time Mr. Y, merely for being a friend of this innocent man, had gone to Siberia by administrative process.
In another case a young student, called Vladímir Sidórski (I use a fictitious name), was arrested by mistake instead of another and a different Sidórski named Victor, whose presence in Moscow was regarded by somebody as "prejudicial to public order." Vladímir protested that he was not Victor, that he did not know Victor, and that his arrest in the place of Victor was the result of a stupid blunder; but his protestations were of no avail. The police were too much occupied in unearthing what they called "conspiracies" and looking after "untrustworthy" people to devote any time to a troublesome verification of an insignificant student's identity. There must have been something wrong about him, they argued, or he would not have been arrested, and the safest thing to do with him was to send him to Siberia, whoever he might be—and to Siberia he was sent. When the convoy officer called the roll of the out-going exile party, Vladímir Sidórski failed to answer to Victor Sidórski's name, and the officer, with a curse, cried "Victor Sidórski! Why don't you answer to your name?"
"It is not my name," replied Vladímir, "and I won't answer to it. It 's another Sidórski who ought to be going to Siberia."
"What is your name, then?"
Vladímir told him. The officer coolly erased the name "Victor" in the roll of the party, inserted the name "Vladímir," and remarked cynically, "It does n't make a bit of difference!"
In the years 1877, 1878, and 1879, no attempt was made, apparently, by the Government to ascertain whether an arrested person was deserving of exile or not, nor even to ascertain whether the man or woman exiled was the identical person for whom the order of banishment had been issued. The whole system was a chaos of injustice, accident, and caprice. Up to November, 1878, as appears from
