Every day we left two stages behind us, each from fifty to sixty versts (about thirty-three to forty English miles), on which the horses were often only changed once, the change being made with lightning rapidity, as the fresh steeds were generally waiting ready harnessed for our hurrying procession. While the drivers were occupied over this business we usually made a hasty meal, buying provisions from the market-women waiting in the yard of the posting-station—hard-boiled eggs, milk, bread, etc. The halting-station (_étape_) for the night we generally reached early, long before twilight set in. Here the first thing was to prepare our meal—dinner and supper in one; that was the task of the _stàrosta_ and some volunteer assistants. Afterwards we stayed out in the open air as long as possible. Songs were sung in chorus; groups and couples wandered about in confidential talk; or sometimes we held formal debates, of a very animated description. On one of the earliest days of our journey we made our first halt in the open, far from any posting-station. We all got out and stood before a boundary post; it was that one so often described, of such sad renown, which bears in engraved letters the two words, “Europe,” “Asia.” It was now the beginning of June. A year and three months had gone by since my arrest in Freiburg, and I had now crossed the border between two continents. The sight of this landmark, passed by thousands driven into exile, brought thronging many gloomy thoughts. I had passed fifteen months in German and Russian gaols. “How many years have I now to linger in a Siberian prison?” I asked myself. “Shall I ever see this signpost again on a return journey? or shall I find my grave over yonder in Siberia?” CHAPTER XVII IN TIUMEN—PARTING—ON THE SIBERIAN RIVERS—A STARTLING PROPOSAL The town of Tiumen was at that time noted for the disputes that were continually arising between the political exiles and the authorities. We dreaded lest our party might be obliged to sustain a battle of this sort, the causes of which were known to us of old from the letters of various comrades; so we had intended to arrange together betimes how we should behave under given circumstances, what we must insist on, and in what manner we should conduct our dealings with the powers above us. But it was so difficult to get any orderly discussion during the journey, that after all we reached Tiumen without having made any definite plan of action.