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persons had been in prison for four years, while the slow
and thorough investigation lasted. The Russian cell
system during this period bore so heavily upon them,
that of the one hundred and ninety-three no less than
seventy-five committed suicide, became insane or died.
A special tribunal had been arranged for the trial of
this cause, so that it was not to be expected that the
judgment would be against the government. There were
sentences of ten, twelve, fifteen years imprisonment, with
hard labor, for two or three lectures, privately delivered
to a handful of workmen, or for having bought or loaned
a single book. And so harshly were political prisoners
treated in prison that in the central prison at Kharkof
(“house of terror”) there were several attempts at
insurrection among them for the purpose of obtaining the
same treatment as the common criminals. And when
the senate of Alexander II., which in other respects was
pliant enough, in the form of a petition for pardon,
acquitted the larger number of the 193, the Tsar
personally set aside the verdict of the Senate. Not even in
the laws which this government had promulgated did
it seek its support against its antagonists. It was,
therefore, natural that these antagonists did not regard
it as anything else than organized injustice, against
which all weapons seemed to be allowable.
In 1877 followed Viera Sassúlitch’s attempt to
assassinate General Trepof, who had caused a political
prisoner to be whipped, and her acquittal by the jury,
which aroused the attention of the whole of Europe.
In August, 1878, came the bullet from “Stepniak’s”
revolver, which, in the forenoon, in the open street, killed
General Mesentzef, chief of the political police.[1] Among
the numerous attempts at political murders which now
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