are often not to be procured at all. Even stale black bread is sometimes a rarity, costing twelve to fifteen roubles the pood,[107] and is regarded as a delicacy only to be set before an honoured guest. The chief, if not the exclusive, food of the natives consists of fish and meat. The dwellings, too, are worse than the wooden huts of Kara, being simply “yurtas,” _i.e._ tent-shaped hovels such as the natives live in, built of rough logs, the interstices between which are filled up with earth and turf. Yet most of us were ready to go to these inhospitable regions, for there was always the chance, when once one was numbered in the category of “exiles,” that in time one might be sent to a more advantageous district. Above all, there was greater freedom; for though a place of residence is appointed for each exile, yet they may travel about in the surrounding country for considerable distances. There are more opportunities, too, of seeing people; new additions are always being made to the numbers of the “administrative” exiles in every province, and from them one learns what is going on at home; while, on the other hand, nobody fresh was sent to the penal settlement at Kara during the whole time that I was there. Finally, the exiles in Yakutsk had the prospect of yet another step in advance—they might gain permission to enrol themselves in the peasant class, and in that way win even greater facility of movement within the borders of Siberia. Things do not move very fast, and even if all goes well this favour may only be obtained after ten years’ exile; but one learns patience in Siberia, and many a one will let his thoughts dwell on that distant future: “Ten years! then perhaps there will be a manifesto; and in fifteen or twenty years may come the great event—return to one’s home!” Footnote 107: About 8½_d._ to 10½_d._ the English pound, a pood being equal to 36.1127 lbs. avoirdupois, and a rouble to about 2_s._ 1_d._—_Trans._ [Illustration: KARA PRISONERS AT WORK To face page 308 ] I confess that I myself indulged in such hopes, though I knew but too well how deceptive these “favours” of the Tsar might be. To the Coronation manifesto there had been attached numberless limitations and exceptions, and it was not to be expected that this time the pardon of which we had been hearing rumours would be extended to everyone. “But who knows? They have let me out of prison at last; perhaps now I shall be made an exile, unlikely though it seems!” Hope and fear alternated, and optimism gained the upper hand.