otherwise pretty honest fellows. A great many of
them have killed a man or woman when mad with vodka; some of the others
have done it in a fit of jealousy; a few perhaps out of vengeance for
some great wrong. The rest, I grant, are thoroughly bad.

"By the way, my name is Osip Ivanoff. There are two or three decent
fellows in our ward. I will introduce you to them this evening. It makes
it pleasanter keeping together. We have got some cards, and that helps
pass away the summer evenings. In winter it is too dark to play. There
is only one candle in the ward; so there is nothing for it but to lay up
and go to sleep as soon as it gets dark. There is the prison. I dare say
you won't be sorry when you are back. The first three or four days' work
is always trying."

CHAPTER IX.

PRISON LIFE.

Godfrey found that there was no Sunday break in the work at Kara, but
that once a fortnight the whole of the occupants of the ward had baths,
and upon these days no work was done. Upon a good many saints' days they
also rested; so that, practically, they had a holiday about once in
every ten days. For his own part he would have been glad had the work
gone on without these breaks. When the men started for work at five in
the morning, and returned to the prison at seven at night, the great
majority, after smoking a pipe or two, turned in at once, while upon the
days when there was no work quarrels were frequent; and, what was to him
still more objectionable, men told stories of their early lives, and
seemed proud rather than otherwise of the horrible crimes they had
committed. His own time did not hang at all heavy upon his hands.

One of the Tartar prisoners who spoke Russian was glad enough to agree,
in exchange for a sufficient amount of tobacco to enable him to smoke
steadily while so employed, to teach him his own dialect. Godfrey found,
as he had expected, a sufficient similarity between the two languages to
assist him very greatly, and with two hours' work every evening, and a
long bout on each holiday, he made rapid progress with it, especially as
he got into the habit of going over and over again through the
vocabulary of all the words he had learned, while he was at work in the
mine. When not employed with the Tartar he spent his time in
conversation with Osip Ivanoff and the little group of men of the same
type. They spent much of their time in playing cards, whist being a very
popular game in Russia. They often inv