When she arrived at her former home she spent several months in making visits to relatives, and once again entered the work of the revolutionists. She was now famous in their circles and known to great numbers of peasants who loved her dearly and called her "Grandmother." She had many narrow escapes from the police, but her friends always succeeded in concealing her.
On one occasion she was hiding in a house, while the police officers searched for her. It was the cook's day off, and Catherine, in the cook's dress, was stirring the soup at the stove while the police officers ranged the house to discover her.
In 1904 she came to the United States to do what she could to spread the work of the revolution by gaining money from Russians in America. She received a cordial reception and made many friends among the Americans, some of them being the most prominent men and women in the country. The Russians themselves received her most enthusiastically wherever she went, and she returned with $10,000 for the Cause.
Through the double dealing of one of her supposed friends, Catherine was arrested again in 1908 and sent once more to Siberia. She remained there until after the outbreak of the World War, while the Germans overran Belgium and Russia in turn. She remained, in fact, until the revolution for which she had labored for so many years at last took place, and the Czar was overthrown. Then she was invited to return by the Government of Kerensky, who came into power when the Czar fell.
Her return from Siberia with the other political exiles was like a triumphal ovation. At every stop the train made crowds thronged about her carriage, cheering and shouting for "the little grandmother of the Russian Revolution," as she was called on account of her many years of labor for the cause. On her arrival in Moscow she was placed in the Czar's former coach of state, and was driven in triumph through the city to the assembly of the people called the Douma, which was then sitting. At Petrograd she was given a sumptuous apartment in the Czar's former palace. Everywhere her name was on the lips of thousands, and everywhere she received cheers, kisses and handclasps. It may almost have been worth the suffering she went through to receive a triumph so generous as that afforded her by the Russian people, who realized that she had been one of the chief leaders of the revolutionary movement and that her heart was bound up in its ultimate triumph.
But the revolution did not succeed, and it was not long before Russia was once more in the grip of a force even more deadly than that of the former Czar. The Bolshevists soon organized and drove Kerensky from power, and anarchy ruled throughout Russia. Catherine Breshkovsky was declared a public enemy by the Government of Lenine and Trotsky. She was in danger of her life if captured, as the Bolshevists were talking of putting her to death. After an unsuccessful attempt to organize resistance to the new government, Catherine was hidden by friends while the Bolshevists sought her, and after traveling for six hundred miles on horseback reached Vladivostok, where she found a steamer ready to take her to America. Here she was again welcomed cordially and made much of on every side, and here too she made many speeches against the Bolshevist government. Although she is over seventy-five years old she declares that she will still aid Russia to gain the freedom and peace it craves and if given an opportunity she will no doubt take part in the future development of her country.
CHAPTER XXVIII
THEODORE ROOSEVELT
Among the great men who have been President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt holds a unique position. Although he had no great trial to undergo in the term of his office—no trial similar to what Washington and Lincoln were forced to endure,—he endeared himself to his fellow countrymen almost equally with these two for his splendid Americanism, his vitality, his kindness and the force of his personality. After his term of office ended and when he was a simple citizen once more, the bare word of Roosevelt's opinion had more influence on the country than the utterance of any public man who still held office. For the power of Roosevelt as a man and an American was greater than any other in the nation.