Page:Siberia and the Exile System Vol 1.djvu/350

328 of all intelligent Siberians, but is becoming known to naturalists and archæologists in Europe and the United States.

During the long series of tragic events that culminated in the assassination of Alexander II., Siberia filled up rapidly with political exiles, and the little town of Minusínsk had to take its quota. With the arrival of these new-comers began a stricter system of police supervision. As long as Kropótkin was the only political exile in the place, he was allowed a good deal of freedom, and was not harassed by humiliating police regulations; but when the number of politicals increased to twenty, the difficulty of watching them all became greater, and the authorities thought it necessary, as a means of preventing escapes, to require every exile to report himself at stated intervals to the chief of police and sign his name in a book kept for the purpose. To this regulation Kropótkin refused to submit. "I have lived here," he said to the isprávnik, "nearly five years and have not yet made the first attempt to escape. If you think that there is any danger of my running away now, you may send a soldier or a police officer to my house every day to watch me; but after being unjustly exiled to Siberia I don't propose to assist the Government in its supervision of me. I will not report at the police office." The isprávnik conferred with the governor of the province, who lived in Krasnoyársk, and by the latter's direction told Kropótkin that if he refused to obey the obnoxious regulation he would be banished to some place lying farther to the northward and eastward, where the climate would be more severe and the life less bearable. Kropótkin, however, adhered to his determination, and appealed to General Sheláshnikof, who was at that time the acting governor-general of Eastern Siberia and who had been on terms of personal friendship with Kropótkin before the latter's banishment. General Sheláshnikof replied in a cool, formal note, insisting upon obedience to the regulation, and warning Kropótkin that further