The governor’s mansion is the largest and best, and near it is the club-house where weekly soirees are held.  I attended one of these and found a pleasant party.  There was music and dancing, tea-drinking and card-playing, gossip and silence at varied and irregular intervals.  Some of the officers read selections from Russian authors, and others recited pieces of prose and poetry.  There were dialogues, evidently humorous to judge by the mirth they produced, and there was a paper containing original contributions.  The association appeared prosperous, and I was told that its literary features were largely due to the efforts of the governor.

There is a gastinni-dvor or row of shops and a market-place surrounded with huckster’s stalls, much like those near Fulton Ferry.  Desiring to replace a broken watch-key I found a repair shop and endeavored to make my inquiries in Russian. “Monsieur parle le Francais, je crois,” was the response to my attempt, and greatly facilitated the transaction of business.  Before I left New York an acquaintance showed me a photograph of a Siberian, who proved to be the watchmaker thus encountered.

Walking about the streets I saw many prisoners at work under guard, most of them wearing fetters.  Though I became accustomed during my Siberian travels to the sight of chains on men, I could never hear their clanking without a shudder.  The chains worn by a prisoner were attached at one end to bands enclosing his ankles and at the other to a belt around his waist.  The sound of these chains as the men walked about was one of the most disagreeable I ever heard, and I was glad to observe that the Russians did not appear to admire it.  The prisoners at Chetah were laboring on the streets, preparing logs for house-building, or erecting fences.  Most of the working parties were under guard, but the overseers did not appear to push them severely.  Some were taking it very leisurely and moved as if endeavoring to do as little as possible in their hours of work.  I was told that they were employed on the eight hour system.  Their dress was coarse and rough, like that of the peasants, but had no marks to show that its wearer was a prisoner.

[Illustration:  PRISONERS AT CHETAH.]

There were between three and four thousand prisoners in the province of the Trans-Baikal.  About one-sixth of them were at Chetah and in its vicinity.  The prisoners were of two classes—­political and criminal—­and their punishment varied according to their offence.  Some were sentenced to labor in chains, and others to labor without chains.  Some could not go out without a guard, while others had more freedom.  Some were sentenced to work in prison and others were imprisoned without labor.  Some were exiled to Siberia but enjoyed the liberty of a province, a particular district, or a designated town or village.  Some were allowed a certain amount of rations and others supported themselves.  In fact there were all grades of prisoners, just as we have all grades in our penitentiaries.