Nadiejda Yakovlevna is twenty-one years of age. She confessed frankly
that she had loved, and still loved passionately the cornet Semenov, but
assured me that no intimacy had existed between them, and that the
cornet was even ignorant of the passion he had inspired. She said the
soldier Tsaryna had paid his court to her, and not being able to obtain
her love had sworn to her that he would revenge himself upon the one who
had obtained it. At first his suspicions rested on Hortinja, and he said
he would soon get rid of the old rascal. Some time after he came to her
and said, “Harken, Nadiejda! be mine, or I swear by St. Nicholas thou
shalt witness the death of Semenov.” She cared little for his threats,
knowing him to be a coward. About this time the cornet left Trehmiria.
Tsaryna renewed his declarations, but still without success. Before
setting out for Kostroma, he said, “The old one will do what I have
threatened; before I return I will be revenged, I swear it by St.
Nicholas.” She had never heard Hortinja threaten the life of the cornet;
he was sad and melancholy—he even wept, but he was a man incapable of
committing a crime unless provoked to it.
This is her account of the night in which she saved the cornet:
“I had a presentiment which oppressed my heart; before I lay down I
found a cat upon my bed. A bad sign! As soon as I fell asleep I had
horrible dreams. I awoke and cried out, ‘Wo to me!’ My father then
ordered me to go upon the Volga and draw away the nets; there I heard
cries, and thought I recognised the voice of Semenov. It was more than a
year since I had seen him, and I knew him in spite of the obscurity. I
rowed towards his boat, and as I neared it, I heard the splash of a body
thrown into the water. Fortunately, I was close by and succeeded in
drawing him out of the river. It was Semenov.”
The inquiry was completed by a few other declarations of less
consequence.
The Armenian merchant tried to excuse himself, and said that he
endeavored to save the two men in order that they might have time for
repentance. In other things he confirmed what Hortinja had said.
The fisherman Yakov gave an account of the manner in which Tsaryna had
threatened him, because he would not give him his daughter.
The inquiry terminated on the thirteenth of May, and the depositions
were on the same day laid before the criminal tribunal of Novogorod by
the captain Isprawnik.
On the twenty-ninth of May the tribunal pronounced the decree which
condemns:
Paul Ivanovitch Hortinja to perpetual banishment in Siberia, and ten
years labor in the mines.
Jerome Smilabej, Armenian merchant, to one year and six days
imprisonment, a fine of one thousand rubles, and the costs.
Pierre A. Tsaryna, being a soldier, was sent before the military
tribunal.
On the fourth of June, the military tribunal of the first corps of the
army, assembled at Novogorod, condemned Pierre A. Tsaryna to pass three
times through the rods of a squadron, and afterwards to be transported
to Siberia, where he must labor in the mines for the rest of his life.
These decrees have been submitted to the emperor, and confirmed by him
with this change: Hortinja is perpetually banished, but will not be
obliged to labor in the mines.
On the third of June, the decree was executed on Pierre A. Tsaryna, who
was so severely beaten that there is little hope of his recovery; he has
been taken to the hospital of Novogorod.
L’Abeille du Nord, a Russian journal of St. Petersburg, reached us at
the same time with the letter of our correspondent. It gives an account
of this affair, and also adds that the emperor has deigned to decorate
the girl Nadiejda with a medal of gold on the ribbon of Saint Waldimir.
The Cornet Semenov married Nadiejda Yakovlevna as soon as the trial was
concluded.
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