A frightful confusion spread among the crowd. Many darted impetuously towards the exit. Others jumped over the fence. Suddenly the crowd, with frenzied cries, came sweeping in retreat from the exits back into the depth of the garden.
Cossacks darted in from somewhere and, crying savagely, made their way along the garden paths. Their sudden appearance gave the impression that they were waiting somewhere near by for the command. Their knouts began to work rapidly. The thin textures upon the girls’ shoulders were rent apart and delicate bodies were unbared, and beautiful blue-and-red spots showed themselves on the white-pink skin like quickly ripened flowers. Drops of blood, large like bilberries, splattered into the air, which had already quenched its thirst on the evening coolness, on the odour of the foliage and the aroma of artificial scents. Delicately shrill, loud sobs were the accompaniment to the dull, flat lashings of whips across the bodies.
They threw themselves this way and that way, they ran where they could. Several were caught—ragged young men and girls with short hair. Two or three of the girls were caught and beaten in error: they were from the most peaceful, even respected, families in town. These were afterwards permitted to go free.
The hooligans were making merry in a dirty, ill-smelling beerhouse. They were celebrating something or another, were jingling their money, discussing future earnings, and laughing uproariously. One table was especially absorbed in its noisy gaiety. There sat the celebrated town-rowdy Nil Krasavtsev with three of his friends. They drank, and sang hooligan songs, then paid their bill and went out. One could hear their savage outbursts:
“The Jew dogs are rebels, they are against the Tsar.”
“The Jews want to get hold of everything for themselves.”
“It wouldn’t be a bad thing to cut up a Jewess!”
“The Jews want to take over the whole earth.”
It had grown dark. The hooligans went into the main street, the Sretenka. It was very quiet, and only a few passers-by were to be met with; people stood here and there at their gates and talked. A Jewish widow sat at the gate of a house and chatted with her neighbour, a Jewish tailor. Her children, a whole throng of them, one smaller than the other, played about here, deeply wrapt in their own affairs.
Nil walked up to the Jewess and shouted: