AFFAIRS IN RUSSIA.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 1975, 10 January 1907, Page 4

AFFAIRS IN RUSSIA.

HEROINES IN RUSSIA. ■ HOW* THE STUDENTS HELP. MOSCOW, November 20. Tlio boy was only sixteen—a cleanskinned hoalthy boy,with a smile that is rare in Russia. .Except that his fnir hair stood all on end without a parting, ho would have passed lor just the best typo of an English publicise!. ~0l boy, interested chiefly in games of ball, but beginning to bo conscious that tiiero were other things almost equally important in the world, and that in two or three years he would be required to know enough Latin and Crook to go to Oxford or Cam-

bridge. His father had boon a large landowner, and the boy had come to Moscow for his schooling, but it was not games or Latin verses that occupied his mind. In looks ho was little more than a child; in manner, in selfconfidence, and knowledge of the world ho was almost middle-aged, and day and night he thought of nothing but the Movement. The first time I saw him his hand was wrapped in surgical bandages. “An accidont in a laboratory,” ho said, and I asked no more. He was very ‘ tired that night—had been for a long ride. Dressed as a peasant, he had ridden for days and nights through the country round Moscow, had slept from time to time in the peasants’ huts, and lived on their black gruel,“which wasn’t very nice.” What had ho been doing P I don’t know, and all the whips of Tsardom would not have made him answer. YOUNG REVOLUTIONARIES.

Next time I found liim in a friendly circle of men and girls, whore ho was drinking tea and laughing and talking with the rest, more gay than any. He had been in school all day, and when wo left the party, towards midnight, I askod if ho was going back to his lodging. “No,” he said, “I am on duty till four in the morning,” and lie walked away to the bridge loading over the river to the southern quarter of the city. What was his duty? No torture could have made him tell. If the bureaucracy works with armies of hireling spies, tlio revolution has its armies too; and they are not hirelings. They are men and women who will dio and take nothing. Organised and directed from week to weck,_ they keep watch throughout the city. They report the movements of troops, they know exactly the military force present in each quarter, they observe the increase or lessening of police, they know on what night the bands of exiles are removed to the outlying station for Siberia, they listen at barracks and prisons for the dull sounds of execution.

There are about 8000 students in tlio university here. In various other institutes and colleges there are probably at least SOOO more. In the high schools and commercial schools, in-

cluding the girls, there are more than those two figures put together. I have heard the numbers of students and pupils from sixteen to twentyfour estimated at 50,000 in Moscow alone. That may bo on over-state-ment, but, at all events, there are many thousands, and, almost without exception, they are working for the Movement. Within the last two years the workmen,, and the peasants have become far more important elements in the revolution. 13ut the students still remain a body to be reckoned with in the civil war as scouts and raiders—clever, hopeful, and as eager for martyrdom as the early Christians,

GIRL PROPAGANDISTS. Since my return to Russia I have ill different cities met three of the girl students who have chosen propaganda among the soldiers as their special piece of work. One was a Jewess, with the masses of black hair and overflowing vitality of the Little Russian typo. The other two were fair-haired Russian girls, demure and very quiet. Under all manner of disguises they obtain access to the barracks or the tea-houses where soldiers resort. They go as sweethearts from the town, or as ignorant peasant-girls who have just come to the city to see a brother, or they carry little baskets of provisions to cheer up a cousin’s nbsenco from his dear old village home. Their object is to proclaim the revolution, and, above all, to induce the men to join the great Soldiers’ Union, which binds itself by an oath never to fire upon fellow-citizens. So they pass in and out among the troops week after week, carrying their life in one hand and their reputation in the other, and both hands open. But all assured me that from the soldiers themselves they had never received the smallest insult or annoyance, beyond the customary compliments and offers of marriage. No soldier has ever betrayed their secret, and in moments of danger a warning passes quickly through the barracks, and they are assisted to escape. Perhaps you have already heard of another girl who was not so fortunate as these. The thing happened a tew weeks ago, and was perhaps mentioned in the English papers, but I have lately seen a letter from a friend of hers who was present at the terrible event, and describes it accurately. The letter was smuggled out pf gaol, where the writer has still .about six months to pass before her trial comes on. The name of the girl JU question was Somonoya, and she had been arrested as a “suspect” .simply because she happened to be in n Liberal newspaper office when the lolice came to confiscate the paper in me usual way. As no evidence could Hf? laked up against her after several ■Weeks investigation, slip was ' daily expecting her release. Meantime she waa shut ip a cell with flftoen other women, similarly “suspected.” Above them were some ordinary criminals fed on the usual prison fare, and any little comforts which the girls received from outside they used to sharp with the criminals, sending them up by a string which was let down from the window above. This was called the telephone, and the av thorities winked at it, as they ofte do in Russia. REWARD FOR MURDER

One afternoon Simonova had made up a little packet of tea, sugar, and tobacco, and knocked with a mophandle on the ceiling for the string to bo let down. Hilt the wind blew the string away, she could not catch it through the bars, and presently it was jerked up again. Standing by the window, with one elbow on the sdl, she waited. The letter, from another girl prisoner, continues:— A few seconds later a shot rang out. I saw a puff of yellow smoke. Simonova s head drooped. My heart stood still, but I saw the others by the window were moving, and I ran to them. A girl who was standing near Simonova took hold of her and laid her on the floor. “She is killed ” she said . ’

One of the prisoners, who was a muse ,ielt her pulse, but turned away with a hopeless gesture. The eyes were glazed, blood flowed from her head.

At hen I saw she was dead I went to the window and cried to the soldier, “Murderer! you have killed a woman!” He took aim at me with Ins rifle, but I jumped aside before he had time to fire.

A\ e ran to the door leading into the corridor, and found a lot of warders standing behind it. “Murderers!” we cried. “AVill you shoot us all?” One of them laughed brutally, and said: A\ hat was she standing at the window for?”

hoi this exploit the soldier who killed the girl received a reward of ten roubles (one pound) by the express desire of the Tsar.

Non-, if Mrs Cobden-Sanderson (who l hear is in prison as a “political”) n-ere to send a little tea and tobacco to a poorer prisoner, and if the war(ler killed her in consequence, and King Edward sent the warder a pound as a mark of his aproval, haw long do you think the monarchy in England would last?—London Clironicle correspondent.