* If Mr Kamyshev found all this necessary, wouldn’t it have been easier to question the coachmen who had driven the gipsies? A. C.
† Why? Assuming all this was done by the investigating magistrate when he was drunk or half-asleep then why write about it? Wouldn’t it have been better to conceal these gross errors from the reader? A. C.
* Kamyshev had no reason to abuse the deputy prosecutor. All the prosecutor was guilty of was the fact that Mr Kamyshev didn’t like his face. It would have been more honest to admit either to inexperience or deliberate mistakes. A. C.
* A fine investigating magistrate! Instead of continuing his questioning and extracting useful evidence, he lost his temper – behaviour that forms no part of a civil servant’s duties! Moreover, I place little trust in all of this… If Mr Kamyshev couldn’t give a damn about his duties, then plain human curiosity should have compelled him to continue with the questioning. A. C.
* A role certainly more suited to Kamyshev than that of investigator: he could not have been an investigating magistrate in the Urbenin case. A. C.