Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - VII. On the Middle Lena
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of the gold-fields on the Vitim.[1] About 7500 men are
engaged here, of whom nearly half the number are
“varnaki”—i.e. exiled criminals. Their work is really forced
labour, for which they receive very small pay. “Varnak
wages” means in Siberia starvation wages.
The “free” labourers receive better pay, it is true,
but the greater part of it goes to the stores of the
“gold-barons” or to the rum sellers—the truck-system and illegal
sale of spirits flourishing here to an extent that is probably
unsurpassed elsewhere in the world, not to speak of other
means and ways of robbing the working men.
The work in these gold-fields is exceedingly hard; the
soil being frozen to unknown depths, the miners have to
work wading knee-deep in ice-cold water; and after the
long day’s work they spend the night in overcrowded
barracks, begrimed with dirt and teeming with vermin.
Disease, especially scurvy and diarrhœa, is rife, and the
mortality enormous.
The diggers commence operations in the spring, going
to the taiga, as it is called, and working hard all the
summer under the guard of a special police until the 22nd
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