On the contrary. But the convict’s whole face lighted up when he met the lieutenant-colonel, and taking off his cap, he was all smiles when the latter came up to him. And if the officer spoke the convict felt as though he had received a present. There are popular people like this. He looked a manly fellow, he walked with an erect and gallant carriage. “He is an eagle,” the convicts used to say of him. He could, of course, do nothing to mitigate their lot; he was only at the head of the engineering work, which, having been settled and laid down by law once for all, went on unchanged, whoever was in command. At most, if he chanced to come across a gang of convicts whose work was finished, he would let them go home before the drum sounded, instead of keeping them hanging about for nothing. But the convicts liked his confidence in them, the absence of petty faultfinding and irritability, the utter lack of anything insulting in speech or manner in his official relations with them. If he had lost a thousand roubles, and a convict had picked the money up, I do believe, if it were the worst thief in prison, he would have restored it. Yes, I am sure of that. With intense sympathy the convicts learnt that their “eagle” had a deadly quarrel with our hated major. It happened during the first month