Even more valuable was the privilege relieving the colonists from military service for a term of twenty-five to fifty years from the time of settlement.

Yet only a few tried to escape conscription by taking refuge in the colonies.

For the military regime gradually penetrated into these colonies as well.

The Jewish colonist was subject to the grim tutelage of Russian "curators" and "superintendents," retired army men, who watched his every step and punished the slightest carelessness by conscription or expulsion.
In 1836 the Government conceived the idea of enlarging the area of Jewish agricultural colonization.

By an imperial rescript certain lands in Siberia, situated in the government of Tobolsk and in the territory of Omsk, were set aside for this purpose.