SIBERIA AND THE EXILES. 635 



rarely have to take the trouble to hide themselves. More than once 

 have we met such desperadoes on the road, been begged from and 

 given, in regular Siberian style. If a police-officer casually comes in 

 the way, he will offer his mite very quietly, without asking a ques- 

 tion. " Let them go, it's no matter," is the refrain of the officers. 

 The farmers take the best of care of the fugitives, and that quite sys- 

 tematically. At night, before bedtime, provisions for any passing 

 " unfortunates " are placed at the windows in all the villages on the 

 roads leading to Russia. When a pair of such men come into the 

 village, they go around from house to house, take the food tbey find 

 set out, as much as they want, with a little provision for the road, and 

 proceed to the bath-house, at the end of the village, where it is always 

 pleasantly warm, to sleep ; and this they do with the greatest security, 

 for they know that, in case of danger from the military patrol, the 

 nearest farmer will send his son or a servant to the bath-house to 

 warn any " unfortunates " that may be lodging there. The farmer is 

 the providence of these people. 



After the fugitives have put a distance of one hundred and fifty or 

 two hundred miles between themselves and the mines, the journey be- 

 comes easier and they appear more openly. They can venture to ask 

 for a lodging from any of the farmers, and to take horses from the 

 back of the village and ride on them to the next village. There they 

 will unbridle the beasts and start them back toward where they came 

 from, mount fresh horses, and so on for hundreds and hundreds of 

 miles. But the horses are every time carefully started back to their 

 homes. Everything goes smoothly, and the sympathy of the people is 

 inexhaustible, so long as the " unfortunate " does not steal. As soon 

 as he appropriates the smallest portion of strange goods, he seals his 

 fate. The whole village turns out and pursues the thief, who is beaten 

 down like a dog, wherever and whenever he is found ; and he is always 

 found. The result of this inexorable popular justice is, that hardly any 

 thieves are to be found in Siberia, and that no country enjoys greater 

 security than this colony of criminals. But, one may ask, "Are not the 

 people punished who execute this lynch-law ?" It must be remembered 

 that the mining district embraces an area at least five times as large as 

 that of the State of New York, that the population is relatively small, 

 and that in most cases no one cares for slain fugitives. If the officers 

 are informed of the occurrence, they will simply remark that no harm 

 has been done. The report is sent to St. Petersburg, and is lost in the 

 flood of similar documents. The escape of convicts is, as we have re- 

 marked, a daily event, and it is of little consequence to the magistrates 

 whether one more or less has been captured or killed. Of the fifteen 

 thousand prisoners annually brought into the district, an average of 

 five thousand escape. These are the desperate ones who stake every- 

 thing to obtain freedom again. If they are brought back, they flee 

 again. The number of those who escape two or three or more times, 



