My stay with the Russels gave me much pleasure; we made expeditions to various parts of the island, to see the volcano Kilauea, the sugar plantations, the native villages, and so on; and we were never tired of congratulating ourselves on the turn of fortune that had brought us together on this island of the Pacific. At last, towards the end of July, after a delightful visit, I set out on my travels once more, this time in a sailing-ship. We were twenty-six days on the journey to San Francisco; though the weather was generally fine, I became heartily tired of the voyage, and was very glad when on the evening of August 25th we arrived in the harbour of San Francisco. Dr. Russel had given me introductions to friends of his, and with their help I made myself at home in the Californian capital. After ten days’ rest there I went on to Chicago, and so to New York.
In Chicago I was received, through a letter of introduction, by two Polish Socialists, immigrants who were living there. They welcomed me very kindly, but unfortunately my ticket did not allow of my remaining with them more than two days. President McKinley had been assassinated on the very day before my arrival in Chicago; people had quite lost their heads, and turned upon peaceable Socialists, accusing them of anarchism. My friends therefore advised me to be careful in travelling, and not to use my own name; so I selected a pseudonym and travelled incognito.
In New York another comrade, Dr. Ingermann, received me, and I stayed in his house four weeks; after which I embarked in the English steamship Satrapia for Liverpool. I pass over my voyage, a stay of two weeks in London, and the same in Paris, as containing nothing worthy of note. Everywhere on the Continent I met with old comrades, many of whom had changed much during the long years of our separation. Some could not recognise me at all, others only with difficulty; all regarded me as one come from another world.
From Paris I went to Zurich. This was the final point of my six months’ journey from Blagovèstshensk, and here dwelt my old friends the Axelrods,[[117]] from whom I had parted seventeen and a half years before. After a journey round the world of not quite the usual type, I returned to them again on November 5th, 1901.
“Look! he hasn’t changed a bit,” cried Axelrod, as he pointed me out to his wife at the station. But it was only at the first moment of meeting that it seemed so to him.
For over a year now I have been living again in freedom, going about from one town to another. During that time I have learned to feel at home in more than one European country; but it may be readily believed that what is passing in my native land interests me beyond everything else. Eighteen years make but a brief span in the life of a nation; yet during that period a transformation has come over Russia that must meet the eyes of even a superficial observer. At the time of my arrest at Freiburg, in 1884, there were but a few groups of revolutionists, and they were recruited chiefly from the young student classes, who rebelled against existing social and political conditions. And, as I have explained, owing to the methods of wholesale executions and arrests adopted by the Government, these organisations dwindled and almost entirely disappeared; so that from the end of the eighties thorough-going reaction was triumphant for a time. Of late years, however, it has been quite otherwise. The publications issued by our secret press and distributed throughout the length and breadth of the Russian Empire, calling on the people to rise against the existing despotism, number above one hundred thousand, and they meet with energetic response among the population of large towns and factory districts. Workmen collect in great crowds in the streets along with the students, and by means of monster demonstrations they voice their demand for political freedom and the abolition of autocratic government. The Tsar and his ministers endeavour by the most cruel and severe measures to quench the torch that has been kindled in the land: the greater part of Russia has been placed under martial law; the prisons can hardly contain the numbers of their captives; those who protest against such a régime are sent to Siberia by the trainload. But nothing can stem the tide of the movement; it will rise higher and higher, embracing ever wider circles of the people, and the hour is not far off when autocracy will be laid low, as it was in Western Europe so many generations ago. My flight from Siberia has taken place at a moment in our history which is full of hope for the future.
In Western Europe also great changes have taken place during the last two decades, though none, perhaps, so significant as in Russia. In Germany the special laws against Social Democrats have been repealed; and this has not only made a great difference to our party, but has altered the internal life of the nation in a striking manner. In one respect, however, Germany has made no advance: she is still ready to lend her aid to Russian despotism. Just in the same manner as I was arrested and delivered over to the Russian Government eighteen years ago, though guilty of no offence against German law, so a compatriot of mine has suffered a like fate even while I have been writing this memoir. The Russian student Kalayev was arrested in Mysolowitz (1902) without any warrant, and handed over to the Russian gendarmerie; since which he has not been heard of. The Prussian police have in no way altered their methods during the years that have flown; but to the credit of the German people I must admit, that with the exception of official journals, the entire press was most indignant over this complaisance of the German Government towards the Russian.
THE END