Page:Dostoyevsky - The House of the Dead, Collected Edition, 1915.djvu/279

 brought to our prison. It began to be filled at this time only with convicts of the military division, men therefore not deprived of civil rights, soldiers like all other soldiers except that they were undergoing punishment in the prison for brief terms, six years at the utmost. At the expiration of their sentence they would go back to their battalions as privates, just as before. Those, however, who came back to the prison after a second offence were punished as before by a sentence of twenty years. There had been, indeed, even before this change a division of convicts of the military class, but they lived with us because there was no other place for them. Now the whole prison became a prison for this military section. The old convicts, genuine civil convicts, who had been deprived of all rights, had been branded, and shaved on one side of the head, remained of course in the prison till their full terms were completed. No new ones came, and those who remained gradually worked out their terms of servitude and went away, so that ten years later there could not have been a convict left in our prison. The special division was left, however, and to it from time to time were sent convicts of the military class who had committed serious crimes and they were kept there till certain penal works were established in Siberia. So in reality life went on for us as before, the same conditions, the same food and almost the same regulations, but the officers in command were different and more numerous. A staff officer was appointed, a commander of the battalion and four superior officers who were on duty in the prison in turns. The veterans, too, were abolished and twelve sergeants and a quartermaster were appointed. The prisoners were divided into tens and corporals were appointed from the convicts themselves, nominally, of course, and Akim Akimitch at once became a corporal. All these new institutions and the whole prison, with its officials and convicts, were as before left under the control of the governor of the prison as the highest authority. That was all that happened.

The convicts were, of course, very much excited at first; they talked, guessed and tried to read the characters of their commanders, but, when they saw that in reality everything went on as before, they calmed down and our life went on in its old way. But the great thing was that we were all saved from the old major; every one seemed to breathe freely and to be more confident. They lost their panic-stricken air; all knew now that in case of need one could have things out with the