bayoneted musket, pushed him in such a manner as to compel him to hasten, while a boy of their party was stationed on the roadside to keep a look-out.
Having penetrated some sixty or eighty paces into the thickest part of the forest, the unfortunate traveller was desired to undress, and having stripped off his trousers, jacket, and shirt, and finally his shoes and stockings, the robbers proceeded to tie him to a tree. From this ceremony, and from the manner of it, their victim naturally concluded that they intended to kill him by firing at him as they would at a mark. The villains, however, with much coolness, merely seated themselves at his feet, and commenced rifling his pockets, even cutting out the lining of the clothes in search of bank bills, or some other valuable articles. They then compelled him to take a pound of black bread, and a glass of rum poured from a small flask which had been suspended from his neck. Having next appropriated his trousers, shirts, stockings, and English shooting shoes—a present from his kind friends in St. Petersburg—as also his spectacles, watch, compass, thermometer, and small pocket sextant, with one hundred and sixty roubles—about seven pounds sterling—they released him from the tree for a while. Then after flourishing a knife in his face, indicating a threat of vengeance if he informed against them, they again bound him to the tree, and finally left him. Here he was at last discovered by a boy, whom his cries attracted to the spot, and who helped to release him. The unlucky pedestrian was compelled to make the best of the blue jacket, flannel waistcoat, and the few other articles which the robbers had left him, in making up some kind
