Other travellers from the west were there at the same time, and we were entertained by their accounts of the state of the roads from Nijni-novgorod. It was amusing to hear the different reports of travellers, and compare them. Most of them were absolutely contradictory, and we were constrained to come to the conclusion that Russian travellers fill up the blanks in conversation with whatever comes uppermost, without taxing their memory to the extent necessary to give an accurate statement of their experience. The amount of attention which the efficient management of the hotel exacted from the landlord left him no time for the duties of his less remunerative position of postmaster. All the postal arrangements were in dire confusion in the morning, when we wished to start on our journey, yemschiks drunk, and no one at his post. We lost the whole morning waiting for horses, which was so vexatious that we resolved to record our complaint in "the book." At every post-station a black book is kept in a corner of a room on a small table, to which it is attached by a cord, and sealed. It is open for public inspection, and every traveller has the privilege of writing in it any grievance he may have suffered from inattention, incivility, or unwarrantable delay on the part of yemschiks or postmasters. The director-general of posts makes a periodical tour, and examines the black book of every station. The complaints of government couriers are, perhaps, the only ones that excite much attention. Everything else in the posting system is made subordinate to the rapid despatch of government intelligence. Horses can never be refused to a courier on any pretence whatever, for the station-keepers are obliged, at all times, to keep a certain number in reserve for such emergencies. When news of importance has to be transmitted, it can be done with very great rapidity by means of an _estafette_, which will carry news from Kiachta to St. Petersburg, a distance of over four thousand miles, in less than twenty days. The rapidity with which the Russian government has, on certain occasions, obtained important news from China, proves the efficiency of the courier service. The signing of the treaties at Tientsin in 1858, and the Taku disaster in 1859, were known at St. Petersburg some two weeks before the official despatches reached this country. And now that the telegraph has been extended to Irkutsk, the Russians receive news from the Chinese commercial ports, on the direct steamer route, a good many days earlier than we can, even by telegraph from Suez. The capture of Nanking, for example, was reported in England _viâ_ St. Petersburg on the 11th September, while our Suez telegram did not reach till the 23rd. CHAPTER XVII. KRASNOYARSK TO TOMSK. It had snowed all night in Krasnoyarsk, and sledges were actively employed in the streets next day. The conveyance given to us for our extra baggage was a sledge.