They were shot down like dogs; women and children were sabered or crushed under the iron-shod feet of horses; they were scourged back to their hovels, their cellars, their sweltering dens.
And the hundreds of dead bodies which littered the streets were thrown into the river like so much carrion.
A few days afterward it was considered good politics by the Grand Dukes who control this contemptible little Czar to grant a hearing to a deputation representing these same laborers.
The whole world had been aroused to anger and indignation at the manner in which the Cossacks had massacred the people.
Public sentiment had made itself felt even in the inner circles of the heartless oligarchy which controls the Russian Empire.
Therefore the Czar was told to receive the deputation, and he did so. The deputation bowed down to the earth before the Czar, who said: “Good day, my children. I have summoned you to hear my words, and to communicate them to your companions. The recent unfortunate events were the inevitable results of your own lawless actions. Those who induced you to address this petition to me desire to see you revolt against me and my government.” After a few more words of the same complacent character, this representative of God on earth said to the delegation:
“I am convinced of the innocence of the workingmen, and believe that they are well disposed toward me. I will pardon those transgressors. Return again to your work. May God assist you.”
The history of the world has so many revolting passages that I cannot say that this Russian episode surpasses others, but when the head of a great Christian government tunes his tongue to the formula of Divine Right which was current during the Dark Ages, and gives us a dash of medievalism, to be reported by a special correspondent in the daily newspapers, there is something so anomalous about the situation that it makes a peculiar impression of its own.
At least 2,000 of this emperor’s “children” had been butchered in cold blood for the high crime of wishing to present a petition to him for shorter hours of labor and a more liberal recognition of their status as human beings.
“May God assist you,” says the Czar—leaving it to the benighted minds of these untutored workmen to find out how it is that God is going to assist them, when the representative of God on earth shoots them down by the thousand, tramples them beneath the hoofs of Cossack horses, slashes them with Cossack sabers, pierces them with Cossack lances, lashes them with Cossack scourges, and sends them bleeding and howling back to their hopeless homes and miserable lives, for no offense other than the wish to kneel at his feet and pray for better treatment.