crimes and misdemeanours, or i to every 552 persons,
who are thus distributed : in the uyezd of Akmolirisk,
less than 1 person in a thousand is a malefactor; in
the uyezds of Atbasar and Kokchetovsk the proportion
is also less than 1 in a thousand; whereas in the uyezds
of Petropavlovsk and Omsk, which are more largely
Russian, crime is committed by nearly 4 persons in a
thousand.
It must be remembered, moreover, that the homeless
working class are largely attracted to the towns that
afford greater facilities for evil-doing, so that usually
in proportion to the density of population of a district
is the proportion of crime committed. I f we confine
our attention to the towns of Petropavlovsk and Omsk,
we have, in the former, 161 crimes, or 44 per cent.;
and at Omsk, 226 crimes, or 74 per cent, of the whole
of the'crimes committed in the uyezds.*
Having thus brought before the reader some of the
characteristics of the new general government of the
Steppe, and statistics regarding its population, we shall
now proceed on our journey southwards.
*
U y e z d s . Number of Crimes. To t,ooo of the
population. To each square mile.
Akmolinsk 0*3 persons j .3- ,
39 Atbasar . . )
121 o'8 ,, 2’04
Kokchetovsk . j
Petropavlovsk . : 366 3 7 » 3-06
Omsk 3°S 3 '8 » 4 3
C H A P T E R V.
FROM OMSK TO SEMIPOLA TINSK.
Description of town of Omsk.— Cause of its decline.— Schools.—-Visits
to inhabitants and institutions.— Dinner with Governor.— Protestant
pastor and distribution of books.— Departure southwards.— Cossack
stations.— Summer appearance of steppe.— Arrival at Pavlodar.—
Scriptures sold to Muhammadans, advice to contrary notwithstanding.—
Cheap provisions.— Roads to mining districts.— Recruits on
the march. — Meeting the Governor-General. — Skirting the
Irtish. — Change of landscape. — Improved fauna, and flora.—•
Arrival at Semipolatinsk.
ON arriving at Omsk I noticed from the deck of
the steamer an officer on the landing stage,
whose face seemed familiar to me. He turned out to
be the police-master who, three years before, had shown
me the prisons of Tomsk. He recognized me, and
kindly sent men to look after the baggage, by whose help
ere long we were safely housed at the Hotel Moskva.
Omsk is a government town of 3 1 ,0 0 0 inhabitants,
situated, at an altitude of 2 6 1 feet, in the strip of
Russian colonization that divides the Kirghese of the
south from the Tatars of the north, and is built upon
the banks of the Om, at its confluence with the
Irtish, the two parts of the town being connected by
a substantial wooden bridge. Omsk was founded in
1717, and the gateways of its fortress are still standing
on the right bank of the river. Near at hand are