or less desolate appearance.
Our yemschik was again catechised about Metzgyr Hotel, but, after all, drove us into a hotel which, after unloading our gear, turned out to be the Amoor. The combined action of two conspirators was too much for us, and we had but to make the best of our situation. We were indeed too travel-worn to be particular about our quarters. A room was allotted to us, facetiously said to contain four bed-chambers. On inquiring for the said chambers we were pointed by themaltchik(boy) to certain corners and recesses, in which, by skilful dove-tailing, it was certainly possible to find sleeping-room for four people. Beds there were none, but there was a good solid floor, a plain hard sofa, three chairs, and a table. There was no fire-place in the room, the temperature being kept up by blazing furnaces opening in the corridor. The windows were hermeticallysealed for the winter. Our first and last sensation, during our occupancy of that apartment, was suffocation, only to be relieved by active out-door exercise. The room was adorned by a few pictures, and a large placard, framed and hung up in a conspicuous place, advertised the prix-courant of liquors, cabs, billiards, and viands. Here we foundcôtelettesandbifsteks, admirably adapted to the Russian spelling.
The attendance was of a very mean order. An unkempt urchin in tattered habiliments, did the duty of maid-of-all-work, always in the way when not wanted, now and again disturbing the time-honoured dust of our fusty chamber by besoms and dish-cloths, but never to be found when he was required. No bells are provided for the convenience of visitors, and you may roar yourself hoarse with cries ofmaltchikortchelavek!before any one will deign even to answersey tchass!This word, literally interpreted, means directly, but it may be more practically translated to-morrow, or next week, or when convenient. It is only thrown out to allay your impatience, and keep you in play while the tchelavek is eating his dinner, or gossiping with the cook. No progress can be made till you have discovered his retreat, when theà posterioriargument of boot leather may be applied with good effect. This is the only form of entreaty that can impress a low Russian with respect, and one application will generally suffice.
All things considered, there is not much to complain of in the culinary department, but the service is enough to blunt the keenest appetite in the world. Everything is cold, dirty, and miserable. A good beefsteak is put on the table hot, but you have to wait twenty minutes for something to eat with it; then knives and forks are wanting, and when you flatter yourself all is in order, and you begin your dinner, salt is found to be missing. All that can be tolerated, but oh takecare of the eggs! In Siberia they keep a stock of these in a fossil state for the entertainment of the unwary, for probably no Russian would be so green as to ask for them. At first we doubted whether Russians recognised any difference between a new-laid egg, and one that had been addled for six months. But, whatever their own proclivities may be, they do know a fresh egg when they see it. We succeeded at last in getting some only "suspicious," by taking hold of the boy in a menacing manner, and vowing that we would dash in his face every bad egg he should bring to us.
In a building separate from the hotel is a dining-room and tap-room, as also a billiard-room, with two tables. This part of the establishment is almost entirely monopolised by military officers, who play billiards all the morning, dine at the table d'hôte at 2 o'clock, and continue billiard-playing all the afternoon. Their billiard-cues have no leather tips, and the one table we attempted to play on was so uneven, from about twenty patches in the cloth, that we soon tired of seeing the balls steeple-chasing across the table. The dining-room is a large oblong, the walls covered with pictures of gentlemen in cocked hats and epaulettes, in a very low gaudy style of art. In the centre of one wall is a full-length portrait of the present emperor, which, with all its artistic defects, is nevertheless a fair likeness of his Imperial Majesty. The Russians are a loyal race, and naturally fond of pictures, whether of saints, or tsars, or heroes.
At the Amoor Hotel, I was greatly pleased to meet a friend and countryman who was travelling from St. Petersburg to China. The effect of this unexpected meeting was exhilarating, and I don't know whether it gave us most pleasure to recount the circumstances of our journey from China, or to hear our friend's experiences of that part of the road homewards which still lay before us. We certainly had no comfortable news to give each other. In exchange for thehorrors of the road through Western Siberia, we threw in the picture of what a month's ride across the Mongolian steppes in November would be.
Irkutsk is a town that will bear a close inspection. The houses are all large, and as handsome as wooden buildings can well be made. The sombre hue of the external walls is the only unsightly feature about the place; but the general aspect of the town is so well relieved by the numerous handsome churches and other public buildings, that the whole effect is pleasing. The streets are adorned with many fine shops, where every European luxury is obtainable for money. Tailors and milliners are very fond of parading flourishing sign-boards in French, and even in that remote corner of the world, Paris is looked to as the seat of fashion. Thegostinnoi-dvoris well supplied with all the staple articles of merchandise, including every variety of fur. We purchased very good Congou tea in the bazaar at 1 ruble 35 kopeks per pound, equal to four shillings.
Bakers are in great force in Irkutsk, many of them Germans.Frantsooski khleb(French bread) is all the rage in Siberia, and this sign is adopted by all bakers indiscriminately. The "French bread" is simply white bread made into rolls. It is very good, and being unobtainable in the country villages, travellers carry a supply with them from one town to another.
The tobacconists of Irkutsk are famed in Eastern Siberia for their "papiros," or paper cigars, which they make out of Turkish tobacco. The Russians, almost without exception of age or sex, smoke quantities of tobacco in the shape of papiros. In Irkutsk itself, however, "Moscow" is considered a better brand for papiros than "Irkutsk."
The prison occupies the corner of two streets. It has one iron-grated window facing the street, at which the prisoners are always to be seen clamouring for alms. The Russians arevery charitable and give a great deal to these prisoners. It is very common also in the streets for passers-by, especially old ladies, to stop the convicts who are employed under a guard of Cossacks in carrying water, &c., and give them money. This is so much a matter of course that when any well-dressed person, suspected of being charitably disposed, is seen approaching a convict, the Cossacks halt by instinct.
Every resident in Irkutsk who can afford it keeps a carriage. Their horses are very showy in harness, and there are enough of them generally to be seen in the street to be an ornament to the place. The droshky service is also very good. The drivers always go fast and their horses are generally fresh and fiery.
There are several good libraries in Irkutsk, branches of scientific societies, a theatre, a newspaper, and other concomitants of cultivation. On the whole, I confess that my pre-conceived notions of Siberian life proved utterly fallacious. I had pictured to myself a barren, inhospitable climate, unfit for the habitation of any except those who were compelled by law to exist there, and who necessarily had to suffer every privation. Instead of that, I found settled communities, not only enjoying all the amenities of civilised life, but living in expensive luxury, and many of them in extravagance.
Irkutsk, like most other Siberian towns, is named after a river. It has a settled population of 23,000, but in winter, when the gold-washing ceases, the population is swelled by the addition of about 4000 miners, who pass the winter in town, and manage to spend every farthing of their earnings before the mining season comes round again. The town derives great importance from its being the residence of the governor-general and the capital of Eastern Siberia, which not only includes the Amoor country, but that large tract recently acquired from China, and now called Primorsky, or the Maritime Region. The heads of the police, military, financial, andpost departments, have their offices in Irkutsk, which not only gives a tone to society, but keeps a large substratum of subordinate officers, with their families, about the place, and indirectly tends to promote the general prosperity. An archbishop also resides in Irkutsk.
On the second day of our stay in Irkutsk we visited the governor-general, and made the acquaintance of the chief of police, who put our papers in train. The governor-general holds a levée once a week, which happened to be on the day of our visit. About twenty persons in full dress presented themselves, including a number of officers, among whom we recognised with difficulty some of our late fellow-travellers. A number of peasants were assembled in the hall long before the appointed hour. They wore the most woe-begone visages, and each seemed to have his own special grievance. Each was armed with a scroll of paper, probably a petition, that he had got some one to write for him. These petitions were being patiently examined by an aide-de-camp, who seemed to decide on which were fit to be presented to his chief. The governor-general of Eastern Siberia has no sinecure. He has on his shoulders the affairs of a region larger than the whole of Europe, and which is yet but in the infancy of its development. The population is certainly scant, but it is composed of heterogeneous tribes, and the mere scarcity of population enhances the difficulty of general progress. A scattered population is,ipso facto, deprived on the one hand of the great stimulant to improvement which rivalry imparts to large communities, and on the other, of the facilities for carrying out the aspirations after better things which it may have. These disadvantages are a serious obstacle to any people, but to a race not naturally progressive, they are doubly so. Russia is not one of those countries where government ought to hold aloof from the affairs of the people. It may greatly err in doing too much;but something it must do if Russia is to follow even at a great distance in the march of development. The people will not put the government in motion, but the government must lead the people in every step. In Eastern Siberia there is vast scope for the energy of a man of administrative ability and singleness of purpose. Untold wealth lies under its soil. With its iron and coal and lead, and the natural fertility of a large portion of its soil, it might by well-directed enterprise, become to a great extent independent of the world; while the fine rivers that traverse the country offer means of water-communication perhaps unequalled, certainly unsurpassed, in any other country. Very much has been done of late years to utilise these natural privileges; but much more remains to be done. And it depends greatly on the governor-general, whose vice-regal power is almost as absolute as the sway of the Tsar himself, whether the commercial and productive resources of those regions will continue to develop under the same enlightened impulse as heretofore.
Another element of the importance of Irkutsk is to be found in the circumstance that it is the commercial centre of Eastern Siberia. The houses of business of the out-stations, such as Kiachta, have mostly their head-quarters in Irkutsk. It is the principal dépôt on the highway between Western Russia, and China and the Amoor provinces; and a great deal of wealth has been accumulated there by persons engaged in trade.
The manufactures of this place, and indeed of Siberia generally, are insignificant and hardly worth alluding to. Manufactures of all kinds in Irkutsk employ a few hundred workmen, the principal works being in leather and soap. In a country so rich in minerals this need not be so. It only needs an enterprising population to turn the resources of the country to account, and cheapen many of those articles ofdaily consumption which the land carriage from Europe makes so exorbitantly dear in Siberia.
This, and the other great towns in Siberia, are well provided with educational institutions, and every good family employs private tutors and governesses. Education is prized by the higher classes, but utterly neglected by the lower, which include, generally speaking, the merchants. The society of Siberia is, on the whole, as good as in Russia proper. The higher class are generally of the Russian nobility, who, either to retrieve their broken fortunes, or with a view to more rapid advancement in rank, go out to Siberia to fill high official stations. Three, and in some cases two, years of public service in Siberia count for five years in Russia. There are other inducements to men of rank and intelligence to seek their fortunes in Siberia, among which may be named the greater scope for ambition which a half-settled country affords, and the freedom from the curse of cliques and intrigue which exist in Petersburg, and which only a few can hope to turn to their own advantage. A man's individuality counts for more in a country where he meets few of his peers, and that consideration may possibly weigh with some of them.
Many of the proprietors of gold-diggings are scions of the highest class of Russian aristocracy. These, and most of the officials, have generally their families with them in Siberia; and although they never lose their hold of Russia, practically Siberia is their home. They spare no expense in the education of their children, and hence the amount of both native and foreign talent that is employed in teaching. Foreign artists and men of science are frequently to be met with in Siberia, and are much sought after and hospitably entertained in the highest circles. The educated Russians, being conscious of their native deficiencies, have a high appreciation of talent, whencesoever it comes. Of late years Siberiansociety has received large accessions of educated people in the Polish political exiles, who are mostly students and professors in the universities, members of the Roman Catholic priesthood, and artists.
But what has done more, perhaps, than anything else to give a high tone to the upper classes in Siberia, and to stamp their manners with elegance, is the thirty years' residence of the political exiles of 1825, so-called Decembrists. On the day of the accession of the late Emperor Nicholas, a widespread conspiracy against him was discovered before it was quite ripe for action. Growing out of the general discontent which had hatched the abortive plot against the life of Alexander I., it assumed a definite shape and formidable magnitude during the three weeks' interregnum which occurred between the death of Alexander and the accession of Nicholas, during which time Nicholas had been coquetting with the crown, before formally intimating his acceptance of it. The army was involved, and many of the officers of the Imperial Guard were deeply committed. The premature discovery of the conspiracy disconcerted the most active leaders of the malcontents, and when the crisis came, the rebellious troops were reduced by whole regiments who backed out at the last moment, and the few thousands who were left found themselves deserted by many of their officers. The forlorn hope assembled in St. Isaac's Square on the 26th of December, and the very first act of Nicholas's reign was to blow the insurgents to atoms with artillery, and cut up the flying remnant with cavalry.
A fearful day of reckoning followed this ill-fated attempt. A searching inquiry was at once instituted, conducted by commissioners. It lasted nearly half a year. Instigated by fear, and the thirst for vengeance, the government interpreted the most trivial circumstances into treason. The leaders of the insurrection were mostly young men of goodfamilies, but they were indirectly encouraged by noblemen of great wealth and power. All this was ferreted out in the protracted investigation. The end of it was the capital punishment of a few of the most active instigators of the plot, and the exile of the rest to Siberia.
Among these exiles were many members of the highest aristocracy. Their wives in most instances followed them into Siberia, which they were permitted by government to do, on certain conditions. One condition was, that the wives of exiles should come under an obligation never to return from the land of their banishment. Another was, that all their correspondence should pass through the hands of the governor-general in Siberia, and the ministry of secret police in St. Petersburg. This latter condition their ingenuity enabled them easily to evade. These ladies, among whom were princesses, countesses, and others of rank, fortune, and refinement, soon began to be influential in Siberia. Their husbands, who had been condemned to labour in the mines for various terms, some to ten, others to twenty-five years, and some others for life, were never detained much more than one year at any of their penal settlements. None were ever compelled to labour at all, except a few who were refractory, or who had committed misdemeanours while in Siberia. As time wore on, and the fury of the government abated, the interest of the friends and relations of the exiles induced the governor-general of Eastern Siberia to look favourably on them. They were then permitted to reside in, and to register themselves as residents of, various villages in the different provinces of Siberia. It was not long before they were allowed to reside in the larger towns, and once there, they soon built for themselves elegant houses in such places as Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, and Yeniseisk, where they lived openly and in comparative comfort, and took up their natural position as theéliteof society. But thoughfortune seemed to smile on them, the exiles were politically dead, that being the inexorable sentence of the law which drove them from their native country. Children were born to them in Siberia, but although they took up the position in society which their birth and education entitled them to, they were, nevertheless, in the eye of the law, illegitimate, and incapable of enjoying any social or political rights. The sins of the fathers were visited on the children to interminable generations. Not only could the children of exiles not inherit their father's hereditary titles, but they were debarred even from bearing their own family name! And they inherited their parents' exile in never being permitted to return to Russia. This has, no doubt, been in some instances evaded, by daughters marrying Russian noblemen, and returning to Russia under cover of their husband's names, but such procedure was nevertheless strictly against the law.
Thus did the Decembrists expiate their political offences in their own persons, and in their descendants', for full thirty years, until the accession of the present emperor. As the iron rule of Nicholas was inaugurated by an act of crushing severity, so the milder sway of Alexander II. was marked at its outset by an act of mercy to the exiles of his father. A free pardon, with permission to return to Russia, was granted to all the survivors. Their children, born in Siberia, had their father's hereditary honours and full political rights restored to them. It is by such measures as this that Alexander II. has made his name respected and beloved by his people.
The influence of political exiles of various periods has made an ineradicable impression on the urban communities of Siberia, but the Decembrists, from their education and polish, have certainly done most to form the nucleus of good society there.
The mercantile class in Siberia, and indeed all over Russia,stands decidedly low in the social scale. A merchant, though enormously rich, and doing a very large business, is essentially a huckster. In manners they are little removed from the common peasant, from which class they have generally sprung. They are for the most part illiterate themselves, and, until very lately, have been incapable of appreciating the advantages of education for their children. They are widely separated from the upper classes, who regard them with unmixed contempt. The line of distinction between the nobility and the substrata of society is more broadly drawn in Russia than in any other country, excepting in the empire of Japan, where, however, the mercantile, and classes in our estimation below them, are well educated. This distinction of ranks is undoubtedly a relic of barbarism, but whether the mean tastes of what ought to be the middle classes in Russia be the cause, or the effect, of their relatively low status in society, they both mutually act and re-act on each other as cause and effect, and so the evil constantly perpetuates itself.
While resting in Irkutsk, we employed ourselves casting about for means of attaining the maximum of comfort, that is to say, the minimum of hardship, for the remaining part of the journey. We had learned the mode of travelling, and thought we knew exactly where reform could be applied with most effect. The greatest annoyance the traveller experiences in Russia and Siberia, is the necessity of paying horse hire at each station. It is bad enough during the day, but to turn out of a warm nest two or three times in a night, to banter postmasters and yemschiks, settle your fare to the next station, and see that your wheels are oiled, is simply intolerable, especially when the thermometer is anything you like below zero. The postmasters, with the most laudable desires possible, cannot cheat you. In every station is exhibited a placard, framed and glazed, signed andsealed by high functionaries, stating the distance in versts to each of the two nearest stations, and the fare in roubles and in kopeks, which, in Eastern Siberia, and also as far west as Tumen, is one kopek and a-half per verst per horse, that is, a little over three farthings per mile. Besides this, you are expected to pay twelve kopeks, or fourpence, for oiling wheels, which is necessary, on an average, at every third station. Then, if you use a post-carriage, orkibitka, another fourpence is due for that at every station. The drink-money, ornavodku, due to the yemschik, must on no account be forgotten, for the speed with which you will be driven on the next stage will bear some proportion to the amount of drink-money which you are reported to have given for the preceding. Money does not always procure speed, but speed will always draw money. In the anxiety to award the due meed of merit a nice estimate must be made of the value of the service rendered, and the reward fixed at ten, fifteen, or twenty kopeks, or nothing at all, as the case may require. The condition of the roads and horses, over which the yemschik has no control, must be carefully weighed in this important calculation. But while nobody can attempt to cheat you with any decent prospect of success, it is always open to the station-keeper to say he has no change to give you. To meet this dodge you must carry a bag of coppers, which, unless it weighs nearly a hundred weight, will not last you from one town to another where alone the coin is procurable. Then, again, it was not to be denied that our knowledge of Russian was too limited for our purpose, in the event of our getting into any real difficulty, from the thousand and one accidents to which travellers in such a country are liable.
We contrived to magnify all these imaginary difficulties in our own eyes, when a young Russian, bearing the German name of his father, Schwartz, waited on us to offer hisservices on the road as far as St. Petersburg. He had literally devoured his patrimony with riotous living, and had been in all employments, from clerk in a government office in Irkutsk, to actor in the provincial theatre, and was now bent on returning to his family, like the prodigal, as he was, without a shirt to his back. His antecedents were nothing to us: seeing he was a Russian, spoke German perfectly, French intelligibly, as also a few words of English which he had picked up from grooms in St. Petersburg. We settled with him at once, giving him fifteen roubles down, to furnish him with clothes to cover his limbs from the cold—for the rest he was to work his passage to Petersburg. An agreement was duly drawn up and signed, and, to conform to Russian formalities, it was certified by the police, on which a special passport for him was issued. When all was in order, a creditor of Schwartz's appeared, and lodged a claim against him for the sum of ten roubles, which we had of course to pay, or forego the valuable services of the scamp. The ten roubles was not very alarming, but the number of similar demands that might follow, inspired us with sore misgivings on Schwartz's account. The more we actually paid for him, the stronger arguments we should have to go on paying. To save the equivalent of the fifteen roubles we had already given him, it was well worth while to pay other ten. But when we had spent twenty-five roubles on him, we should only have a stronger reason to pay twenty more, which, at that stage of the proceedings, would be evidently throwing good money after bad. After grave deliberation we determined, illogically as I confess, to pay the ten roubles demanded, and stop there. By good luck we were not called upon for more roubles. But our experience with Schwartz proved so unsatisfactory, that it would have been an economy to pay a hundred roubles to get rid of him. He was a trouble and a dead loss to us from first to last. His only real use was, as astanding butt for invective. His follies were, at the same time, aggravating and amusing. When he left at a post-station some of the things of which we had given him charge, it was a solace to us to know that he had also lost an extra pair of his own boots. And when we missed a preserved ox tongue, which had been put into water to soak at a previous station, it relieved our resentful feelings mightily to make Schwartz go without his dinner.
Snow fell in Irkutsk on the 17th October, and for two days, sledges were at work in the streets. The sun was powerful enough on the 18th to melt it a little during the middle of the day. But still there was the snow, a fortnight before its regular time, and we were just too late to be able to get over the rivers while they were still open for boats. It was an early winter in Eastern Siberia: that world-renowned individual, the "oldest inhabitant," only recollected one season in which snow-roads were practicable in Irkutsk as early as the 1st October, Russian date, or 13th, new style.
The 19th was a fine hard morning, with a sky slightly overcast; and on that day we resumed our nomad life, after six days' rest.
The River Angara flows through Irkutsk, but there is only a small portion of the town on the left bank. The Irkut, rising in the mountainous region near Kosogol, on the frontier, south-west of Irkutsk, falls into the Angara opposite the town. The post-road crosses the Angara below the confluence. The crossing is effected by means of a most efficient floating bridge, which consists of a boat held by a strong warp to an anchor dropped about 500 yards up the stream in mid-channel. The slack of the warp is buoyed up by three boats at equal intervals. In crossing, the boat's head is pointed obliquely across the stream by means of a large oar over the stem. The strength of the current does the rest. The boat swings on her anchor until she is laid alongsidethe landing on the opposite bank. The boat is double-bottomed, with a spacious platform on deck, and a moveable rail on each side. There is room on deck for three or four carriages to stand, and the passage is effected without taking the horses out. The Angara flows as clear as crystal out of the Baikal, and maintains its purity after receiving the Irkut. It is deep at Irkutsk, and the current is nearly six miles an hour.
The town again appears to good advantage from the left bank of the Angara. The river banks are in themselves rather picturesque, and when the water, the pretty white spires of the town, and thick woods around, are combined in one view, the effect is beautiful, and the traveller retains a pleasing impression of Irkutsk.
For the first two stages from Irkutsk we caught occasional glimpses of high mountain ranges at a great distance to the south-west. But the dense forest soon shut in our view. The roads were tolerably good, and we rumbled along expeditiously and comfortably. The country maintains the same characteristics as already noted—thick woods for the most part, with clear patches here and there, and villages at intervals of a few miles; while its surface is pleasantly varied with hill and dale, and if only there were less forest to enable one to see round him, it would be a very cheerful drive. Innumerable small rivers have to be crossed in ferry-boats, which help to break the monotony of the journey. Reading is next to impossible on Russian roads, and the art of sleeping—when there is nothing better to do—is a most valuable accomplishment to the traveller. We had attained considerable proficiency in this, and I have been ferried across a river amid the hubbub of taking out and putting in horses, and rolling the carriage into and out of the ferry-boat, without suffering any interruption of a profound slumber.
Being eager to make up lost time, we drove our yemschiks hard with drink-money, and they certainly responded heartily to the stimulant. The roads are very steep, and nothing has been done in the way of cuttings or embankments. The ravines have generally small streamlets running along thebottom, which is ragged and broken. These are bridged over in a rough-and-ready manner. But the ascents and descents are fearfully steep. When a heavy carriage starts down a hill with three rats of ponies in front of it, one only bearing the weight of the vehicle, no earthly power can stop it. The drag on the wheel is of little use. The only safety is in the plan the Russian drivers adopt of going full tilt from top to bottom, to the delight of Siberian ponies—dashing over the wooden bridge like madmen, and halfway up the opposite hill before they draw rein. There is a fascinating excitement about this mode of charging a ravine which kills all sense of danger, except, perhaps, when the road is slippery with snow, well polished with sledges. Under these circumstances it is only the more necessary to urge the beasts at top speed; but a qualm of nervousness will occasionally rise, unbidden, until you have learned to confide implicitly in the infallibility of the yemschiks and their high-mettled steeds.
The ponies are always in prime condition for work. Little or no attention is paid to them in the stable or out of it, but they have always as much corn as they can eat, and they are notoriously good feeders. They are capable of a great amount of continuous hard work. On an average every one of them travels two stages a day, both ways, for they always return to their own station. That is equal to about forty miles with a loaded carriage, and the same distance back, with an empty one, on the same day. When the roads are tolerable they go at a good speed. We have travelled eighteen miles at a stretch within an hour and a half. The roads seldom admit of this rate of travelling, however, being generally, saving the bridges and the original cutting through the woods, left pretty much to nature.
Along the whole length of the post-road the distances from station to station are marked at every verst by wooden poles,painted black and white; and at each station a high post indicates the distances from the chief towns. A feeling of depression always came over me on spelling out the interesting word St. Petersburg, and finding it was more than 6000 versts or 4000 miles off. It was a tedious business to reduce such an imposing figure as that. After Irkutsk we had got it under the 6000. When wearied out with rough travelling, the few versts to the next halt were painful enough, and on such occasions the 5000 odd were really appalling.
We never stopped by day or night, unless compelled by force of circumstances. Our meals were consequently uncertain and irregular, both as to time, quantity, and quality. At most of the stations shtchee and beef could be had about mid-day, though unless it was ready we did not wait for it, but pushed on, trusting to what we might pick up in a chance way, and having our small stock of preserved meat to fall back upon, should everything else fail. Twice a day we drank tea. The Russians lose a great deal of time in tea-drinking at the post-stations. Give them plenty of tea, and they care little for food. Indeed they encourage the habit partly to blunt the appetite. It suits their constitutions, but it certainly did not answer with us, to be jolted and tumbled about on bad roads with a stomach full of fluid. Besides the loss of time was an object to us, but of little account apparently to the Russians. A sufficiency of solid food can be disposed of in a very few minutes, not so boiling tea, and I have constantly seen Russians slowly sipping quarts of the decoction long after their horses were ready for the road. In a very cold night the hot tea is no doubt acceptable, but one tumbler of hot grog is worth a gallon of tea, and occupies less time and less room.
After three days and nights' travelling we arrived at the Birusanskaya station, distant from Irkutsk 638 versts, or 426 miles, which was very fair going, all things considered. Inthat distance we had only passed one town—Nijni-udinsk. Birusanskaya stands on the right bank of the river Birusa, which, at this part of its course, divides the government of Irkutsk from that of Yenisei. This river, as well as those crossed to the eastward, rises in the mountain ranges near the southern frontier of Siberia. They all flow northward, and fall into the Angara, before its junction with the Yenisei.
At Birusanskaya we were told that the river was impassable on account of the ice, and that there were no horses, with a number of similar stories, more or less true. It was night, and we were not the only sufferers; so, as soon as we had fairly exhausted all the persuasive means at our disposal, we quietly went to roost like the rest. At 10 o'clock next morning we were furnished with horses, and drove to the river. It was fast freezing over, and at the regular crossing there was too much ice at the edges to admit of the ferry-boat's "communicating." Another crossing had therefore to be used, where there was no proper road on either side of the river, and which consequently involved much loss of time. On leaving the river, and before joining the post-road, a tract of prairie ground had to be crossed, all holes and hillocks, and anything but an eligible road for wheeled carriages.
The distance from home seemed to diminish suddenly as we came in sight of the telegraph wires which had been carried as far as the river Birusa. The posts were put up at some parts of the road eastward. Coils of wire were lying at every station, and the workmen were busy stretching and carrying it on. The posts are tall rough spars, placed at intervals of one hundred yards, and only two wires are used. The telegraph was completed to Irkutsk in December last.
A marked improvement in the roads was observable in the government of Yenisei. They had been macadamised, andalthough the stones had been overlaid with a coating of mud during the early part of autumn, it was not so deep as to become very rough with traffic. In some parts a thin covering of snow lay on the ground, and sledges were in use in such places.
In the middle of the night (a very cold one) of the 23rd October, we arrived at the river Kan, which, from the town of Kansk, flows nearly west, and joins the Yenisei north of Krasnoyarsk. The ferrymen were all on the opposite shore with their boats, and of course asleep, and we were anything but sanguine of rousing them. We called lustily, but the echo of our shouts alone responded, as if in mockery. "You may call spirits from the vasty deep," &c. But either we must get over, or shiver on the banks of this river Styx till day-light. Fortunately the yemschiks were as impatient as ourselves, and possessing stentorian lungs, they plied them vigorously, until at last a gruff response from the log-hut on the other side was vouchsafed. Then some low mutterings were heard (for the air was so still and frosty that you might have heard a pin fall), then a little rumbling of oars and heavy footsteps on the loose deck-boards of the ferry-boat, some splashing in the water, and in due time the boat itself, with the grim ferrymen in beards and sheepskins, was seen approaching us. The town of Kansk is a verst and a half from the ferry. The sharp air had affected all and sundry at the post-station of Kansk, for a deep sleep had fallen on them. With a little perseverance we knocked them up, in anything but an amiable frame of mind, and it was near 4 o'clock, a.m., before the sleepy yemschiks had got the horses in.
We had picked up a fellow-traveller the day before, and arranged to travel in company, if possible, as far as Tomsk. He was carrying gold from Irkutsk to Barnaul, which is the great place for smelting it. Our first introduction to him wasat the Birusa river, which he excited our jealousy by crossing in advance of us. To get a rise out of him we promised extra drink-money to our yemschik if he would pass him, which he did. The Russian was annoyed at being passed, and at the next station he recorded his grievances in the book kept for that purpose. We left him there drinking tea, and soon after we missed some things which we had in the hurry left behind. Our new friend came up with us at the next station, and brought with him the missing articles. This began to make us feel kindly to him, and as we encountered him at every station, we soon got intimate, and he ended by proposing to keep company with us, dining and drinking tea together. His name was Vasil Vasilovitch Something or other (I never could catch his family name), but as his talk turned greatly on the charms of Barnaul, we gave him the nickname of Old Barnaul. He tried hard to speak French and English, but as he had only acquired about ten words of the former, and five of the latter, we could only get on with a conglomeration of Russian, French, and English, or through the interpretation of Schwartz. "Prendre thé—very good," was about his highest effort in philology. Old Barnaul talked much of San Francisco, whither he had been carried as a prisoner on board H.M.S. Pique, during the Crimean War. He was captured at Sitka, and after spending some time at San Francisco, studying American character, and acquiring his modicum of the English language, he found his way back in an American vessel to Sitka. Old Barnaul had a cossack in full accoutrements,i. e., armed with a long sword, a most kind, good-natured Russian soldier, who was infinitely more useful to us than the empty-headed Schwartz.
Travelling in company has its argumentsproandcon. First,pro—you have the chance of exciting in the respective yemschiks the noble ambition of landing you first at the nextstation, by holding out the promise to each of extra drink-money if he wins. This is also exhilarating to yourself, as in every stage of the journey you have the excitement of a race to beguile the tedium of the way. Then, by preconcerted arrangement, you determine at what station you will dine or drink tea, so that whichever of you arrives first can make the necessary preparations. Second,con. You throw a heavier burden on the yemschiks at the stations, and thereby protract the usual time required to change horses. And you run the risk of stopping the whole party by the greater number of horses you call for all at once, for there may often be horses for one traveller, where there are not enough for two. On the whole, it retards progress, just as in the case of vessels keeping company on the water, the speed obtained is somewhat less than that of the slowest of the convoy.
To the west of Kansk, the country is nearly cleared of wood, and is for the most part rather flat. Cultivation becomes more general, and the clear view occasionally obtained over the bare country, revealed many large villages dotted here and there.
The wind rose early in the day, and sent a cold chill through us as we drove up in its teeth. While halting at a station, a smart shower of snow fell, and caught our tarantass, half-open in front, and face to wind. It was fast filling with snow, and we rebuked Schwartz for his negligence. He at once transferred the responsibility from his own shoulders, by going out into the yard and kicking the first yemschik he met, which seems to be the most civil kind of salutation a Russian moujik expects. When the shower stopped, it was not difficult to shake out the snow from our blankets, and what was left was no great inconvenience to us, for the air was too cold to allow it to melt. The road was kept clean by the wind, which drove the snow before it like fine sand drift. But the wind was a sad inconvenience to us, and this was perhapsthe only day on which our heavy furs and blankets were inadequate to retain warmth. The roads were excellent, however, and we went merrily along. We found the inconvenience of travelling with Old Barnaul, on coming to a station where horses were obtainable for us, being privileged, but none for him. The "cold without," and a good dinner within, induced us to wait a few hours until he could get horses. Besides, the Yenisei river was before us, and we were assured that the passage could not be effected in such a wind.
Very late at night we reached Basailsk, a station ten versts short of the Yenisei. There we remained all night, and next morning drove on to the river. Here was one instance, out of many, of the absurd situations that have been chosen for many of the post-stations in Siberia, with reference to the rivers. The station is nearly always placed at some distance from the river, sometimes only one or two versts. Horses have to be harnessed and driven to the river, there unharnessed again, transported across the water, and put to again on the other side. This extra work and loss of time would be saved by placing the station on the bank of the river, and so by having one on each side, the horses need never be ferried over at all.
The Yenisei is a noble river, the largest in Siberia. Its banks are bold, but very bare, while the lack of timber, and general baldness of the country, give the scene a bleak and inhospitable aspect. The sprinkling of snow that hung about the crevices served to intensify the gloom.
It was questionable whether we could cross the Yenisei in the face of the wind, which blew in strong gusts from the north-west, but we managed to get our establishments into a boat, rather small for the load she had, but quite large enough for the power available to propel her. She was headed straight across the stream, pulled by four men in the bow, and steered by the usual rudely made oar over thestern. They made very little way with her, and when we had reached the right bank of the river, we had dropped about a mile down stream. A horse was ready on the other side to tow the boat up to the proper landing-place. A rope was passed ashore, but before it was properly secured to the horse, the end slipped, a gust of wind caught the boat, and she was blown from the shore. This was too good an opportunity for jabbering and gesticulation to be lost on our lusty crew, and accordingly to this luxury they abandoned themselves, while the unfortunate boat, bearing us, the unfortunate passengers, was being blown out to the middle of the stream by the wind, and at the same time gliding swiftly down the river. When the crew had recovered themselves a little, they hesitated about which shore they ought to make for; and at last concluded it would be best to go back again to the left bank, which we reached at a point three miles below our original starting-place. The men landed, and went to the town to fetch horses to tow the boat up again. We walked to the town also to seek some shelter from the biting wind, and wait the arrival of the boat. She got up at noon, and we made a fresh start to cross, which was successfully accomplished the second time. A used-up team of horses awaited us, and we travelled slowly to Krasnoyarsk.
Amid a great deal of grass and waste land, the country round Krasnoyarsk is well cultivated, but very bare. The town is situated on a raised plateau in a large valley. Like other Siberian towns its streets are wide, straight, and clean, with dull-looking wooden houses, and handsome churches. There is something incongruous in this combination. The churches are undoubtedly highly ornamental to the town—it would be poor indeed without them—but the contrast between their snow-white walls and spires, and the earth-colour of the houses, is too great. They seem to have no connection with each other.
Krasnoyarsk, though the government town of Yeniseisk, is comparatively a small place, its population being something under 10,000. As an exception to the general rule, its name is not derived from a river, but means "red cliff."
The station-master at Krasnoyarsk combines with his official duties the business of hotel-keeper, an arrangement admirably convenient for travellers. The station hotel is a very good one from a Siberian point of view, and we were induced to shake down in it for the night from a variety of reasons, chiefly because we were very tired, and it was snowing heavily.
Other travellers from the west were there at the same time, and we were entertained by their accounts of the state of the roads from Nijni-novgorod. It was amusing to hear the different reports of travellers, and compare them. Most of them were absolutely contradictory, and we were constrained to come to the conclusion that Russian travellers fill up the blanks in conversation with whatever comes uppermost, without taxing their memory to the extent necessary to give an accurate statement of their experience.
The amount of attention which the efficient management of the hotel exacted from the landlord left him no time for the duties of his less remunerative position of postmaster. All the postal arrangements were in dire confusion in the morning, when we wished to start on our journey, yemschiks drunk, and no one at his post. We lost the whole morning waiting for horses, which was so vexatious that we resolved to record our complaint in "the book." At every post-station a black book is kept in a corner of a room on a small table, to which it is attached by a cord, and sealed. It is open for public inspection, and every traveller has the privilege of writing in it any grievance he may have suffered from inattention, incivility, or unwarrantable delay on the part of yemschiks or postmasters. The director-general of postsmakes a periodical tour, and examines the black book of every station. The complaints of government couriers are, perhaps, the only ones that excite much attention. Everything else in the posting system is made subordinate to the rapid despatch of government intelligence. Horses can never be refused to a courier on any pretence whatever, for the station-keepers are obliged, at all times, to keep a certain number in reserve for such emergencies. When news of importance has to be transmitted, it can be done with very great rapidity by means of anestafette, which will carry news from Kiachta to St. Petersburg, a distance of over four thousand miles, in less than twenty days.
The rapidity with which the Russian government has, on certain occasions, obtained important news from China, proves the efficiency of the courier service. The signing of the treaties at Tientsin in 1858, and the Taku disaster in 1859, were known at St. Petersburg some two weeks before the official despatches reached this country. And now that the telegraph has been extended to Irkutsk, the Russians receive news from the Chinese commercial ports, on the direct steamer route, a good many days earlier than we can, even by telegraph from Suez. The capture of Nanking, for example, was reported in EnglandviâSt. Petersburg on the 11th September, while our Suez telegram did not reach till the 23rd.
It had snowed all night in Krasnoyarsk, and sledges were actively employed in the streets next day. The conveyance given to us for our extra baggage was a sledge.
Old Barnaul could not get horses, so we left him behind. He managed to hire private horses for one stage, and came up to us at the next station.
The roads were good, but yemschiks sulky, and we were driven along at a snail's pace. When drink money was asked for, we upbraided the yemschik for his contumacy. He appealed to the "regulations," which only authorise a speed of eight versts per hour. We had nothing to object to this. But as the yemschik defended himself by the strict letter of the law, we could avail ourselves of it also, and there was nothing about drink money in the "regulations."
The wind had fortunately subsided, but the cold was intense. The country west of Krasnoyarsk continued very bare. The crisp snow made travelling easy, and later in the day we managed to mend our pace, making good way during the night, and arriving early on the following morning at the town of Achinsk, 166 versts, or 110 miles, from Krasnoyarsk. There are two pretty churches in Achinsk, and the houses are rather handsome for a small town of two or three thousand inhabitants. It is situated near the river Chulim, which trends westward and joins the Ob. Achinsk is thelast town of the government of Yenisei, and also stands on the boundary line between eastern and western Siberia.
The country is more woody near Achinsk, and game of various kinds is abundant. We here for the first time tasted theryabchik, a bird something between a pheasant and a partridge in size and in flavour.
While at Achinsk we were bluntly told we could not cross the Chulim, owing to the quantity of floating ice. The river is one verst and a-half from the town. The postmaster offered to drive us there, but said we should have to come back, unless we chose to encamp on the bank of the river. When we did get there, we succeeded, after a long debate, in inducing the boatmen to ferry us over. But for a full hour they stoutly refused to take the tarantass. The large boats had been laid aside, and smaller and more handy craft, better fitted for threading their way through thick blocks of ice, were being used. With patience, however, we gained our point, and got tarantass and all across the river, though not without considerable difficulty and danger.
We now entered the government of Tomsk, a fact of which the state of the roads would have been sufficient evidence. All through the government of Yenisei, a distance by our route of 350 miles, the roads are well kept up, with side drains and cross drains to keep them dry; but in Tomsk government the roads were far worse than nature made them, for traffic had ruined them and made them all but impassable. During the wet weather of early autumn they had been a mass of soft mud, which was cut up by wheels and horses' feet to a fearful extent. The frost caught them in that condition, and the result can be more easily imagined than described. The main road had been in fact abandoned, until enough snow should fall to fill up the inequalities; and in the meantime by-roads had to be struck out through the forest, that being the only practicable means of travelling atall. It is considered that between the autumn and the snow there are "no roads," and no Russian travels at that season unless under the most urgent circumstances. In the post regulations it is laid down that travellers can demand to be driven at the rate of ten versts per hour in summer, eight in autumn, and twelve in winter, from December to March. These rates are, in practice, greatly increased in summer and winter, but, in the month of October, it is hard work to average even the government speed. The state of the road beyond Achinsk had necessitated the subdivision of the stages, by erecting temporary intermediate stations. The whole of the arrangements were in confusion; so much so that after an early breakfast in Achinsk, we found no opportunity of dining till near midnight.
The cold continued very severe. Our freezing breath kept our faces in a mass of ice, large icicles formed on the horses' muzzles, and they were white all over with hoar frost, formed by the perspiration freezing on their hair. Our bread, and everything we had, was frozen through.
As we toiled on, painfully and slowly, on the 28th of October we met travellers who assured us of the impossibility of crossing the Kiya river at Mariinsk. We had learned, however, rather to take courage from this kind of Job's comfort with which we were so often entertained on the road; and we did not hesitate to advance to the river, which we reached at seven in the evening. An hour sufficed to persuade the ferrymen to tempt the crossing, and another hour saw us over the water and in the town of Mariinsk. We were fain to rest our aching bones a little, and finding a very civil but garrulous postmaster, a Pole, we dined comfortably at the station, and started again at midnight.
On the preceding night we had come to grief, by the wheel of our tarantass sinking into a pit that had been dug for a telegraph post, and then filled with snow. With theassistance of a peasant whom chance threw in our way, and a stout pole for a lever, the vehicle was extricated; but we had not gone two stages from Mariinsk before the same wheel fell suddenly to pieces without any immediate provocation. We were a number of miles from any station when this accident occurred, but the yemschik, being no doubt accustomed to similar mischances in driving four-wheeled carriages through tangled woods, proceeded at once to put us in temporary travelling order. He cut down a pretty stout tree, one end of which he laid on the axle of the fore wheels, while the other end rested on the ground behind the carriage. This formed a bridge for the axle of the hind wheel (the broken one) to rest upon, and by that simple expedient we got safely to the station, Berikulskoé. The accident delayed us a whole day at the station. Old Barnaul parted company with us to proceed to Tomsk, which was then only 120 miles distant. On entering the village, a blacksmith, spying our condition, and smelling a job, followed us to the station. We settled with him to repair our wheel, which was equivalent to making a new one all but the tire, for the sum of six roubles, and it was finished in the afternoon.
At this point we discovered that our special pass had been left five stations behind us. It was a serious matter to lose a document so essential to inspire postmasters with respect, and we wrote to the station where we supposed it had been left, requesting it might be forwarded to us. During the day, however, the post from Irkutsk passed, and brought us the paper, for which delicate attention we felt duly grateful.
From Berikulskoé we resumed the circuitous tracks through the forest. During the night our yemschik contrived to drive us up against a tree, to the irretrievable injury of the hood of our tarantass. Misfortunes seemed to come thick upon usand our ill-fated tarantass. Indeed, considering the terrible ordeal it had passed through, it was surprising that it had held together so long. Apprehension is lively in the dark hours, and visions of a final break down haunted us all that night, as we threaded our way in the deep shade of the forest, pitching and rolling like a ship in a storm. Our minds were sensibly relieved on reaching the town of Ishimskaya, at daybreak on the 30th of October.
Here we found Old Barnaul and his Cossack sleeping soundly on the boards. He had arrived the evening before, but had allowed himself to be cajoled into resting all night, and now it was too late to cross the river. The post that had passed us the day before had crossed the river in a boat at midnight, but since then the ice had set in so strong that the passage was impossible. It was therefore necessary to wait at the station till the ice on the river was strong enough to bear horses and carriages.
The station-master was a Pole, a very good sort of fellow, who would talk on any subject but Poland. He was something of a sportsman, possessed two old guns and some under-bred pointers. His wealth consisted in three curious old-fashioned watches, which he offered for sale. One was by Dent, and he informed us he had bought it of a traveller for 125 roubles.
As the force of circumstances compelled us to spend the day at Ishimskaya, we endeavoured to make the most of it, and tried to induce the postmaster to accompany us on a shooting excursion. This he declined, but proffered us all the topographical information necessary to enable us to find the game for ourselves. So armed, we plunged into the woods, and beat about for hours among the snow without the satisfaction of seeing a feather, or finding traces on the snow of anything but vermin. We returned about sunset, tired and cold, spite of all our walking, and an irreverentmagpie, on the outskirts of the town, paid the penalty of our disappointment.
The delay at this outlandish place was the more vexatious that it was within less than a day's march from Tomsk, where we purposed resting a day or two to refit. On the second morning we again stirred up the postmaster, but he absolutely refused to attempt the crossing with our tarantass. One traveller had come to grief that same morning trying to get a carriage over the ice. We resolved, however, to go without the tarantass, packing up a few necessaries in a small sledge, which we had drawn over the river by one horse, two more being sent from the station and put to on the other side. Old Barnaul accompanied us. The tarantass we left behind in charge of Schwartz, with orders to follow on as soon as the ice was strong enough to bear the carriage. Let it not be supposed that the same place that was open for boats on the 29th of October was frozen strong enough to bear horses and sledges thirty-six hours afterwards. When the river is freezing the ferry is removed to some distance, where a passage is kept open as long as possible by the constant traffic of boats. During that time the usual crossing at the post-road is left to freeze quietly, so that by the time the temporary ferry is no longer practicable, the ice at the regular ferry may be thick enough to bear the traffic.
Old Barnaul managed to slip on the ice and fall into a hole that had been broken by the horses' feet. A more miserable-looking object, on his emersion from the cold bath, I never saw. In the sledge his clothes became sheets of hard ice, but we were, fortunately for him, delayed for want of horses at the second station from Ishimskaya, so that the old man had time to melt down his congealed habiliments.
A good deal of snow fell during the day, but still the roughness of the road was but slightly mitigated thereby.The sledge was comparatively easy, however, the runners lying on two or more hillocks at once, instead of jolting up and down each separate lump, like the wheel of a carriage.
During the night we were again stopped, with a number of other travellers, for want of horses, and it was 3 o'clock on the morning of the 1st November ere we entered on the last stage before Tomsk. Our sledges were quite open, and we could but abandon ourselves to the enjoyment of a night scene more gorgeous than fancy ever pictured. The snow had ceased falling, and the sky was clear and cloudless. Not a breath of wind stirred. It was a little past full moon, and the pure white surface of the ground sparkled in the bright moonlight as if it had been strewn with diamonds. Some of the finest constellations were high above the horizon. Orion, Taurus, and Gemini were conspicuous; and Sirius was never seen in greater splendour. Towards daybreak, Venus appeared in all her glory, and completed the most brilliant group of celestial phenomena the human eye ever rested on. There is a peculiar transparency in the Siberian sky, both by night and by day, but it needs a still frosty night to show it off to its best advantage.
Long before daylight we passed numerous trains of peasants, with their sledges, driving towards Tomsk with their daily supplies of provisions for the market.
Before sunrise we entered the town of Tomsk, and were not sorry when Old Barnaul conducted us to a lodging-house, where we could thaw ourselves and take rest. We were made excessively comfortable there by the old lady and her daughters. Thecuisinewas excellent, attendance good, and charges very moderate. Our room was adorned with a number of pictures. Christ and the apostles, with some others of saints, were most conspicuous. A view of Kazan, the column of Alexander at St. Petersburg, coloured Germanlithographs of the bombardment of Sevastopol and the battle of Inkermann, and, finally, a certificate, signed and sealed, purporting that the old lady had made a donation to "the Church" in 1846. Great value appeared to be set on this document, but whether the lady regarded her good deed as laying up treasures in heaven, or thought the evidence of it, given under the hands of holy men, to be proof against ill luck, is not easy to say. It is difficult to separate the religion of Russians from the gross superstition with which it is mixed up. The upper classes, as a whole, keep aloof from religious observances, while the peasant class are constantly crossing themselves to churches and saints, and never will enter a room without uncovering the head and doing reverence to the picture of the saint that always faces them as they enter the door. Many excellent men are to be found in the Russian priesthood, but as a class they certainly do not stand high. The Russian government has always used the clergy to work on the illiterate masses by means of their superstitious fanaticism. The cross was borne in front of the troops in St. Isaac's Square when Nicholas put down the insurrection of 1825. And the Empress Catherine II., whose life was the reverse of all piety, invoked the protection of the saints in order to excite the enthusiasm of the people. The Russian peasants are pharisaical in their observance of saints' days and fast days, but their sense of religion stops there. A characteristic anecdote, illustrative of the religious sentiments of the Russian moujik, was told us at Tomsk. A moujik killed a traveller on the road, and robbed him. In his pocket was found a cake made with fat, which the moujik, being hungry, was preparing to eat, when he suddenly recollected that it was a fast day, on which it was unlawful to eat animal food. His religious creed, which placed no obstacle in the way of murder and robbery, was inexorable in the matter of eating meat on a fast day.
Tomsk is not equal to Irkutsk in size or population, and lacks the mathematical symmetry which distinguishes the latter town. The buildings in Tomsk are also less elegant, but they have an air of more homely comfort than those of Irkutsk. Its architectural defects are, however, amply compensated by the superior advantages of its site, as it is built upon several hills, sloping on one side to the river Tom, and on the other side forming deep ravines, which gives the town a picturesque and even romantic appearance. A good many houses are built of brick, which the Russians callstone. On the outskirts there are great assemblages of small, miserable-looking, wooden huts, which help to disfigure the town. The principal houses are insured against fire, and the emblem of the "Salamander" Fire Office, nailed on the outer wall or over the door, meets the eye everywhere. Fires are by no means common, which is surprising considering the combustible material of which the cities are constructed, and the necessity of keeping up large fires during at least six months of the year. Nor do the inhabitants display any extraordinary caution in their habits, for though smoking in the streets (where it could not possibly do any harm) is strictly prohibited in Russia and Siberia, smoking within doors is universally practised by all classes.
Tomsk has been considered the coldest town in Siberia on the same parallel of latitude. The temperature in winter is as low as -30° to -40° Réaumur (-35° to -58° Fahrenheit), but it is becoming milder. An English lady, who had resided there a dozen years, informed us that during that period a marked improvement in the climate was noticeable. The extension of agriculture has probably been the means of producing this change. During our stay in Tomsk the thermometer showed -8° to -13° Réaumur (14° to 3° Fahrenheit).
Excellent water is procured from the river. Water-carryingis quite a trade, employing a number of people from morning till night. A large hole in the ice is kept open, whence the water is carried up the steep bank in buckets, and conveyed through the town in carts, which are kept perfectly water-tight by the thick coating of ice that accumulates from the water dropped in filling.
All classes in Siberia are careful to cover themselves well from the cold. Wealthy people muffle up in expensive furs, and the peasants attain the same end by means of sheep-skins or deer-skins, which cost very little. No peasant is so poor as to be without very substantial gauntlets, made of stout leather with some warm substance inside, which protect both hands and wrists. They make little of the cold, however, when their avocations necessitate the endurance of it. In Tomsk, for example, it is not uncommon for the women to do their washing on the ice. Cutting a hole with an axe, they will stand or kneel over the water till their work is done, without even the appearance of hurrying. How they escape frost-bite it is hard to understand.
A few boys were seen skating on the river at Tomsk, but so few in number, and so grave in their demeanour, that it was sad to see them. Elsewhere we had observed skating in a small way, and in some villages small sledges even were used as playthings for children, but all so demurely as to be suggestive of the absence of real enjoyment. It may be that the Siberians make little of the ice because they have so much of it. But all roystering games in which the exuberant spirits of youth in other countries delight, are conspicuous by their absence in Siberia, and thegenus,little boy, may almost be classed among the extinct mammals. So much the worse is it for the country. The youth who grow up without a taste for manly exercises are very likely, in maturer years, to betake themselves to in-door recreations of the most unprofitable kind.
Many of the largest mining proprietors have their town residences in Tomsk, and about four thousand workmen are in the habit of wintering in the towns, and spending their earnings there. I will here note a few particulars relative to mining in Siberia, supplied by a gentleman of extensive personal experience in that department. Siberia is rich in nearly all mineral treasures; but little attention has been paid to any but gold and silver, and even few of the latter mines have been worked. The richest gold-diggings that have ever been worked in Siberia are situated in the northern part of the government of Yeniseisk, but they are now nearly worked out. Very rich diggings, or mines, have also been worked in the Altai-saian chain, or "White Mountains," in the south of the same province, on the Chinese frontier. Within a recent period, gold has likewise been worked in the northern part of the government of Irkutsk, and in the Trans-baikal regions, which have only lately been thrown open to private enterprise. Within the last two or three years, gold discoveries in the Amoor districts have attracted thither many exploring parties, but I have not ascertained what success has attended their efforts.
Gold-diggings are to be met with in nearly all the uninhabited parts of Siberia. But in western Siberia the gold-fields are almost worked out, so that they are now of little value, and are carried on only in a small way.
In the Kirghis steppe there is one very rich silver mine, called the Zmeiewskoi, the property of a private family in Tomsk, the descendants of the first discoverer of gold in Siberia. This gentleman turned his discovery to good account. He was the first who worked gold-diggings in Siberia, and obtained many immunities from the government, who have always eagerly promoted the working of that metal. In his lifetime, he amassed a colossal fortune, and at his death, left mining property of enormous value. Hissuccessors, however, contrived to dissipate their inheritance by various means; but the silver mine in the Kirghis steppe has once more raised them to affluence.
The government gold, silver, copper, and iron mines are worked by criminals, condemned to hard labour, after having undergone corporal punishment for capital offences. They receive no pay for their labour, but only food and clothing enough to keep body and soul together. The works are all under the control and management of officers trained in the mine corps, called Mining Engineers. These officers are strongly imbued with the national weakness of peculation, and their position affords them ample opportunities for promoting their own personal interests. Generally far removed, in uninhabited regions, from the surveillance of superiors, no efficient check can be put on their doings. As a necessary consequence of this state of matters, all government mining works are very far behind private ones in machinery, and indeed in everything else essential to their efficiency, and are therefore unproductive. So far from being a source of revenue to the government, they are, for the most part, a constant expense. These mines are all private property of the Crown, and within the last five years the Emperor, despairing of being able to work them to a profit, has proposed leasing them out to private individuals, and would now gladly do so were persons of sufficient capital and enterprise to come forward.
Private gold-diggings and mines, and, in a few instances, silver mines also, generally situated in entirely uninhabited parts of Siberia, are ceded by government to private individuals on certain conditions. The applicant must be either a hereditary nobleman, or he must have the right of doing business as a merchant of the second class, and must pay the dues of the second guild. The portion of ground ceded to him is seven versts (nearly five miles) in length, and one hundredfathoms in breadth. The place always chosen is along the margin of a stream flowing through the mountains. Hence the elongated form of the allotment is adopted, in order to include as much water privilege as possible. The claimant may, however, if he chooses, take a greater breadth, but in that case the length must be reduced so as to give the same area. The river, or stream, is always included in the claim, as the richest gold is often found in its bed. The land, once allotted, is the property of the claimant only until it has been entirely worked out, or has been thrown up and abandoned, when it reverts to the Crown. Or, if not worked by the claimant at least one out of every three years, the claim is forfeited to the government, who may let it out to another applicant. The object of the government is to promote the working of gold, in order to secure the revenue from it, which is of some importance, as all gold must be delivered to the mint at a fixed price, which leaves a good profit to the government.