448 BY STEAMER TO YENESEISK 



speak, and he speedily left without taking leave either of 

 Kitmanoff or of myself. 



We did not get a chance of going on shore till late 

 the following evening, when it was too dark to shoot. 

 Boiling and I had a long talk about Siberia, and the 

 anomalous facts in its domestic history. It presents the 

 spectacle of a healthy race of people, living in a healthy 

 because dry climate, continually replenished by emigrants 

 and exiles, and yet the population remaining almost 

 stationary ; a country with capabilities of becoming 

 "rich beyond the dreams of avarice" continuing poor. 

 Report affirms that scarcely one merchant in ten in it is 

 solvent, and that not one bank in ten could pay more 

 than ten shillings in the pound if wound up. The 

 question arises, to what cause is this extraordinary state 

 of things to be attributed ? Boiling ascribed it all to the 

 gold mines. The land, he said, cannot be cultivated, 

 and manufactures cannot be successfully carried on, 

 because the peasants and workmen are continually tempted 

 away by advances on account of wages, and by having 

 the opportunity of pocketing gold. Arrived at the gold 

 mines they are overworked. A certain task is allotted to 

 each man to perform every day, and he must work until 

 it be done. Not unfrequently it takes twenty hours out 

 of the twenty-four to finish it, and then, after insufficient 

 rest, he has to turn to work a^ain, often in wet clothes. 

 The miners have to "work the dead horse" for perhaps 

 a year ; that is to say, the advance of wages which 

 they received on being engaged having been speedily 

 squandered, it usually takes them a year to save sufficient 

 from their pay to clear off their debt. They do not like 

 to return to their village empty-handed, so they steal 

 gold as fast as they can. When at length they have 

 made a purse they come home, possibly with ruined 



