I heard in Tomsk many sad and heart-breaking narratives, but none perhaps so touching as the case of a young Scotchwoman, Mrs. B., whose husband had in 1879 practised as a physician for some years in the district of Chernigoff, European Russia. Although a liberal, Dr. B. had religiously abstained from openly expressing his views, or meddling in any way with politics, in fact had lived as a peaceful and industrious citizen in every way. In the spring of 1880, however, two young women from St. Petersburg arrived at his house with letters of introduction. They had been studying medicine at the hospitals in the capital, and finished the course of lectures, but wishing to continue their studies, called upon the doctor upon their return to their native town, to ask whether he would receive them as pupils, a proposal to which he at once assented. The girls were then introduced to his wife, who took a fancy to them, and a day seldom passed that one or both did not visit the house.
One morning, about a month after their arrival, the doctor was visited by the police superintendent, who informed him that his young friends were political suspects, and, from information received from Petersburg, were living on forged passports. But the next piece of news fairly staggered him: the women were to be sent at once by administrative process to the village of Verkhoyansk, in the province of Yakoutsk, where in a week’s time he, the doctor was, condemned to follow them for an indefinite number of years!
As is usual in such cases, a guard was put over the house, and Dr. B. forbidden to leave it. To make matters worse, his wife, a young and beautiful woman of twenty-two, was enceinte. But there was no help for it. The day of his departure arrived, when poor B. excused himself on the plea of going for a few days to Petersburg on business. It was only two months later, when her child was born, that Mrs. B. learnt the truth, and within a week had made up her mind to follow her husband, and start on a journey of six thousand miles before she had really recovered from her confinement, under circumstances before which many a strong man would have quailed. Not possessing the necessary means for travelling by steamer and tarantass, Mrs. B. joined a party of exiles at Tomsk, and set out for her long, weary journey. She would, in the ordinary course of affairs, reach her destination in sixteen months, always supposing she was not taken ill on the road. For weeks, months, did her almost superhuman courage and determination sustain her, and enable her to bear the long, weary marches under a burning sun, the insufficient food, the fetid atmosphere of ostrogs, and, worse still, the insults of her male companions. For four months she struggled on, but the tax had been too great on the nervous system, and on arrival at Krasnoiarsk, her mind showed symptoms of wandering. Still the thought that every day, every hour, was bringing her nearer her husband’s arms, gave her courage and additional energy, and put her in better spirits, which, alas! were soon destined to have a terrible fall. It was within three or four stages of Irkoutsk that she heard her death-warrant. “At Irkoutsk,” said the poor woman one fine sunny evening when, the day’s march over, she was sitting out in the prison-yard with her fellow-prisoners, “At Irkoutsk I shall only be one hundred and eighty miles from my husband. Only fancy, in another month I may be at Verkholensk, and with him again.” “Is that the Englishman who was banished from Chernigoff,” asked a “political,” a stranger, who had just come in from Krasnoiarsk, “if so, you will have to go a good deal further than Verkholensk to find him. Do not you know that they have sent him to Verkhoyansk, a Yakout settlement three thousand miles from Irkoutsk, within the Arctic circle?”
Within the Arctic circle! Poor soul! little as she knew Siberia, she knew what that meant; knew that to reach her husband’s place of banishment she must travel weeks and months alone, in dog or reindeer sledges, through the arctic desolation and fever-stricken “Toundras” of North-Eastern Asia. Next morning, however, she resumed her march mechanically, ate and drank nothing, spoke to no one, but seemed dazed and bewildered by the blow. The very evening of the day the gang reached Irkoutsk (the city which throughout the weary pilgrimage had been her haven of hope and rest), she went raving mad, and died in the criminal asylum three days afterwards. Has any writer of fiction ever imagined a more tragic or heart-rending story than this?
We reached Biriousinsk, a town of five thousand inhabitants, about mid-day on the 3rd of September. Gold has lately been discovered near here in large quantities. This event caused some surprise amongst the gold-workers of Tomsk and Irkoutsk, for until just lately this district had been looked upon as almost barren of mineral productions, the richest gold-fields being situated to the north of the province of Yeneseisk, Nertchirsk, in the Trans-Baikal, and Yuz, near the Altai chain, on the borders of China. The whole of Siberia, however, may be said to teem with the precious mineral, and, as a Russian once remarked to me, “Where it has not been found, it has not been looked for!” Silver, copper, and iron, are also found in large quantities in certain districts of Russian Asia, as many as 40,000 lbs. of the first-named metal being annually sent from the district of Barnaul, in South-Western Siberia, to Petersburg. On arrival, the silver is refined, and about three per cent. of gold extracted from it.
The Government gold and silver mines are worked by convicts, who receive no pay for their labour. The private mines are mostly of gold, and are leased by Government to private individuals on certain conditions. The applicant must, however, be a Russian subject. No foreigner, although naturalized, is permitted to rent ground for gold-digging purposes. The land, once allotted, is the property of the lessor, until it has been completely worked out, or has been abandoned. It then reverts to the Crown, or if not worked by the lessor at least one out of every three years, the claim is forfeited to Government, who may let it out to another applicant. All gold must be delivered to the imperial mint at a fixed price, which leaves a good profit to the Government. Many private mines employ as many as two and even three thousand men. The Siberian peasant seldom goes to work at the diggings; he can earn far more by agriculture at home, for Siberia is as rich a country above-ground as below. The workmen employed by the mine owners are generally discharged convicts, who have been sent to Siberia for theft and other minor offences. Bad characters of all sorts——drunkards, vagabonds, the scum of Irkoutsk and Tomsk——are the kind of men who find refuge in the private gold-mines, which, as may be imagined, are perfect pandemoniums when compared with the strict and well-regulated government establishments. The usual pay of a miner is four roubles (about 8s.) a month. On making the contract, however, he is paid a sum of money varying from six to ten English pounds sterling. With this he proceeds solemnly and deliberately to get drunk, nor does he desist till every penny of the “Hand-money,” as it is called, is exhausted. When sufficiently sober, he is sent off with a couple of hundred companions to the diggings. The working season lasts about a hundred and twenty days, and terminates, at latest, by the 15th of September. Work commences at 3 a.m. all weathers, and is seldom finished till eight or nine o’clock at night. The workmen are, therefore, as may be imagined, well fed. Each man gets from 1½ to 2 lbs. of fresh beef per diem, salt, buckwheat, and as much black bread as he can eat. His lodgings, too, are in most cases good, and well ventilated, and every gold-mine owner is bound by Government to keep up a fully-equipped hospital, with a resident surgeon and staff of assistants on the premises. Besides the fixed rations of food, a large stock of “vodka” is also kept for the men, who get a tumbler-full of the spirit once or twice a week, by way of warding off ague, and other malarial attacks. A pound of brick tea is also allowed each man per month. When the season is over, the majority of the gangs find their way to one of the large towns with the balance of their wages, and spend their money in drink and debauchery, till the return of the summer, and this accounts largely for the frequency of crime in Tomsk and Irkoutsk. The idea of saving money or in any way bettering his condition rarely enters the head of a Siberian gold-digger.
We were not detained long at Biriousinsk, and after a substantial breakfast of tea and boiled eggs, took the road again, and by seven o’clock that evening had rolled off nearly fifty versts. At Ilinskaya, however, we were brought to a sudden check. Our off wheel had caught fire, and it was only on discovering this that we remembered that in our eagerness to push on, we had for the last half-dozen stages neglected to oil the axles, an operation that should be performed at the very least every other stage.
We made up our minds therefore to stop the night, and push on to Kansk early the next morning, for clouds gathering to windward looked anything but reassuring. About midnight I was awoke from a delicious dream of home and its comforts, to find a huge, shapeless fur-clad figure standing over me, and in a loud and imperious voice, commanding me to rise and get horses. “Yeshchi lochade,”[[15]] it yelled, as I with difficulty made out that my nocturnal visitor was a woman. Vainly I endeavoured to make her understand that I was not the post-master, but all to no purpose. The more I reasoned, the more she stormed, till even Lancaster turned uneasily in his slumbers. “Get me horses,” shrieked the gorgon, “get me horses at once, or,” and here she pointed dramatically to the complaint-book. At last, losing all patience, she knelt down, and seizing my shoulders, shook me with masculine force. Thinking the joke had gone a little too far, I was about to summon the post-master, when that worthy appeared. Then with true Siberian politeness, and without a word of apology, the gorgon turned upon him, a small meek man, who was utterly powerless to compete with this dread vision of the night. Her system seemed to pay, for in less than half an hour the horses were in and we heard her jingle out of the yard, leaving us to our slumbers in peace.
The rain came on a few versts from Ilinskaya with every appearance of settling in for a steady downpour. The landscape to-day was less wooded and more cultivated than any we had passed since leaving Irkoutsk. A couple of post tarantasses passed us a few versts from Kansk, returning to Ilinskaya. Their drivers were fast asleep inside, coiled up out of the rain. Our yemstchik did not attempt to wake them. Although we were on the summit of a steep hill, he gave the horses a cut over the quarters and sent them careering away down the decline full gallop. I did not see what happened. This is thought a good joke in Siberia.
Perhaps the most trying time to a beginner on wheels in Siberia is getting on board the river ferries, when each yemstchik vies with the other who shall gallop the quickest on board and pull up the shortest without going over the other side. As the ferries were invariably approached by a steep road cut down the river-bank, there was no lack of excitement on these occasions. I remember once, just before reaching Krasnoiarsk, our driver, who was somewhat intoxicated, overshot the mark, one of his horses tumbling over the side, and only being got back with great difficulty. Rarely a day passed, that one of our outside horses did not fall, once or twice at least, but no yemstchik ever pulls up for anything under a broken rein or wheel.