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It did not appear for some time what the real cause was of this proceeding; but there is every reason to believe it arose out of the jealousy of the North-west Russian Fur Company, whose head-quarters were at Irkutsk, and that their influence at Petersburgh had procured from the empress the annulment of her previous order, together with the present inhuman mandate.
From the Pillar of Farewells to Tiumen, from thence to Tomsk, where they met the first of the released political exiles returning in a joyous band to their beloved Russia, and thence to Irkutsk, and then over the ice of Lake Baikal, and through the awful frozen desert of the Trans-Baikal Provinces, they had been driven like cattle until the remnant that had survived the horrors of the awful journey reached the desolate valley of the Kara and were finally halted at the Lower Diggings.
Swimming beneath the water, Michael managed to get a footing with Nadia on the quay. Michael Strogoff had reached his journey's end! He was in Irkutsk! "To the governor's palace!" said he to Nadia. In less than ten minutes, they arrived at the entrance to the palace. Long tongues of flame from the Angara licked its walls, but were powerless to set it on fire.
Then, I will watch over her without her suspecting it; and as she appears to me as anxious as myself to reach Irkutsk, she will cause me no delay." But one thought leads to another. Michael Strogoff had till now thought only of doing a kind action; but now another idea flashed into his brain; the question presented itself under quite a new aspect.
Noticing one man who danced the Mazurka splendidly, he whispered to General Mouravieff and asked his name. "That," said Mouravieff, "is a revolutionist of 1825. He is one of the best men of society in Irkutsk." After their first few years of exile, the Decembrists had little to complain of except the prohibition to return to Europe.
At Tomsk their reception was not less cordial than it had been at Irkutsk. Next they plunged into the immense marshes of Baraba; into a dreary succession of lakes, and pools, and swamps, blooming with a luxurious vegetation and a marvellous profusion of wild flowers, each more beautiful than the other, but swarming, unhappily, with a plague of insects eager to drink the blood of man or beast.
Could the fugitives not reach Irkutsk by five o'clock in the morning, they must lose all hope of ever getting there at all. At half-past one, notwithstanding all efforts, the raft came up against a thick barrier and stuck fast. The ice, which was drifting down behind it, pressed it still closer, and kept it motionless, as though it had been stranded.
It's different for anyone travelling on foot.... IRKUTSK, June 5, 1890. Greetings, dear Nikolay Alexandrovitch! I send you heartfelt good wishes from Irkutsk, from the depths of Siberia. I reached Irkutsk last night and was very glad to have arrived, as I was exhausted by the journey and missed friends and relations, to whom I had not written for ages.
Ogareff took a match from his pocket, struck it and lighted a small bunch of tow, impregnated with priming powder, which he threw into the river. It was by the orders of Ivan Ogareff that the torrents of mineral oil had been thrown on the surface of the Angara! There are numerous naphtha springs above Irkutsk, on the right bank, between the suburb of Poshkavsk and the town.
Irkutsk has been frequently shaken at the foundations, and on one occasion the walls of its churches were somewhat damaged. Around Lake Baikal there are several hot springs, some of which attract fashionable visitors from Irkutsk during the season. The natives say nobody was ever lost in Lake Baikal. When a person is drowned there the waves invariably throw his body on shore.
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