ed up for the night they removed these
altogether. They packed their haversacks with the articles they had
agreed to take, with six pounds of bread each and some meat, rolled four
blankets up and knotted them tightly together, strapped up the three
fur-lined cloaks, and placed the knives in their belts. Then without
much difficulty they prised up one of the thick planks with which the
hut was roofed. Godfrey got through the opening, and Alexis passed out
to him the haversacks and coats, and then joined him, and they slid down
the roof and dropped to the ground.

The paling was but twenty yards behind the huts. As soon as they reached
it Godfrey climbed upon his companion's shoulders, threw the loop of a
doubled rope over one of the palisades and climbed on to the top. Then
with the rope he pulled up the coats and haversacks and dropped them
outside. Alexis pulled himself up by the rope; this was then dropped on
the outside and he slid down by it. Godfrey shifted the rope on to the
point of one of the palings, so that it could be easily shaken off from
below, and then slipped down it. The rope shaken off and two of the
blankets opened, the haversacks hung over their shoulders, and the
great-coats strapped on, each put one of the twisted blankets over his
shoulder, scarf fashion, wrapped the other round as a cloak, and then
set out on their way. Fortunately the prison lay on the south side of
the town and at a distance of half a mile from it; and as their course
to the extremity of Lake Baikal lay almost due south, they were able to
strike right across the country.

The wind was from the north, and they had therefore only to keep their
backs to it to follow the right direction. It was half-past ten when
they started, for the nights were short, and had it not been that the
sky was covered with clouds and the air thick with rain, it would not
have been dark enough for them to make the attempt until an hour later.
By three o'clock it was light again, but they knew there was little
chance of their escape being discovered until the warders came to unlock
the hut at six in the morning, as the planks they had removed from the
roof were at the back of the hut, and therefore invisible to the
sentries.

"No doubt they will send a few mounted Cossacks out to search for us, as
we are political prisoners," Alexis said; "but we may calculate it will
be seven o'clock before they set out, and as this is the very last
direction they wi