The Warwickshire Herald. — 1893-07-20 (Birmingham, West Midlands, England)

CRIMINAL CONVICTIONS IN SIBERIA. A correspondent travelling in Siberia writes to the Daily .Vress from Chita, May 28th: To exile a man for his opinions must ever excite the indignant abhorrence of all who have learned to recognise the fact that liberty of conscience is the inalienable right of every man. In this respect Russia must repent and reform as England and America have already done. But actual criminal convicts have little to complain of in Siberia. They have to tramp on foot the two or three thousand miles of road between the Ural Mountains and their destination, but the soldiers who escort them and the majority of voluntary emigrants do the same. They are never required to walk further than from one post station to another, which seldom exceeds 19 miles, in • day; and if from any cause they are certified by the doctors to be unequal to this journey, they are allowed to ride in a cart. Political prisoners always ride. At the stations each individual receives a liberal supply of bread and meat and tea, and in special cases eggs and milk. Many of the alleged hardships 0 Siberian prisoners are among the ordinary conditions of a Russian peasant's life, and the law would cease to be a "terror to evil-doers" if the prison were made more attractive than the home. The belief that some classes of offences and offenders can only he dealt with effectively by flogging is shared and practised by some of our own colonial Governments ,to-day, and it in Siberia the knout has sometimes been used with unnceesaary severity, its administration, as a rule, is little more than a farce. The instances of actual brutality which have been from time to time adduced by foreign critics of the prisons of Siberia, are evidenty irregularities, such as used to occur in our own Australian convict stations, and such as occur to-day in some parts of America. These irregularities are deplorable enough, but they should be discussed as irregularities, and not as part and parcel 01 the Russian judicial system. There is, at any rate, little doubt that a practical acquaintance with the modes of life among the peasantry of this country,and a careful study of the character of the peculiarly desperate and hardened class of criminals with which this Government is called to deal, would considerably modify the opinions which prevail in England and America with regard to the treatment of Russian prisoners.  The London coirespondent of the Manchester Courier professes to know that a good deal of high play has been going on just lately in some of the London clubs, and that in some that are considered by no means shady. Indeed, at one famous resort in Pall Mall, he says, the committee caused last week a hint to be transmitted to certain members that,as rules existed with regard to cards, their evasion could not be tolerated with impunity. Besides, the practice of paying with *paper," he adds, has been very much on the increase. In the case of an unfortunate youth who became deeply involved not long ago, his relatives stoutly refused to pay, because they held that he had been the victim of a conspiracy, but similar examples of fortitude are uncommon, more the pity.  Miss Tenseason "It's a fact. One _man coin.  mated suicide on my account." Little boy ;inquiringly): "Was he 'fraid you'd marry him ?." First lodger: "This ooffee is as weak as water." Second lodger: "Never mind; just take some butter, and you'll find the combination above the average strength." _  Pretty teenier: "Now. Johnny, can you tell me what is meant by a miracle?" Johnny "Yes'm. Mother says et yew don't ketch the new person it will be a miracle."