Book 2 Chapter 19 An Old General of Repute

The man on whom depended the easing of the fate of the Petersburg
prisoners was an old General of repute--a baron of German
descent, who, as it was said of him, had outlived his wits. He
had received a profusion of orders, but only wore one of them,
the Order of the White Cross. He had received this order, which
he greatly valued, while serving in the Caucasus, because a
number of Russian peasants, with their hair cropped, and dressed
in uniform and armed with guns and bayonets, had killed at his
command more than a thousand men who were defending their
liberty, their homes, and their families. Later on he served in
Poland, and there also made Russian peasants commit many
different crimes, and got more orders and decorations for his
uniform. Then he served somewhere else, and now that he was a
weak, old man he had this position, which insured him a good
house, an income and respect. He strictly observed all the
regulations which were prescribed "from above," and was very
zealous in the fulfilment of these regulations, to which he
ascribed a special importance, considering that everything else
in the world might be changed except the regulations prescribed
"from above." His duty was to keep political prisoners, men and
women, in solitary confinement in such a way that half of them
perished in 10 years' time, some going out of their minds, some
dying of consumption, some committing suicide by starving
themselves to death, cutting their veins with bits of glass,
hanging, or burning themselves to death.