I spoke just now of T--ski, and have something more to say of him. When he had with his friend to leave the first place assigned to them as residence in their banishment to come to our fortress, he carried his friend B---- nearly the whole way. B---- was of quite a weak frame, and in bad health, and became exhausted before half of the first march was accomplished. They had first been banished to Y--gorsk, where they lived in tolerable comfort; life was much less hard there than in our fortress. But in consequence of a correspondence with the exiles in one of the other towns--a quite innocent exchange of letters--it was thought necessary to remove them to our jail to be under the more direct surveillance of the government. Until they came M--tski had been quite alone, and dreadful must have been his sufferings in that first year of his banishment. J--ski was the old man always deep in prayer, of whom I spoke a little earlier. All the political convicts were quite young men while J--ski was at least fifty years old. He was a worthy, gentlemanlike person, if eccentric. T--ski and B--ski detested him, and never spoke to him; they insisted upon it that he was too obstinate and troublesome to put up with, and I was obliged to admit it was so. I believe that at a convict establishment--as in every place where people have to be together, whether they like it or not--people are more ready to quarrel with and detest one another than under other circumstances. Many causes contributed to the squabbles that were, unfortunately, always going on. J--ski was really disagreeable and narrow-minded; not one of those about him was on good terms with him. He and I did not come to a rupture, but we were never on a really friendly footing. I fancy that he was a strong mathematician. One day he explained to me in his half-Russian, half-Polish jargon, a system of astronomy of his own; I have been told that he had written a work upon the subject which the learned world had received with derision; I fancy his reasonings on some things had got twisted. He used to be on his knees praying for a whole day sometimes, which made the convicts respect him exceedingly during the remnant of life he had to pass there; he died under my eyes at the jail after a very trying illness. He had won the consideration of the prisoners, from the first moment of his coming in, on account of what had happened with the Major and him. When they were brought afoot from Y--gorsk to our fortress, they were not shaved on the road at all, their hair and beards had grown to great lengths when they were brought before the Major. That worthy foamed like a madman; he was wild with indignation at such infraction of discipline, though it was none of their fault. “My God! did you ever see anything like it?” he roared; “they are vagabonds, brigands.” J--ski knew very little Russian, and fancied that he was asking them if they were brigands or vagabonds, so he answered: