The author — one of Russia's most renowned mining engineers — paints a vivid picture of the Mining Institute, his alma mater. Concisely and vividly, he describes the organization of education and, in particular, the daily life and customs of the "wards" or "cadets" of that time. The article contains much compelling and interesting autobiographical material. The author's stay at the Mining Institute spanned from the end of the summer of 1858 to the beginning of the summer of 1866. Until the autumn of 1865, the Institute had been a boarding educational institution for many years. For a significant part of the author's time there, the Institute was in a state of transition, which led to its transformation into an exclusively higher, open educational institution — not only due to the gradual closure of the preparatory courses, which corresponded to gymnasium-level studies, but also under the influence of new governmental and social currents of the 1860s.