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330 large and very interesting colony of political exiles. We had made their acquaintance and had had some conversation with them on our outward journey; but as we were then making every effort to reach the mines of Kará before the setting in of winter, we could not spend as much time with them as we wished to spend, and we therefore decided to stop for ten days or two weeks in Chíta on our return. Most of these exiles were forced colonists who had already served out terms of hard labor at the mines and who belonged to the class that the Government regarded as particularly dangerous. In view of this fact, and of the official attention that our investigations had already attracted at Kará, it seemed to me necessary to proceed with more than ordinary caution and to cultivate the most friendly possible relations with the authorities. It was more than likely that Captain Nikólin, the gendarme commandant at the mines of Kará, had informed the acting-governor at Chíta of our surreptitious visits to the politicals of the free command; and, if so, it was quite probable that our later movements would be watched. What would be the result of a discovery that we were visiting the politicals in Chíta every day I did not know; but as we were still apprehensive of a police search it seemed prudent to take every possible precaution. I called at once upon Colonel Svechín, who was then acting as governor in the absence of General Barabásh, gave him a tolerably full account of our experience at the mines, — omitting, of course, the episode with the political convicts, — and outlined to him our plans for the future. He was very pleasant and courteous, asked no inconvenient questions, and when I bade him good day and bowed myself out of his reception-room I felt quite reassured. Either he was not aware of the extent of our intercourse with the political exiles in his province, or he regarded such intercourse with indifference as a matter of little consequence.

Two or three days after our arrival, a wealthy merchant of the town, named Némerof, whose acquaintance I had