ABUSES CONNECTED WITH EXPLOITATION. 141 



young officer presented the corrected account. He was 

 told to come again the next day. Again he was told you 

 must see the chief of the department. 



He went to his room with fear and trembling ; he was 

 received as if the accounts were being presented for the 

 first time. He was complimented on the zeal and care 

 with which he had discharged the duty entrusted to him, 

 and on the very reasonable amount of the expenses which 

 had been incurred. But whether all this was said in 

 irony or otherwise he knew not. He was told to call next 

 day at the office. He did so, fearing he had fallen into a 

 trap, but was at once informed that his accounts were 

 passed, and presented with authority to draw the amount. 

 He drew it accordingly ; but following instructions received 

 from his adviser, he waited upon the head of the depart- 

 ment to take leave, and handed to him a closed envelope 

 containing the surcharge of 5000 roubles. This was 

 received in apparent ignorance of its contents, but he was 

 asked to call once more before he set off on his return 

 journey. He did so, and received from the head of the 

 department, with the parting Gluckliche Reise, a closed 

 envelope. Upon afterwards opening this he found that it 

 contained 500 roubles, his share of the spoil. ' Such/ said 

 the officer of rank, ' was my initiation into the mysteries 

 of the service.' 



The reader would err who should conclude that the 

 Ural mining district must be, in comparison with other 

 parts of Russia, a sink of iniquity, and all connected with 

 the operations carried on there greater sinners than all 

 the sinners in the land. It is not so. I had almost said 

 it is the same everywhere. I only hesitated because I 

 could not prove so sweeping an assertion. I may say, 

 however, that according to all accounts the facts reported 

 are, taking in accordance with the customs of the country, 

 only their special form from the conditions and usages 

 of the locality. In so far as Government officials in the 

 forest service have conformed to these they have only done 



