Then he went on to tell us how once already the Livadia had been the means of saving the Czar’s life:
“When she was getting on I had a model of her made—in fact, two; one of them,” he said, turning to me, “you saw the other day in my office. These models are troublesome and costly things to make. The one which I intended as a present to the Czar cost five hundred pounds. It was my present to his Majesty on the twenty-fifth anniversary of his succession. It arrived the day before, 17th February—29th February old style. The Czar was delighted with it. That evening there was a banquet in the Winter Palace, where he was then in residence. He had been threatened for some time by means of a black-edged letter finding its way every morning into the Palace, warning him in explicit terms that if his oppression did not cease he would not live past the anniversary of his accession, which would be the following day. When he was leading the way to the dining-hall from the drawing-room he turned to the lady with him—Princess Dolgoruki, his morganatic wife—and said:
“‘By the way I want to show you my new toy!’ The model had been placed in the salon at the head of the grand staircase and they stopped to examine it.
“As they were doing so the staircase down which they would have been otherwise passing was blown up. The Nihilists, knowing the exact routine of the Court and the rigid adherence to hours, had timed the explosion for the passage of the staircase!”
We spent a delightful Sunday going around Arran. We dined at anchor in Wemyss Bay and slept on board. On the forenoon of Monday we went back to Glasgow.
XLVIII
STEPNIAK
I
On the evening of 8th July 1892, after the play, Faust, Irving had some friends to supper in the Beefsteak Room. I think that, all told, it was as odd a congeries of personalities as could well be. Sarah Bernhardt, Darmont, Ellen Terry and her daughter, Toole, Mr. and Mrs. T. B. Aldrich of Boston, two Miss Casellas—and Stepniak. It was odd that the man was known only by the one name; no one ever used his first name, Sergius. Other men have second names of some sort; but this one, though he signed himself S. Stepniak, I never heard spoken of except by the one word. I sat next to him at supper and we had a great deal of conversation together, chiefly about the state of affairs in Russia generally and the Revolutionary party in especial. He, who had presumably been in the very heart of the Revolutionary party and in all the secrets of Nihilism, told me some of his views and aspirations and those of the party—or rather the parties—of which he was a unit.
II
Stepniak was a very large man—large of that type that the line of the shoulders is high so that the bulk of the body stands out solid. He had a close beard and very thick hair, and strongly marked features with a suggestion of the Kalmuck type. He was very strong and had a great voice. On 1st May of that year, 1892, I had heard him speak at the great meeting in Hyde Park for the “Eight-hour” movement. There were in the Park that day not far from a quarter of a million of people, so that from any of the tribunes—which were carts—no one could be heard that was not strong of voice. The only three men whom I could hear were John Burns, Stepniak, and Frederick Rogers—the latter a working bookbinder and President of the Elizabethan Society—also one of the very finest speakers—judged by any standard—I have ever heard.