9
Private 3rd Company
After rattling across the trembling bridge spanning the river Ural, the tarantass rolled up a hill and drove into the Orsk Fortress.
By the bridge another crew of convicts with ugly brands on their foreheads was repairing the road (probably in preparation for the reception of some bigshots), and on a large parade ground soldiers were going through drill.
The parade ground was surrounded by barracks, headquarters, offices, a prison, stacks of logs, stables, storehouses with huge padlocks on their doors, and only the brick church painted dazzlingly white at the opposite end slightly enlivened the gloomily dully sight of the parade ground and the whole of Orsk which was devoid of any vegetation.
All the public buildings were covered with tin roofs of a dark-reddis
