Page:Julian Niemcewicz - Notes of my Captivity in Russia.djvu/220

192 but the cries of these poor fellows followed me, and rent my heart. The punishment is not measured in Russia by the number of blows, but by the time. They flog a quarter of an hour, twenty minutes, half an hour, and sometimes more. Anybody except a Russian would breathe his last under such a torture.

I often remonstrated with the Praporszczyk upon his barbarous conduct; I used all my arguments, and endeavoured to move his humanity and compassion, but it was preaching to a deaf man. He always answered me, that it was the custom, that he was obliged to do as others did, and that, having been a private, he had received himself thousands of strokes, and knew by experience that it did not do so much harm as was believed. Seeing that all my arguments were ineffectual, and knowing that he was superstitious, I tried to alarm his conscience. “Remember Paul Iwanowicz,” said I once to him, “that the Author of the universe, the Judge of all we do here, the great St. Nicholas (here he