Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - XVI. The two Worlds, Peasant and Official
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thanks to the moderation and tact of ispravnik Kapgar, who
talked the peasants into a proper frame of mind, and procured
their submission to their lord’s rightful claims. Loschkarjev
was rewarded with special marks of the Tsar’s favour, and
Kapgar received a high military decoration.
As said above, so the matter would have rested, had it not
suited Potapov’s rival, who had a majority in the Cabinet, to
take it up. But Potapov was so strong in the Senate that he
escaped with a slight reproof. Then the Cabinet reported the
matter to the Tsar, recommending a severe sentence. The Tsar
endorsed this with his own hand in the words “Most
decidedly.” In spite of this Potapov’s party succeeded in
deferring the execution of the Tsar’s orders for three years.[1]
Besides these illustrations, gathered from public records, we
here give some notes specially written by a friend in Russia
for our use, containing descriptions of cases that have come
under his own personal notice.
A snowstorm is raging, with dismal howls. If we go out of
doors we are at once covered from head to foot with driving,
penetrating snow, or bitten in the face by a cold, sharp wind.
If we sit in a warm room our thoughts turn with a sad
unwillingness, with prickings of a half-wakened conscience, to
the traveller who is overtaken by so terrible a storm. I do not
know whether it is better for travellers on horse or foot. A
pedestrian runs great risk of exhaustion and burial in some deep
snowdrift; a rider may equally perish with his steed. But for
us who are just now fighting a famine storm it is a day of rest.
.No applicants for aid throng our doors, and we can spend some
hours in our own pursuits, giving ourselves up to thought,
busying ourselves in household matters, reviewing the past, or
planning the future work, bringing into coherence many of the
impressions we have received. I will use the occasion to set
down some of my experiences of the recent past.
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