COTTRELL'S RECOLLECTIONS OF SIBERIA,

Mr. COTTRELL, who appears to have a love of locomotion, and to have travelled over a considerable part of the habitable world, found himself at Moscow in 1841, when the convicts, or, as he calls them, deporles, were starting for Siberia. As the commence- ment of their march is a sight, he went to see it, and was so favourably impressed with what he saw, and what he heard, that an opportunity offering, he resolved to make a tour in Siberia himself. Having done so, he has given the world an account of his journey ; partly because little has been published of late years about the country, partly in order to dispossess the people of South-western Europe of the notions they entertain of autocratical severity and the cruelties of a Siberian banishment. This, says he, so far from being a disadvantage to the majority of the deportee, is really beneficial, (like the shipping off the Negroes to the West Indies of yore,) if they could only be brought to think so. The reader who would follow Mr. COTTRELL'S route may take up a map of Russia, and running his eye eastward in a direct line from Moscow till he reaches the Ural river, it will fall upon Oren- burg; by which city Mr. Corrsunx proceeded to Western Siberia, the region of his explorations. His subsequent route embraced the principal towns and stations of the country,— Omsk and Semipolatinsk, frontier-towns on Chinese or Thibetiau or Inde- pendent Tartary ; Tomsk, the head-quarters of the gold-specu- lators, who wash the sands of the Steppes for the precious metals, some of whom are millionaires, and a good many ruined men ; Irkustsk, the head-quarters of criminal convicts in the Western division of Siberia; Kiakhta and Mai-ma-tchin, the respective Rus- sian and Chinese posts, where the overland trade is carried on ; and Tobolsk, which our traveller describes, though it is not clear to u

whether he went there. As Mr. Ccrrramr. entered the country in the autumn and left it in the winter, he did not observe it under the most favourable circumstances; but he made good use of such opportunities as he had. He visited the mines, schools, and other institutions ; be conversed with the merchants and the officials ; and be picked up information from the few savans who are to be found in Siberia.

The attractions of the book are the novelty of its subject, a spi- rited but unaffected style of description, and the earnestness and bonhommie of the author. Its literary defect is the usual one— the personal narrative and the general conclusions are not kept sufficiently distinct. The line of demarcation is indeed more strongly drawn by Mr. Corrimm. than by many other travellers; but then, much of Mr. Corrs.r.r.es information does not appear to be original, but derived from books or drawn from hearsay, though it is the hearsay of the spot. If what is original and what is secondhand were separated from each other, Mr. COTTRELL'S Re- collections would be considerably diminished ; and perhaps the most valuable parts of them do not refer to Siberia, but to the Tartary frontier.

Another defect, though not of a literary kind, is predicable of Mr. Col-ream, : he seems less to have seen things with his own eyes than with Russian spectacles, and has not a very clear conviction that there is a sentient world beyond the salon and bureau of office. Feted and caressed by the authorities, apparently travelling with a Russian, and living during the greater part of his travels at the houses of official men, he was naturally disposed to be biassed in his conclusions of what he saw, and to have all his derived information tinged by the medium through which it passed, even supposing it was not somewhat tinted by professors of diplo- macy. Hence he saw every thing couleur de rose, and has perhaps erred as much on the favourable side as the writers he accuses of prejudice and incorrectness have sinned the other way. This is rather strongly shown in his frequent panegyric upon Siberian exile, where his occasional facts contrast glaringly with his general conclusions. Touching the Poles, and mere political offenders, Mr. COTTRELL graciously doubts as to whether banish- ment to a place where the oak only grows on the Southern bound- ary, and that stuntedly, and where the nut is never seen, may not be a hardship as well as felt as one. But the Russians—whether criminals, rogues, or vagabonds—very greatly improve their condi- tion by a trip to Siberia ; and most of them own it. We have often beard those who hays been banished to Siberia, after they have been sometime established there, assert how much better their condition is, and that they would advise their friends at home, if possible to come out there by way of bettering themselves. In spite of this," he naively continues, "there are every year a great number who make their escape and go hack to Russia, with the great probability of being discovered and knouted, and having to make the long journey over again." Again, on the question of roads Mr. COTTRELL remarks- " One would have supposed there could not be a better way of employing the criminals than on road-making ; but on our making this remark to Ge- neral Rupert, he told us it would be necessary to treble his military force to guard them, and that would make the road rather an expensive one. We cannot see why chains should not answer the purpose as they do in other countries • as it is, a good many escape in the course of every year, and perish in the woods by banger, or are destroyed by the animals."

The fact seems to be, that besides the restraint of surveillance, enforced labour, often in the mines, the absence of kindred, and the love of home, the severity of the climate may be a source of dislike even to a Russian exile, who is not quite so well provided with mate- rial comforts as the magnates and their friends. Here is an ex- ample of the October delights of this paradise even in the Southern parts.

AUTUMNAL TRAVELLING IN SIBERIA.

We made our first journey en traineaa here ; and bad enough it was in that way—on wheels it would have been impossible. The road was very moun- tainous, and lay through forests for eight or ten versts together, where the snow was drifted to the height of many feet; through which we had to force our way, it not being yet sufficiently hard to resist the horses' feet. In the rapid descents, we constantly rolled over and over; and three horses to a light traineau bad the greatest difficulty in getting up the long steep hills of snow, where there were no solid footing for them. What we should have done with our carriage on such roads, we know not ; and we had still a long journey before us, before we should come to any town where we could leave it till our return from the far East, and to take it on the whole way was out of the question. The next day, a council of war was held; when it was decided we should go on to Barnaoul on wheels, a distance of two hundred and eighty versts: but the road was represented as good, and we were told we should find much snow, it being mostly over a dead fiat. Accordingly, the carriage was fortified with very strong ashen shafts, which were fixed all round it, so as to force a passage through the snow in the case of need ; and thus we started for Barnaoul. Bed as our journey had been for some time past, it was evident we had not reached the maximum, and that every day the roads would be worse, till the snow bad settled down into solidity, which, in parts where there is little communication, requires some time. We had generally ten or twelve horses the whole of this journey, and did not with all average above five vents an hour. Our first stage was mountainous; hut after that the Steppes began again, with driving snow and wind, almost amounting to what is called in this country a burii n, or whirlwind, which is often fatal to travellers if accompanied with snow in any quantity. Having tried the effects of fire, water, and air, under their most fearful forms, we are inclined to give the preeminence in point of horror to the latter. A bards which overtakes you in a forest is less formidable, be- cause you cannot well get out of the right track, and the only danger is being buried alive in the snow. But in an open Steppes country, when it is very violent, the snow which is falling becomes whirled round, and mixed with that which the wind raises from the ground ; so that, in broad daylight, the driver cannot ace an inch before him, and does not know whether he is going to the right or the left. Many fatal accidents occur in this way ; carriages being rolled down precipices, or men and horses frozen to death in the drifted snow, which naturally collects round the only object which interrupts its course for miles and miles.

CROSSING A FROZEN LAKE.

The passage in sledges on the ice is agreeable and rapid : the point where it

is crossed is not quite sixty versts, which is sometimes performed in two hours and a half; and the view of the surrounding mountains is imposing and ma- jestic. There are occasionally small fissures in the ice, and particularly in the spring, when the season approaches for its dissolution, which mast be for- midable to an unhabituated traveller ; but as the horses and their drivers are thoroughly practised in getting over them, there is no real danger. When the crack is small, the horses jump over them without stopping ; when they are large, planks are laid across so as to form a bridge, which is made and un- made in an instant, the planks being carried for the purpose, and dragged be- hind the sledge. If the fissures are too large even for this, a bridge is made of large blocks of ice, which they cut off on the side of the opening, and the driver, with a sort of leaping-pole, jumps over the chasm. He then fastens on other similar blocks from the opposite side. The bridge is clearly none of the most secure ; but the horses are unharnessed and passed over first, and then the carriage is pulled over as rapidly as possible by ropes. Sometimes it occurs that a horse, going at full speed, is all of a sudden enfonce in the ice, which, instead of cracking, has become soft and porous; the driver in that case jumps on his back with great quickness, crawls over him, disengages him in an instant from the sledge, and as he is blown, pulls him out by main force before he has time to struggle and sink deeper in the icy bog. In order to blow bim more effectually, he throws a slip-knot round his neck, and draws it as tight as possible, so as to deprive him of the little breath he had remaining. Raving lugged him out, he harnesses again as quick as lightning ; and the whole ope- ration does not take more time than it does to relate the manner of extri- cating him.

One of the strongest points which Mr. COTTRELL'S volume im- presses, is the care taken by Russia in the education of persons who are to fulfil any public employment, especially the diplomatic. Here is an example of a public establishment of this kind at Omsk.

STATE -EDUCATION BY RUSSIA.

There is another military school for Cossacks only, and the boys are destined for a different career in some respects from the others. We may safely defy any country in the world to produce an establishment in any way superior to this; our only doubt is if it is not too good for those who are brought up in it, considering what their future destination is likely to be. It consists of sixty boys who are noble, and a hundred and twenty common Cossacks. The building is handsome; the dormitories most comfortable, far more so than Long Chamber at Eton ; and their dinners, of which we have partaken, excellent. The boys are taught drawing, algebra, languages, history, and fortification: the first class, who were all under seventeen years of age, studied principally the Oriental languages, and are intended for interpreters and agents in the East. We were told by General Schramm, who has the superintendence of the school, that most of those who composed the first class understood Menges lish, Arabic, and Persian, and have also native youths to teach them the patois of the Normandie tribes. We saw boys of twelve years of age go through their French lesson ; which they 'Pronounced and wrote from dictation with great fluency and accuracy. Several of the specimens of their drawings which we brought away show great talent ; and, as we before said, our only doubt is, if they have not too many comforts, and are not educated a little above their sphere.

We cannot, however, wonder, when these pains are taken in the wilds of Siberia to educate boys for the services they are to perform as men, that Russian diplomatic agents should be so superior to our own ; and the habit of thinking such a preparation must have created cannot fail to give them great advantages as negotiators and general agents.

SIBERIAN CELLARS.

At Yakutusk the inhabitants have cellars in all their houses, made in the frozen ground, precisely as we make ice-houses in this country. In summer, when the heat is as excessive as the cold is in winter, they place all their fresh provisions, such as milk, meat, and fish, in these cellars, where every thing becomes frozen in two hours. They likewise construct their graves in this manner, excepting that they make large fires above and burn the holes in the ground. In these they might easily keep their deceased friends, without going through the process of embalming them, in a perfect state of preservation for any length of time. Should this ever be done, it may afford new subjects of conjecture, after a lapse of a thousand years, perhaps as interesting then as the Egyptian discoveries now are to us.

SIBERIAN FOWLING.

Shooting after our manner is never practised here. If a peasant sees any one shoot flying, he stands with his mouth open, staring with astonishment, not at the skill of the sportsman, but at his folly in expending so much ammu- nition, which is exceedingly expensive, on a single bird. He believes, as is really the case, that more skill is required to shoot with his rifle that carries the smallest quantity of powder, and a single ball about the size of swan-shot, with that extraordinary precision necessary so as not to perforate the fur. In this, perhaps, they excel any people living : if they do shoot, though they prefer to trap even the black-cock, gelinottes, and coq de bruyere, they always strike the bird on the head, and this at a distance of two or three hundred paces. They snare even the double becasse, a bird hardly known in England, of which there are periodical flights in Russia and Siberia, and which are in our estimation superior to any sort of game we are acquainted with. When they shoot, they approach the object first on all-fours, and then crawl on their stomachs till they are at a proper distance for firing. They have usually two rests to their rifle, which they fix in the snow or ground when not frozen' and having taken a steady aim, rarely if ever miss. To an Englishman these rifles do appear, to be sure, the most extraordinary machines, and few would have the courage to use them. They prove however, that success depends much more on the skill of the sportsman than the excellence of his arms, which, indeed, we have long since found out in many other countries. We had with us one of Lancaster's tube-guns, for which the amateurs would have given more than the prime cost, but more out of curiosity than for use. The com- mon rifle-barrels are made at Tobolsk, are very heavy, and have a very small bore. The grooves are round instead of perpendicular, and the ball, which is cut instead of cast, is forced in and the edges rounded off in ramming down. The lock is large and awkward-looking, the springs on the outside, that of the cock clumsy and not tempered : the whole machine works so slowly, that you may see the trigger stop and move on again daring the progress of the cock towards the pan. The charge does not contain fifty grains of powder. In the event of a spring breaking, the chasseur readily replaces it by one of wood, ge- nerally of larch, which answers his purpose equally well, and he is thus inde- pendent of the gunmaker. With all these imperfections, as we have said be- fore, they rarely or never miss, and always hit an animal whose fur is precious through the muzzle. Rifles of this sort cost here twenty-five roubles, powder five roubles a pound, and lead is also dear.

According to Mr. Corrasix, English ambition is as ranch a bugbear in Russia as that of Russia is to us ; and, he thinks, with as much reason. For example, the expedition to Khiva was, he says, undertaken in good faith, for the purpose of getting back the prisoners and preventing such kidnapping in future • as is proved by the smallness of the force employed. His tale about this, how- ever, is chiefly curious for the light it throws upon the exten4Ye correspondence which Me Duke most have to carry on in his cha- racter of universal referee, from Buckingham Palace scandals to expeditions into Tartary. It was from Apsley House that the final judgment was passed on

THE EXPEDITION TO KIIIVA.

'Shiva is distant about six hundred English miles from Orenburg; the road 'sing through a Steppes inhabited by tribes of Turcomans hostile to Russia. The difficulty of obtaining a supply of water was so great, that the winter was selected as the least unfavourable season for making the expedition. No ar- rangement which foresight could suggest or money could complete had been omitted; and though the distance is so trifling, so convinced was the Emperor of the difficulties they had to encounter, that be applied to the Duke of Wel- lington for his opinion as to how the enterprise had been conducted. Although the Duke had certainly never been in any country exactly of this description, his Indian experience had taught him to form so accurate a judgment of what the principal impediments, which were not easy to be surmounted, would be, that in his reply to the Emperor, he gave as his opinion that the expedition had failed solely from causes which were beyond his control.

The numbers of the troops engaged in this undertaking were very much over- stated in the Commerce and other French accounts; but it was certainly more than ample for the resistence they met with. Twelve thousand camels were employed to carry the baggage and materiel ; and when the snow became very deep, these unfortunate and much-enduring beasts perished miserably from being unable to scrape with their feet down to the grass, without which food they cannot live. The convoy set out by seven o'clock every morning ; and the days being very short, generally halted by two, at which time they often had not advanced above two versts. The time lost in clearing away the snow and pitching the tents was so great, that the General, who never dined till.he saw every thing in order, frequently did not retire till midnight. The cold, in the mean time, was excessive; an much so, that a flask of Irish whisky, which hung by the General's bedside, often froze. The first time that this occurred, he accused his servant of allowing some one to steal it, thinking the flask was empty. The moaning of the camels was described to us as pitiable; they perished one after another, till, we believe, not a hundred, if any, ever re- turned to Orenburg.

The expedition was absent five or six months, and did not get much beyond the Emba, a river which forms the nominal Russian frontier, and not much above one-third of the distance they had to perform. During all this time, they had but one skirmish with an enemy; who was soon satisfied with a few rounds of grape-shot, which, however, only killed two persons. The Russians, though they lost all their camels, did not lose half-a-dozen men or horses; and we have heard a General of Cossacks give it as his opinion, that if only Cossack horses had been used, instead of camels, they might have succeeded in reaching %hives

The commander of the expedition was General Pcrofski, the Governor of Orenburg, a province larger than France, and one requiring the most active and able head to manage it successfully. We made his acquaintance in the summer of 1840, at the reviews at Krasno Selo, and should imagine him to be a man of five and forty; one who has seen a great deal of service, and whom we heard invariably highly spoken of. When the failure of the expedition was known at Petersburg, and the General was summoned to give his account of it, it was commonly supposed he would fall into disgrace. It was, however, so far from being the case, that General Roccasofski, who was Governor of Oren- burg in his absence, told us that be had seen the Duke of Wellington's letter to the Emperor, which he forwarded to General Perofski on his return, and on which he had written that it was the greatest eulogium that could be passed on him, inasmuch as he had only failed from impediments which the Duke had given his opinion were insurmountable. Be added, moreover, that the General had done all that a good man and able commander could have effected under the circumstances—he had saved his army ; and we know that such an opinion, coming from such a quarter, had the greatest weight in St. Petersburg, and was received with the greatest gratitude by the person most interested in it. General Molostof, an officer who had spent the greater part of his life out of Russia as Aide-de-camp to the Prince of Wiirtemburg, who returned about this tune from Germany, asked the Emperor's leave to accompany the expedition as a volunteer. We dined tete-a-tete, and went out shooting several times with him during our stay at Orenburg, and from him we heard the details as above stated.