PLOT AGAINST THE TSAR.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXII, Issue 8946, 11 October 1907, Page 4

PLOT AGAINST THE TSAR.

j When the trial of the eighteen men ! and women accused of plotting to I kill the Tsar was resumed at St. Petersburg on August 82nd, the first • -witness was the father of the beauti- ' ful girl Maria Prokofieva, described i as the bride of Sosoueff, the murderier of M. do Plehve. She is the police description says, the sister of fan Anarchist who killed himself in \ the Grand Hotel in St, Peterburg ! after sustaining a long siege of the • police. j Her father is a magnificent speciJ men of the old type of Northern Rus I sian, dressed in their picturesque J costume —tall, broad-shouldered, upi riglit and handsome. He said that i his children were never Anarchists or revolutionists. Maria knew Sosoueff well in childhood, when they j were neighbours and fast friends. I Possibly a girl and boy attachment j existed between them, but they ‘ were never betrothed. They parted ! when she was 15, and did not meet again till shortly before M. de j Plehve was murdered. Of that crime I she knew nothing, i Concerning Maria’s brother, the

; father said that lie was never an ! Anarchist, nor even politically ini terestecl. For an offence committed ' at school he was once sent to prison. ! This made a deep impresssion on i him, and ever afterwards he was ■ deadly fear of the police, believing himself shadowed and spied on everywhere. Ho was always weak in the lungs, and later developed consumption. “In St. Petorburg,” said his father, “ho committed a terrible mistake caused bv his haunting fear of the police. My noor brave boy killed himself through a police mistake. Now mv good and beautiful daughter is threatened with death by a similar mistake, and I shall bo bei reaved of all my children.” Here the stalwart man broke clown, sobs preventing his finishing his tale. The deepest impression was caused, and there was no dry eye in the court. Women sobbed loudly and even the officers of the guard wept. , ~ . The next witness was a brother oi Naumoff, one of the accused. He first asked that his brother might be removed, as he had things to tell which would be unpleasant to him. The accused man then retired. The witness said his father and grandfather were drunkards, and that his mother died when her children were only a few years old. His brother was a dunce at school, and ‘failed in half a dozen different professions, and sometimes spoke of suicide. This, the witness thought, was caused by the alcoholism of the two previous generations. The indictment’s statement that it was intended that his brother should enter the Imperial choir to obtain access to the Tsar’s proximity the witness characterised as nonsence. His other brother, he said, was a teacher of singing in this choir, while it was well known that the accused was absolutely without musical ear. Besides, if his brother had intended to kill the Tsar he would not have needed the assistance of the Cossack Ratimoff. He lived with his father, within the walls encircling the Emperor’s residence at Peterhof. Within the same walls was situated a farm where the Emperor daily went to drink his morning milk, passing on his way the window of his brother !s room. If he had intended to kill the Tsar it would have been the easiest thing in the world.