Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art, March 1885

“Are the effects given you by the Government all in order?”

“They are, your nobleness.”

“Two shirts, two pairs of drawers, woollen trousers, great coat, pelisse, a pair of boots, leg irons?” enumerated the councillor, in a rapid, monotonous voice.

As each article is named, I say, “It is here,” and during the interrogation an obscure personage fumbles in my bag to verify my statement.

This concluded the inspection, and after surrendering my fetters, which I removed without the help of a blacksmith, I passed into the apartment where I was to remain as a prisoner until they took me to the village where I had to be interned as a settler.

I had not long to wait. The fifth day after our arrival, the remaining vagabonds of the gang were sent further east, and there remained only the ordinary exiles and prisoners under sentence of penal servitude. An important consequence of the departure of the vagabonds – old offenders who formed the bulk of the convoy – was the break-up of our communistic organisation, and the subsequent revelation of my secret.

On the following day the involuntary colonists, of whom I was now one, started for our final destination, a village some forty miles from Irkoutsk, and on November 1st, we arrived at Talminsky, the end of our long journey. For the last time we were paraded and counted in the court of the volost. Then, after our effects had been again examined, we received our registers and were handed over to the clerk of the village, who had orders to find us quarters.

The escort went one way, we went another, and we walked through the streets of the great village free men – within the limits assigned to us.

The Flight

If I meant to escape I had no time to lose. At any moment I was liable to be betrayed. My comrades among the colonists, as also the prisoners we had left at Irkoutsk, all knew who I was. Any of these, by turning traitor, could earn a considerable reward; even a slight indiscretion might reveal the secret, and the disclosure of my identity to the authorities would lead to my immediate arrest. It was therefore necessary to go at once; yet I could not start on so long a journey without money, and I did not possess a kopeck. So I sold my great coat, my woollen trousers, and my gloves, for a rouble and a half. It was not much. After this depletion of my wardrobe, my costume left a good deal to be desired. A regulation pelisse, a fur cap, thin trousers, and ordinary underclothing, did not afford much protection against the intense cold of a Siberian winter. But I dared not hesitate. On November 2d, at ten o'clock, before noon, I set out from the village. The morning though cold was clear and quiet. I made no attempt to hide my quality; it was evident to everybody. My yellow regulation pelisse and closely cropped head showed clearly enough that I was a vagabond. But this gave me little anxiety; I had observed that in Eastern Siberia vagabonds were neither arrested nor questioned. It would be the same with me, I thought, and in this expectation I was not disappointed. My journey as a vagabond lasted about eight days, and I suffered much both from hunger and cold. In the valleys – for the country was hilly – I often experienced a cold so intense that I thought my limbs would freeze as I walked. Sometimes the valley bottoms were filled with a thick fog. Going through one of those fogs was like taking a bath of pins and needles – so keen was the cold – and, though on these occasions I always ran, one of my knees became frost-bitten – my pelisse not being long enough to cover my legs, which were clothed only in light cotton pantaloons.

I generally passed the night in the bath-room of some peasant after the manner of vagabonds, for nobody in Siberia, however poor, is without a vapor bath, the vapor being produced by pouring water on red-hot stones.

One afternoon, just as night was closing in, I reached a village and sought a lodging. I had heard from the experienced vagabonds of the gang that it was always better to ask charity or help from the poor than from the well-to-do. Never, they said, when you are on the tramp, knock at the door of a rich man's house. Go rather to the most wretched cabin you can find.

This rule, based on a wide experience and a profound truth – for the poor naturally receive more sympathy from the poor than from the well-to-do – I deemed it expedient to follow. At the end of the village in question I found a cabin of unprepossessing aspect, and, concluding that it was exactly what I wanted, I went in, making, as I entered, the sign of the cross before the picture of a saint, as is the custom in Russia. Then I greeted my hosts.

“Good day, my boy,” answered the peasant, an old man with a long white beard, in a kindly voice.

“Could you sell me a bit of bread?” I asked; for though I travelled as a vagabond I did not like to beg after the manner of vagabonds, and always tendered a piece of money for what I received.

“Yes, you can have bread,” said the old man, handing me a loaf.

“Thank you, father; and may I pass the night in your house?”

“I fear that is impossible, my boy. You are a vagabond, aren't you? They are very severe just now about vagabonds, the police are. If you take in a man without a passport you may get fined. Where do you come from, my boy?”

“From the convoy.”

“I thought so. I was right then. You are a vagabond.”

I answered with a supplicatory gesture, and I dare say I looked cold enough and wretched enough to move the compassion of a harder-hearted man than this good old peasant.

“You fellows generally sleep in the baths, don't you?” he said, after a pause. “Well, go into mine if you like; I can put you nowhere else. And I have heated it to-day; you will be warm.”

So picking up my loaf, and laying on the table a few kopecks – nobody ever thinks of bargaining with a wanderer – I leave the house. The bath is hard by, and on going in I find that it is quite warm, as the old man had said. The heat is so great, indeed, that I can dispense with my pelisse.

These peasants' bath-rooms are seldom supplied with a chimney. The stones are heated in the middle of the room, and the smoke, after blackening the rafters, finds its way out as best it can. There were no windows, and, in order to look round, I had to light one of the tallow candles which I carried in my bag. They were very useful for rubbing my feet with after a long march. I was in no hurry to sleep, and before lying down on the wooden bench which was to be my couch I had a little operation to perform. My yellow pelisse proclaimed my quality a long way off. That was an inconvenience, and in certain easily conceivable circumstances, might lead to awkward consequences. I meant to change its color. This I did by smearing the garment with a mixture composed of tallow from my candles and soot from the wall. It was not a very fast black perhaps, but it answered the purpose. Henceforth, nobody, without a pretty close inspection, would perceive that I was a vagabond on the tramp.

This done, I lay down on the bench and was soon fast asleep. I must have slept an hour or two when I was wakened by the creaking of the door, and I heard the heavy steps of a man entering the room. As it was pitch dark I could not see him, and I did not think it worth while to strike a light. The newcomer seemed to be of the same opinion, for, without speaking a word, he groped his way towards my bench and laid down beside me. Though he touched my body he made no remark, and a few moments later I could tell by his regular breathing that he was fast asleep. Then I slept again, and did not open my eyes until I was wakened by the cold – for the bath-room had lost all its warmth, and the temperature was far below freezing-point. So I rose from my couch, donned my pelisse, and, though the sun had not yet risen, I left my snoring bed-fellow, whom I never saw, to his slumbers and resumed my journey.

My plan was to reach the house of a friend about 150 miles from the village where I had been interned. To traverse a region as large as Europe without money was quite out of the question, and even if I had succeeded in doing so it would have been impossible, without papers, either to cross the frontier or leave the country. It is hardly necessary to say that I took care never to ask my way. That would have been a great imprudence. And there was little need, for the roads in Siberia are so few that it is scarcely possible to go wrong. According to my reckoning I was still about thirty miles from my destination. Shortly after leaving the village I saw, near a little cabin by the road-side, a man who eyed me keenly. From his short hair and stubby beard I guessed that he was a recently arrived colonist who had come into the country with a chain gang.

“Won't you come in, brother,” he said, “and rest yourself and take a cup of tea?”

I accepted the invitation with pleasure, for I had not broken my fast. We entered the cabin together. It was very small, and on a brick hearth was sitting a woman, probably the exile's wife. My host asked me to take a seat and began to prepare the samovar, an appliance which is found in every Siberian cottage. As we drank we talked.

“Is it a long time since you left the gang?” asked my entertainer.

“Quite lately. I belonged to convoy number four.”

“You have turned vagabond then, brother?”

“Yes, what is the good of staying here?”

“You are quite right,” returned the exile bitterly. “The country is abominable. I shall do the same thing myself in a month or two. Which way do you go – by the Angara road?”

I gave him an itinerary, though not exactly the one I meant to follow.

“I know all these places well,” observed my host. “But do you know you will have to be prudent. The authorities hereabouts are very vicious just now. They arrest every wayfarer they see. You must look out, my brother, or they will arrest you.”

“What would you advise me to do, then,” I asked, greatly alarmed at this news.

“I will tell you, brother; listen!”

And then he gave me very valuable information; described the villages through or near which I should have to pass, indicating at the same time those that were dangerous and the footpaths by which I might avoid them. He gave me the names and described the dwellings of the peasants with whom I might lodge, and, in a word, told me everything which it imported a wandering outlaw to know.

“But why,” I asked, “are the police so active just now? I thought this road was one of the safest for vagabonds in the whole country.”

“God knows. Perhaps they have found a body somewhere and are looking for the murderer.”

I made no remark, but I thought it was much more likely that they had discovered my flight and were looking for me. And so it proved.

After finishing the tea we talked a little longer, and as I took my leave I thanked my host warmly for his hospitality and information.

When I reached the last village before that at which lived my friend, I was quite overcome with fatigue, and faint with hunger and cold; but I counted on a long and quiet rest in the cottage of a peasant woman whose address had been given me by the friendly exile. It was at the extremity of the village, and to get thither I had to pass the headquarters of the communal authorities. In the light of the exile's warning, and my own fears, this seemed a sufficiently dangerous enterprise. Albeit I put on an air of indifference and took care not to increase my pace, yet I could not avoid an occasional backward glance to see if I was being followed. No one, however, seemed to notice me, and I reached my destination without receiving any unpleasant attentions. The peasant woman welcomed me kindly, if not very effusively. But she was a dear good soul, gave me of her best, and let me lie on a bench and pass the night in her house.

About two hours before sunrise my hostess came into the kitchen and began to busy herself with preparations for breakfast. But I remained stretched on my bench; the cottage was warm. I felt very comfortable, and I saw no reason for hurry. The day was before me, and I had not far to go. So I turned round on my wooden couch and was just sinking into a second slumber when I heard the sound of bells, such as post-chaises and mail-carts in Russia invariably carry.

“Bells!” I cried, starting up. “Does a mail-coach run on this road?”

“No,” answered the peasant, “we have no mail-coach here; it is probably a private carriage which is passing through the village.”

Meanwhile the bells came nearer; then the sound suddenly ceased, as it seemed not far from the cottage. I did not like this at all. What could it mean?

“Would you mind going to see what or whose carriage it is?” I said. She went, and as the door closed behind her, I jumped off my bench and put on my clothes.

In a few minutes she was back with the news that the carriage belonged to the gendarmes, and that they were questioning the starosta and the clerk.

“The gendarmes!” I exclaimed, “who says so – where are they from?”