'The _Knout_ is a long narrow thong of leather, which is steeped and boiled in a chemical solution until it becomes thickly coated with metallic filings and deposit. Prepared in this way, the thong acquires considerable weight and hardness. Before it cools and hardens, however, they take care to turn the edges, made thin for this purpose, up toward each other, thus forming a groove extending through the whole length of the metal-coated thong, with the exception of the extremity, which is left limber that it may be wound round the hand of the executioner, while a strong iron hook is appended to the other extremity. The scaffold on which the victim suffers is called in Russian 'Kobyla,' literally a mare. It is an inclined plane, on which the sufferer is tied, his back is stripped naked, his arms embrace the higher end of the plank, his hands are tied under it, his feet are fastened on the lower end, all movement being thus rendered impossible. Hacking down upon the naked back of the victim, the knout falls with its concave side upon the skin, which the metalized edge of the instrument cuts like a knife, the blades of the groove burying themselves in the flesh; the instrument is not lifted up by the operator, but is drawn horizontally toward himself, tearing away, by means of the hook, the severed flesh in long strings. If the operator performs his part conscientiously, the sufferer loses consciousness after the third blow, and frequently expires with the fifth. Peter the Great fixed the maximum of the number to be given at one hundred and one--of course, this was a sentence of death. It is a singularity of the Russian laws that the number of blows decreed for the knout is always uneven. As soon as the wretched victim has received the prescribed number, he is untied, forced to kneel, and submit to the punishment of the brand. This brand consists of the three letters VOR (robber, criminal), cut in iron points upon a stamp, and is struck by the executioner into the forehead and cheeks of the sufferer. While the blood is still flowing, a black fluid, partly composed of gunpowder, is injected into the wounds. When the wounds heal, the letters assume a dark blue tint, and are forever after indelible. After the infliction of the brand, it was formerly the custom to tear out the nostrils, but this horrible barbarity was definitely abolished toward the close of the reign of Alexander I. I have, however, met more than one Siberian exile thus hideously disfigured, no doubt belonging to the time anterior to the publication of the ukase. I have met an incalculable number of men bearing upon cheeks and forehead the triple inscription VOR. I do not think the brand is applied to woman; at least I have never seen one thus desecrated.