A logging excursion would seem to be the best type of katorga. Physical work in clean air generates merely a good appetite, deep sleep, and healthiness. Some penal laborers take this point of view on the matter. But most go into the taiga extremely unwillingly.

“You’re living like a chattel,” they say. “Enterin’ the taiga, you’re freezing, but on the road with the log, you’re tortured by sweat— ‘n’ look— it's already late! No cleanin’ your underwear, no doin’ nothin’, ‘n’ don't e’en think about earnin’ a kopek! You can't ever e’en play a little cards… Unwind your soaked puttees, ‘n’ straight to bed! ‘N’ runnin’ into the taiga with tea so early ain't human. You guess you’ll boil it there. But when you gotta fell a tree quick, there's no drinkin’ ‘gainst the frost. Good if the frost is mild, but there's been whole weeks you gotta form ranks when it's forty below. E’en worse, there's blizzards. And God don't help! …”

In point of fact, during blizzards, which are especially frequent here, it's difficult to go lightly dressed along the road, and not just with a log. The snow whirls through the thin air: you can't see ten paces in front of you in daylight. Snowdrifts pile up to a sazhen or more in spots on the road. Meanwhile, the terrible, piercing power of the wind not only prevents you opening your eyes but presses on them. “Where's the log heading?!” Truth be said, a logging crew shouldn't be dispatched into powerful blizzards.

Yet this job is transformed into true katorga during the spring mud season. It always happens that the quantity of logs ordered in autumn isn't met during the succeeding winter, so the command is driven into the taiga for logging during the whole of the mud season. Hauling a log, while circling round thawed spots in the road that consist of ice beaten into deep puddles, is practically impossible. Heartrending cries resound through the settlement's streets until late at night. The cheerful “Blockheads!” is not heard. Even rarely heard is the definitive: “One, two, three!” Their urgent cry is a meaningless noise, albeit clearly articulating all a hungry man's suffering, exertion, and exhausted frustration.