[15] All the details of this and the preceding cases are authentic.—Author's Note.
[16] Comically striking in this respect is the naïve assertion of the Russian authorities in doing violence to other nationalities, the Poles, Baltic Germans, Jews. The Russian government practises extortion on its subjects, for centuries has not troubled itself about the Little Russians in Poland, nor about the Letts in the Baltic provinces, nor about the Russian peasants who have been exploited by all manner of men, and suddenly it becomes a defender of the oppressed against the oppressors, those very oppressors whom it oppresses.—Author's Note.
[17] Thus I know of the following protest of students, sent to Paris, which was not accepted by a single newspaper:
"OPEN LETTER TO THE FRENCH STUDENTS
"Lately a group of Moscow students of law, with the university authorities at their head, took it upon themselves to speak in behalf of all the student body of Moscow University in respect to the Toulon festivities.
"We, the representatives of the association of student societies, protest in the most emphatic manner possible both against the arrogation of this group and substantially against the exchange of civilities between it and the French students. We, too, look with ardent love and profound respect upon France, and we do so, because we see in it a great nation, which formerly used to appear before the whole world as the herald and proclaimer of great ideals of liberty, equality, and fraternity; and which was also the first in the matter of bold endeavour for the materialization of these great ideals,—and the best part of the Russian youth has always been ready to welcome France as the leading champion for the best future of humanity; but we do not consider such festivities as those of Kronstadt and Toulon a suitable occasion for such civilities.
"On the contrary, these festivities signal a sad but, let us hope, temporary phenomenon,—the disloyalty of France to its former great historic rôle: the country, which once called the whole world to break the fetters of despotism and offered its fraternal aid to every nation that revolted for the sake of its freedom, now burns incense before the Russian government, which systematically trigs the normal, organic, and vital growth of the national life, and mercilessly crushes, without stopping at anything, all the strivings of Russian society toward the light, toward freedom, and toward independence. The Toulon manifestations are one of the acts of that drama which is presented by the antagonism—the creation of Napoleon III. and Bismarck—between two great nations, France and Germany. This antagonism keeps all of Europe under arms, and makes the Russian absolutism, which has always been the stay of despotism and arbitrariness against freedom, of the exploiters against the exploited, the executor of the political destinies of the world. A sensation of anguish for our country, of pity for the blindness of a considerable part of French society, such are the sensations evoked in us by these festivities.
"We are fully convinced that the young generation of France will not be carried away by the national Chauvinism, and that, prepared to struggle for that better social structure toward which humanity is marching, it will know how to render to itself an account of the present events and to take the proper stand about them; we hope that our fervent protest will find a sympathetic echo in the hearts of the French youth.
"The union council of twenty-four united Moscow student societies."—Author's Note.
Transcriber's note:
Variations in spelling, punctuation and hyphenation have been retained except in obvious cases of typographical error.
Missing page numbers are page numbers that were not shown in the original text.
The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up paragraphs, thus the page number of the illustration might not match the page number in the List of Illustrations.
Page 290: The transcriber has removed "were" from "But since there were was more than one woman in each house".