e, or at some place of public entertainment when the fatal
touch on the shoulder summonses him away, perhaps for ever. The sentence
once passed, there is no appeal to a higher court, nor can a prisoner
hold any communication whatever with the outer world. An exile's
relatives, therefore, when ignorant of his fate, frequently ascribe his
absence to voluntary motives, and years sometimes elapse before the
truth is known. In some cases it never reaches his family, and the
harassing thought that he is, perhaps, regarded by the latter as a
heartless deserter has driven many a victim of the "Administrative
Process" to self-destruction.

A term of imprisonment varying from six months to two years in a
European fortress invariably precedes a term of exile, and this rule
applies to both sexes. There are hundreds of towns and villages
throughout Siberia where men and women are domiciled for various periods
of their existence, but as we are now dealing only with the remoter
settlements within the Arctic Circle we will follow the footsteps of a
political exile deported to, say, Verkhoyansk. From the forwarding
prison at Moscow to the city of Irkutsk in Eastern Siberia, politicals
not sent by rail travel with a criminal gang, wear prison dress, and
live practically the same as ordinary convicts. At night time, however,
in the _etapes_[28] a separate cell is set apart for their use. On
arrival at Irkutsk prison-dress is discarded, and an exile may wear his
own clothes, although he remains under lock and key and in close charge
of the Cossack who is responsible for his safe delivery. In summer-time
the two-thousand-miles' journey to the first stage northwards, Yakutsk,
is made by river-steamer, but during the winter months this weary
journey must be accomplished in uncovered sleighs, and is one of great
severity and privation, especially for women. At Yakutsk reindeer-sledge
conveys the ill-assorted pair ever northwards for another six hundred
miles to Verkhoyansk. The reader has seen the difficulties which we
experienced crossing the mountains, where delicate women on their way to
exile are compelled to clamber unassisted over giddy places that would
try the nerves of an experienced mountaineer. I should add that women
never travel alone with a Cossack, but are always accompanied on the
journey by another exile, either a man or one of their own sex. In the
former case, an acquaintance is occasionally made which ends in a
life-long _l