By degrees, playing upon the wretched man’s hopes and fears, Baouschkin obtained all the details—the instrument with which the murder was committed (an axe, with the hammer end of which the men had been brained, and not a heavy weight, as had been supposed) was found, together with a box in which the stolen offertory had been contained, and the prisoner was condemned to death. Penitent he was at the last, moved thereto by the contemplation of the photograph of one of the murdered men which had been placed in his cell, that the sight might haunt him into confession and repentance. For civilians the death penalty was abolished, except for high treason; for them flogging with rods and Siberia were the punishment; but Gudzevitch, being a soldier, must die. The night of his execution I met the officer who commanded the parade. He was shot, twelve conical bullets riddling his body, and even so he was not dead; it was a gruesome sight when the poor wretch fell and lifted himself slowly up—six more bullets and he was dead. The criminal procedure, if successful, struck me as peculiar. It had something of the flavour of the Herodotean stories of the methods of ancient kings. I do not believe that there was more crime in St. Petersburg fifty years ago than in any other city. The _mujik_ is good-natured, easy-going, rather dull and childish, and his tastes are distinctly bacchanalian. But one could not fancy so simple a creature vicious or criminal. In old days there were frequently, if reports be true, murders of a peculiarly ugly kind. In the dark winter nights robbers used to infest the frozen river, waylaying the unwary footpad who ventured across alone. A stunning blow on the head was quickly given, and a hole in the ice was ready to receive a victim, stripped of his clothes and valuables; the body would be carried down the river under the ice, past Kronstadt, into the Baltic, and all trace of the crime would be lost for ever. In my time the river was well policed, and the brilliant lighting not only shed over the city the joy of beauty, but gave safety in place of danger. But stories used still to be told of a certain wicked old watchman (_Budotchnik_) who, posted near the Blue Bridge, was supposed to have sent out to sea in this way upwards of thirty of the very people over whose lives and property it was his duty to keep guard. _Quis custodiet custodes!_ Since man has fallen, wickedness there must be in all nations. Satan is ubiquitous. But in Russia the doctrines of the Faith are so infused into the blood of the people that even the criminals are religious—at any rate so far as the outer observances are concerned. It is said that a Russian thief will cross himself with one hand while he picks your pocket with the other, and I have no doubt that even that murderous old Budotchnik would have sacrificed his own life rather than take down the _ikon_, the sacred image of his patron saint, from its place of honour in the corner of his room.