Identifier: sidelightsonsibe00simp Title: Side-lights on Siberia; some account of the great Siberian railroad, the prisons and exile system; Year: 1898 (1890s) Authors: Simpson, James Young, 1873-1934 Subjects: Prisons -- Soviet Union Exiles -- Russia (Federation) Siberia Siberia (Russia) -- Description and travel Publisher: Edinburgh and London : W. Blackwood and Sons Contributing Library: University of California Libraries Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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Text Appearing Before Image: hroad that unites theEast and West. After eight weary days on a river-boat,from Tinmen, or half as many in a tarantass from Krasnoy-arsk, men gather hope when suddenly Tomsk breaks upontheir view. Part of the town is built on the edge of a highplateau, which, extending from the foot of the Altai Moun-tains in the south, somewhat abruptly descends about thislatitude to the lowlands of the Ob, that are in turn continu-ous with the treacherous tundra of the north. Part also issituated on the plain below, wedged in between the rightbank of the river Tom, a tributary of the Ob, and the bold APPROACHING TOMSK. 115 bluff above. So, in approaching the town from the east, thetraveller is unaware of its existence until he wellnigh reachesthe broken brink of the high level; and it is this half, too,with its statelier buildings, that first attracts the notice ofthe river-voyager. The road from the south affords the same pleasant surprise,for it is only when one stands on the left bank of the Tom,

Text Appearing After Image: On the outskii ti awaiting the paddle ferry-boat of three-horse power, that onebecomes aware of the presence of human habitations. Aftergaining the other side, the traveller passes between two brickpillars, each surmounted by the imperial eagle. These markthe entrance to the town, as also the beginning of a longbroad street (if the rough and deeply rutted thoroughfare 116 MONARCH OR MONK? A LEGEND OF TOMSK. can be dignified with such a name) that traverses the lowerquarter with a continual though gradual ascent. Here theappearance of the buildings still resembles that of a Siberianvillage, for they consist of two rows of decrepit shanties, eachwith its little yard enclosed by more or less of a high woodenpaling. Sometimes these squalid tenements lack the powerof even standing squarely on their foundations by the road-side,—probably because they have none. But as you pene-trate farther, by degrees all this is left behind, till at onesharp steep bend you pass into the upper terrace, a

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