Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1914-10-11
WORLDS MOST WICKED CITY
Irkutsk, in Russian Siberia, Claims
That Unenviable Distinction.
BASED ON ITS MURDER RECORD
One Person slain Every Twenty.
Four Hours is the Present Rate
of Homicide I'm This
Place Of Crime.

irkutsk, II seems, wSs founded about
the middle Of the seventeenth century by
an energetic Cossack who saw an oppor-
tunlty to lovy a small tribute for the
government and large one for himself
from the Monaghan fur traders.
II has a climate that Is all it's own, and
nobody grudges Irkutsk the possession,
either. At o'clock in the morning the
ground Is likely to be- frost bitten, by 2
o. o'clock in the afternoon people are walk
Ing on the shady side OF the street and
loosening their collars. Nobody thinks
Of getting up In Irkutsk before 10 O'Clock
In the morning. unless perhaps Il is the
milkmen; nobody thinks of going TO bed
before or o'clock The dinner hour
Is from 10 o'clack at night until In the
morning, and you linger over drinks and
Crimean cigarettes as much longer as you
want
The chief restaurant in the town, the re-
sort OF the creme de la creme OF wealth
and smartness. offers not uninteresting
gllmpses. II is quite good form. for in
stance, 10 enter the crowded room vikor-
ously scraping your hair and mustachios
and whiskers and beard with large and
greasy comb. None Of the lunchers
are squeamish enough to push away their
soup plates from your scurf strewn wake
wanting walter, you bang your plate
with knife, clamorously and with ap-
plication,' Till he appears Mold and
manure stained earthen pots, standing in
water logged saucers. hold the rooted
once-we-were flowers on your table. Ar
gumentative canar1es and vainly shrill lin
nets, thrilling from n dozen cages, drive
you nearly silly. Yet the food is excellent
and the walters models of their genius
apart from a lamentable tendency to
snatch the fork from your plate where
with 10 pry the cork from a bottle OF wine
There are no guide books about the
city of Irkutsk, although II is the capital
OF tract OF country three times as big
as Europe. That is, Europe, emitting
Russia. But because Irkutsk lies deep
In the heart OF Siberia and very well off
the beaten track of travel. you seldom
hear about II, although Il contains moro
bizarre things worth writing about than
most towns of $1,000.
II you are looking for occidental spIen-
doris, comforts and culture, approaching
this outpost OF empire with the Berlin or
Boston point OF view, you will find Irk-
utsk crude. To appreciate it, You should
come upon II, mentally. II not in actual
ity, out of the awful solitudes of forest
that hedge II about; then you will not
cry file upon Il for being the capital city
Of northern Asia and having neither
street cars nor skyscrapers. few drains
and fewer street lamps hotels a rire, an
actorless opera house and roads that are
lakes of mud or drifts OF sitting dust
There Is only one street in Irkutsk
where It is safe TO walk after the shades
of night begin TO fall. That is the Boil
shaia, a broad and dusty throughfare,
half a mile or so in length, which is con-
tinualiy in a choking cloud by reason OF
the carriages which trundle up and down
1t. There's little strip OF garden at one
end with a statue of the Gear Alexander
III, AID a soldier whose duty IL Is TO see
that nobody blows up the statue. And
the populace lolls on wooden benches
along the street and smokes and drinks
and reads the Sibir. the daily paper OF
the Siberian metropolis.
Up and down the Boshaia the crowds
parade. Three out OF every four men
wear a uniform. No Russian is really
naPpI UAl nc WtdTh n
scopio schoolboys, who are not yet s.
wear a reductio ad sdsurdum of a
grownup's official kit Every officer has
to salute his superior, which comes hard
on the Colonels and such, who have to
salute In echo, followed one potenate
who had to acknowledge 81 in two blocks
Traits of the siberian.
The Siberian Is an interesting and not
unworthy animal when he Is frankly
and openly semi-Asiatlc, his shirt-tails
flutterinG In the breeze as he and his
women toll at a wooden ploughshare
outside their log and turf hut In the
wilderness. Veneered with the modern
parlor tricks. however. and become
townsmen, he doesn't show signs of a
healthy national growth. That applies
TO the Russian. too. II is a symptom
that causes many a sympathetic friend
OF the eastern slav to shake his head
gravely over the future.
Twilight is drawing on new. You have
been wondering for an hour past how
these people can stand the dust. Heavens.
.4ttaff Thar a. pothinp like % out.