veillance. When, in 1870, the modern revolutionary movement began, it was the dream of all the ardent young Russian revolutionists to rescue Chernishéfski from Siberian exile, and enable him to escape from the Empire to some place where he could continue his work unmolested. Several attempts were made to liberate him, but they all failed, and the project was finally abandoned as impracticable. In 1875 a young student in the Technological Institute at St. Petersburg named Hypolyte Muíshkin conceived the idea of going to Siberia in the disguise of a captain of gendarmes and presenting himself boldly to the isprávnik in Villúisk with forged orders from the gendarmerie directing him [Muíshkin] to take charge of the exile Chernishéfski and carry him to Blagovéshchinsk, on the Amúr River. Such transfers of dangerous political exiles were not at that time uncommon, and Muíshkin felt confident that he should accomplish his purpose. He went as a private traveler to Irkútsk, resided there several months, succeeded in getting into the corps of gendarmes as a subordinate officer, and in a short time made himself so useful that he was generally trusted and was given the freedom of the office. He provided himself with the necessary blanks, filled them up with an order accrediting him as a gendarme officer intrusted with the duty of taking the exile Chernishéfski to Blagovéshchinsk, forged the signatures, affixed the proper seals, provided himself with the uniform of a captain of gendarmes, and then resigned his position in the gendarmerie upon the pretext that he had received news that made it necessary for him to return at once to European Russia. He disappeared from Irkútsk, and as soon as he deemed it prudent to do so he set out for Villúisk, with the uniform of a gendarme officer in his satchel, and a forged order in his pocket directing the isprávnik of Villúisk, Captain Zhírkof, to turn over the exile Chernishéfski to him for conveyance to Blagovéshchinsk. Muíshkin was an accomplished conspirator, an eloquent talker, and a man of fine personal presence, and
