y could, to go with them to Irkutsk.
All that they had seen of the invasion, its burnings, its pillages, its
murders, had perfectly sickened them, and they longed to be among the
ranks of the Siberian army. Jolivet had told his companion that he could
not leave Tomsk without making a sketch of the triumphal entry of the
Tartar troops, if it was only to satisfy his cousin's curiosity; but the
same evening they both intended to take the road to Irkutsk, and being
well mounted hoped to distance the Emir's scouts.

Alcide and Blount mingled therefore in the crowd, so as to lose no
detail of a festival which ought to supply them with a hundred good
lines for an article. They admired the magnificence of Feofar-Khan, his
wives, his officers, his guards, and all the Eastern pomp, of which the
ceremonies of Europe can give not the least idea. But they turned away
with disgust when Ivan Ogareff presented himself before the Emir, and
waited with some impatience for the amusements to begin.

"You see, my dear Blount," said Alcide, "we have come too soon, like
honest citizens who like to get their money's worth. All this is before
the curtain rises, it would have been better to arrive only for the
ballet."

"What ballet?" asked Blount.

"The compulsory ballet, to be sure. But see, the curtain is going to
rise." Alcide Jolivet spoke as if he had been at the Opera, and taking
his glass from its case, he prepared, with the air of a connoisseur, "to
examine the first act of Feofar's company."

A painful ceremony was to precede the sports. In fact, the triumph of
the vanquisher could not be complete without the public humiliation of
the vanquished. This was why several hundreds of prisoners were brought
under the soldiers' whips. They were destined to march past Feofar-Khan
and his allies before being crammed with their companions into the
prisons in the town.

In the first ranks of these prisoners figured Michael Strogoff. As
Ogareff had ordered, he was specially guarded by a file of soldiers. His
mother and Nadia were there also.

The old Siberian, although energetic enough when her own safety was in
question, was frightfully pale. She expected some terrible scene. It was
not without reason that her son had been brought before the Emir. She
therefore trembled for him. Ivan Ogareff was not a man to forgive
having been struck in public by the knout, and his vengeance would
be merciless. Some frightful punishment familiar to the b