CHAPTER III.
When the first excitement of this unexpected meeting had somewhat subsided, Catharine, in her turn, told of the wondrous and providential dealings to which she was indebted for her preservation amid countless perils.
The good sutler's wife was not forgotten in this extraordinary account; and with what sensitiveness and touching expressions of gratitude she disclosed to her attentive listener the innumerable acts of kindness she had received all these years from the noble Polish lord and his lady, who had loaded her with constant benefits, and had in every respect treated her as their own child.
In a few days Catharine's father had quite recovered from the effects of his wound. His business required attention, and he was impatient to restore his beloved child to her mother's arms, so father and daughter bade adieu to the Polish Count and Countess, but not before assuring them that their gratitude would never cease as long as they lived.
M. Somoff and his long-lost Catharine returned to Moscow, where they were welcomed with surprise and joy by the delighted mother, who forgot all her sorrows when once more embracing her child, who had been lost to her for so many long years.
Very soon the young Russian's marvellous history became known. She was asked in marriage by an officer holding high rank in the army, and in due time she became his wife.
Ten years passed.
Great changes had taken place on the Continent of Europe. Poland had proclaimed its independence, and Nicholas, the Emperor of all the Russias, had an immense army in the field to repress the efforts of this brave but most unfortunate nation.
The horrors that were perpetrated, and the sad issue of this too unequal warfare, are well known.
Catharine's husband had taken part in this campaign, and she had followed him to the camp.
We will not stop to describe the heartrending scenes connected with this war, but merely inform the reader that Warsaw was taken by assault; and in this is included a whole chapter of misery. On this fatal day many thousand Poles as well as Russians lost their lives. In the course of the evening after the battle, the superior officers of the triumphant army went to inspect the scene of the late bloody combat, where heaps of dead and dying were lying in confusion, for there might be seen the victor and the vanquished side by side.
Moved by charity, touched with compassion for the fate of those to whom fortune had been so unpropitious, Catharine's husband sent all who still retained a breath of life to the hospitals and ambulances. He was just on the point of leaving this desolate spot, when, casting his eye on a heap of corpses being covered over with earth, he noticed a Polish officer of high rank, decorated with numerous crosses and medals. He thought he saw some signs of animation, so he had him removed, and carefully conveyed to the house in which Catharine then was. Once there, every possible care was bestowed upon him. By degrees he recovered from his lethargy, and looked around the room.
Catharine was sitting at his bedside. Suddenly she uttered a cry: she had recognised the Polish lord Barezewski, her preserver and benefactor.
The Count recovered from his wounds, but he had only escaped one peril to fall into another even more terrible; his name was on the list of proscribed persons, and the mildest punishment for this in Russia means degradation and exile to Siberia.
Catharine no sooner discovered the fresh misfortune impending over the noble Pole than she determined to risk everything, and obtain an audience of the Czar Nicholas, when, falling before him, she embraced his knees, and with tears implored him to accord the pardon of her generous protector, Barezewski.
Nicholas, much touched by her gratitude and her earnest entreaties on behalf of the Polish lord, graciously granted his pardon.
Perhaps some of my readers may think Catharine need not have been so frightened at what she had to do in seeking an interview with the Emperor; but in our highly-favoured land we can scarcely enter into her feelings, for in Russia the sovereign is all-powerful, and, especially in past days, political offenders, or those taking their part in any way, were punished with the greatest severity.
I will tell you what happened during the reign of the Empress Elizabeth to the most beautiful and delicately nurtured lady at the court of Russia, because, poor creature, she had the misfortune to offend her imperial mistress. She was condemned to the knout, a fearful instrument of punishment made of a strip of hide, which is whizzed through the air by the hangman on the bare back and neck of the hapless victim, and each time it tears away a narrow strip of skin from the neck along the back. These blows were repeated until the entire skin of the lady's back hung in rags; then this woman's tongue was plucked out by the roots, and she was at once sent off to Siberia.
What does 'sent to Siberia' imply? Worse, far, far worse than any criminal, however vile and hardened, endures in our beloved country. We frequently hear of persons being condemned to penal punishment for many years, or even for life; but this is absolutely nothing compared to being exiled to Siberia, a place where the criminals of the Russian empire, and persons suspected of intrigues, are often sent without even knowing the cause of their banishment.
A faint idea of what the poor unfortunate exiles have to suffer may be gleaned from the description which follows:—'Barren and rocky mountains, covered with eternal snows, waste uncultivated plains, where, in the hottest days of the year, little more than the surface of the ground is thawed, alternate with large rivers, the icy waves of which, rolling sullenly along, have never watered a meadow or seen a flower expand. The Government supplies some of the exiles with food, very poor and very scanty; those whom it abandons subsist on what they obtain by hunting. The greater number of these hapless beings reside in the villages which border the river from Tobolsk to the boundaries of Tschimska; others are dispersed in huts through the plains. For these unfortunates not a single happy day exists.'
To such a state of exile and misery would the noble Polish lord have been reduced if Nicholas had not granted Catharine's petition. This tale shows how the eye of a tender and watchful Father is ever over the young and unprotected. How true are these beautiful words:
| 'No earthly father loves like Thee; |
| No mother, e'er so mild, |
| Bears and forbears as Thou hast done |
| With me, Thy sinful child.' |