lofty to exist in this blood-soaked hell of ghoulish czars. He needed
freedom like the eagle needs the mountain crag. Had he shared his
brother's views, he would have remained to work and die for the Cause.
But as it was his opinion that a popular uprising was an impossibility,
he could take no part in political agitation, and he went to Switzerland
with wife and child. Here his great scientific work assumed monumental
proportions; it was to be a nineteenth century counterpart of the
renowned _Tableau de la Nature_ of the Encyclopaedists. He labored in
love, for science was to him what it was to Darwin.
Then he heard of Kropotkin's arrest. In a twinkling he left everything.
He re-entered the gore-dripping cave of the Bloody Bear. For his loved
brother's sake he breathed again the murderous miasma. Once more he
walked in that cursed country where the nagaika of the cossack beats
freedom to death.
Better than anyone else, he knew that if Kropotkin could not write, he
would die. The Geographical Society and the Academy of Sciences wished
the prisoner to finish a volume on the glacial period, and using this as
a support, Sasha petitioned the authorities to allow his brother resume
work. He made every scholar in the capital miserable, and plagued every
scientific association until they agreed to support his application.
The fruit of this labor was that the governor entered Kropotkin's cell
bearing precious gifts. It would take an Ippolit Mishkin in his most
eloquent moment to describe the captive's unfathomable joy when he felt
the paper beneath his palm and clutched in his hungry fingers, an inked
pen!
In the presence of gendarmes, the brothers were permitted to see each
other.[35] Sasha was much agitated. He hated the very sight of the
uniforms of the executioners, and was too frank to keep his feelings to
himself. Kropotkin was happy to see his honest face, his eyes full of
love, and yet he wished him as far away as Zurich, for he knew that tho
Sasha now came to the Third Section by day of his own free will, the
time would come when he would be brought there by night under the escort
of blue-garbed gendarmes.
Kropotkin was right. Sasha wrote a letter to his friend, the famous
refugee and profound thinker, P. L. Lavrov, in which he mentioned his
fears that his brother will fall ill in his armored chamber.
The Third Section intercepted the letter and arrested the writer. This
was the story which leaked into Kropotkin's cell and broke him down.
There is a touching little poem by Nora Perry about two attractive young
ladies who come home after the ball. It is late, and they sit on the bed
in their pretty nightgowns, stockingless, slipperless, combing their
beautiful hair. Their dresses and flowers and ribbons are scattered over
the room. They talk of the evening's revel, and laugh idly at the waltz
and merry quadrille. Yet the hearts of these girls are not quite as
light as their lips, for they both love one man and they fall asleep
dreaming of him--his face shines out like a star. Here the poetess leans
over the alluring sleepers and whispers if they could but peep into the
future, they would not be jealous of each other, for ere another year
rolls by, one will be ready for bridal and the other for burial. The
eyes of one will sparkle among her jewels; her cheeks will blush thru
her curls, but the other will be in that cabalistic country where there
is neither wish nor want.
[Illustration: "BEFORE THE SEARCH"--_By Kolinichenko_
A Russian student burning his papers.]
Yet is it not well that we cannot lift the mysterious veil and peer
behind the darksome curtain? Otherwise would not we see future tragedies
that would rob us of all strength to live thru the present?
Certain it is that had Kropotkin guessed the fate that was to befall
Sasha, he would soon have left the fortress--carried out.
It may be a mooted point as to whether cossacks or gendarmes have been
more successful in violating women, but all will agree that the former
are pre-eminent in sabering students, while the latter receive the palm
when it comes to searching houses. When half a dozen of them,
accompanied by an officer,[36] burst into Sasha's flat after midnight,
on Christmas eve, they excelled themselves. Against Alexander Kropotkin
there was no accusation except that he had written a personal letter to
a personal friend. Yet the Third Section kept him a prisoner for several
months.
At this time his charming child, whom illness rendered still more
affectionate and intelligent, was dying from consumption. It was not
Sasha's nature to ask favors from his enemies, but when Death beckons
with its bony finger, one cannot be proud. So Sasha asked permission to
see his son for the last time. The request was refused. He begged to be
allowed to go home for one hour, promising on his word of honor to
return. The request was refused. Then the high-souled man cast his
spirit in the dust before them and implored to be taken there in chains,
and guarded by gendarmes. The request was refused.
The child died; the mother went half mad with grief; Sasha was told he
would be transported to one of the loneliest towns in farthest Siberia;
that he would travel in a cart between two gendarmes; that his wife
could not go with him, but might follow later.
A year passed, and Sasha remained in exile. Another year, and he was
still in Siberia. His sister Helene, without asking anyone, wrote a
petition to the czar. She gave it to her cousin Dmitri Kropotkin, an
unfeeling scoundrel who was afterwards killed by the revolutionist
Goldenberg. At this time he was governor-general of Kharkoff,
aide-de-camp of the emperor, and a favorite of the court. Heartless as
he was, he thought it unjust for a non-political to be exiled so long,
and he handed the petition personally to Alexander II., adding words of
his own in support of it. Romanoff took the document and wrote upon it:
"Let him remain there."[37]
Ten years later. Sasha was still in bleak Siberia, cut off from his
scientific work, severed from the intellectual world. A gloomy
night--the wolves howled and Sasha lived. But these things could not go
on forever. A silent night--the wail of the wolf ceased, and the soul of
Sasha escaped.[38] Helene wrote no petitions to Death, but it was Death
that liberated him.
FOOTNOTES:
[33] Determining to preserve his physical vigor, Kropotkin mapped out
for himself a course in gymnastics. Among other feats, he made excellent
if undignified use of his weighty oak stool. He balanced it on his nose
and lifted it with his teeth; he put it on the end of his foot and
raised it at right angles to his body; he turned it on its edges and
twirled it like a wheel; he tossed it from one hand to the other, faster
and faster; and he hurled it between, under, and across his legs.
[34] That is, his arrest in 1875; for Alexander Kropotkin had previously
been arrested and thrown into prison in 1858, for reading Emerson's
essay on "Self-Reliance," which was loaned to him by a university
professor. For a portrait and his noble behavior on this occasion, see
George Kennan's world-known "Siberia and the Exile System."
[35] See Kropotkin's "Memoirs of a Revolutionist."
[36] "There is not depicted in Russian literature a single type of
officer which inspires sympathy or commands respect."... "Each of these
young officers knows a string of such anecdotes all relating to the same
topic. Here we have a tipsy cornet who rushes among a crowd of Jews and
scatters them with drawn saber. A sublieutenant sabers a student who had
inadvertently jogged his elbow. An officer shoots dead a civilian who
had ventured the remark that a gentleman never addressed ladies to whom
he had not been introduced."--G. SAVITCH in La Revue.
[37] This is a typical drop in the ocean of his extreme cruelty.--Among
those who contributed to my "Symposium on Humanitarians," (see August
1908 issue of the Medico-Pharmaceutical Critic and Guide), was the
distinguished ex-ambassador to Germany and Russia, Andrew D. White,
Ph.D., L.H.D., LL.D. He mentioned as one of his favorites, Alexander II.
Naturally I could not understand such a barbaric choice. A little later,
this eminent former President and Professor of Cornell University
published his "Autobiography," and I found he was the apologist, admirer
and friend of Pobedonostzeff! He speaks as highly of this relentless
persecutor as of Leo Tolstoy! I deserve to have my face slapped for
expecting Truth and Right from an official personage!
[38] He committed suicide by shooting himself.
THE OPEN GATE
The autumn night is dark as the crime of the traitor. But darker
still, piercing the mist like a gloomy vision, stands--the prison.
The sentinels are striding idly around, and in the deepness of the
night is heard their groanlike melancholy "Lis-ten!" Tho the walls
of the barrier are strong, tho the iron locks are unbreakable, tho
the eyes of the gaolers are keen, and everywhere are shining
bayonets, still the prison is not a morgue. Thou sentinel, be not
negligent, trust not the darkness, be careful, Lis-ten!...
MIKHAILOV.
The plague of the prisons was upon Kropotkin--he was sick with
scurvy[39] and dying from insufficient oxidation of the blood. The
wretches who lifted the shutter of the Judas and spied upon him,
believed he would soon change his silent casemate for a silent coffin.
His relatives heard about his condition, and their alarm was great. His
sister Helene tried to obtain his release on bail, but the procureur
turned himself like a golden pheasant and said with a sinister smile,
"If you bring me a doctor's certificate that he will die in ten days, I
will release him." The girl fell in a chair and sobbed aloud. Shubin
smiled again, for like Gorky's Tchizhik in _Orloff and his Wife_, he was
fond of gratuitous entertainments.
But a prince is not a peasant, and Kropotkin was examined by a thoroly
competent physician who ordered his transfer to the military hospital
(where politicals were sent when it was thought they would soon require
an undertaker).
Kropotkin improved at once. With a full chest he breathed the blest air
which he had missed so long. The rays of the sun warmed him, and the
scent of flowers gladdened his life. The immense window of his spacious
room may have been grated, but it was never closed. He sat there all day
gazing at the rows of trees. Later he was taken out for an hour's walk
in the prison yard--large, and full of sweet growing grass. The first
moment he entered it, he stopped on the doorstep unable to move. Before
him was a gate, and it was open! He tried not to look at it, yet stared
at it all the time.
The desire of the moth for the flame, the attraction of steel for
loadstone, the bond between chlorine and hydrogen, the affinity of
kalium for the halogens--what are these compared to the passion of a
prisoner for an open gate?
Kropotkin trembled as if in a fever. From head to foot his body shook,
while the heart leaped and his pulses throbbed. He soon managed to let
his Circle know how near he was to liberty, and immediately the comrades
determined to aid him in escaping. Plans and plots were devised and
disposed of, till Kropotkin feared all would be too late. He violated
the rules of hygiene, hoping to keep in bad health, for he knew his
walks would be stopped as soon as the doctor pronounced him well. Alas!
in spite of all his efforts, his weight increased, his eyes brightened,
his complexion cleared, his digestion improved. All symptoms of scurvy
left him,--the livid spots under the skin and the oozy spongy gums
disappeared.
At last all was ready. The revolutionists were sentimental, and decided
the escape should occur June 29th, Old Style, for this is the day of
Peter and Paul. It was arranged that Kropotkin's signal that all was
well should be the taking off of his hat, and if all were right outside,
the comrades would send up a red toy balloon. The day of the "saints"
came. At the usual time--four o'clock--Kropotkin was brought out for his
walk. He took off his hat, and waited for the little balloon. But in the
air no red ball arose, and at the end of an awful hour, he returned to
his cell--sick, crushed and broken.
A peculiar thing had happened. Usually hundreds of balloons could be
bought near the Gostinoi Dvor. Yet that day not a red one was seen--only
blue and white ones were there. Later one was discovered in the
possession of a child, but it was damaged and could not ascend. The
comrades rushed into an optician's shop, bought an apparatus for making
hydrogen, and filled the rubber with the gas. Had they pumped it full of
fluorine, the result would not have been worse. No inflation occurred,
and the unexpanded balloon did not fly--but time did. The comrades grew
worried. Then a lady attached the useless toy to her umbrella, and
holding it above her head walked along the prison wall. But Kropotkin
saw nothing because the wall was high and the lady was short.
The next day, at two, another lady came to the prison, bringing
Kropotkin a watch. Not dreaming that a pocket time-piece could contain
anything dangerous, the authorities passed it along without examination.
Kropotkin did not look at the hour, but pulled off the lid, and found a
tiny cipher note containing a new plan. (Had one of the officials
performed this operation the lady's life would have been forfeited.)
This time the comrades rented the bungalow opposite the hospital. A
musician was there ready to play on his violin if all were well. For a
mile around every cab had been hired to render pursuit difficult. But
what was to be done with the soldier who was posted at the gate and who
could easily prevent Kropotkin from gaining the street, by merely
stepping in front of him with lowered bayonet? Ah, the comrades, like
Chitchikoff in Gogol's _Dead Souls_, had an idea. This soldier had once
worked in the laboratory of the hospital, and therefore they appointed
one of their number to divert his attention by a discussion on
microscopes.
At four o'clock Kropotkin was escorted to the yard. He waited a moment,
wiped his brow as if it were hot, and took off his hat. From the little
gray house a violin sounded. The tones fell sweetly on Kropotkin's ears.
He moved toward the gate intending to run in a moment. Suddenly--the
music ceased. His heart hurt. Something writhed. One painful minute
passed ... Two ... Three ... Four ... Five ... Ten minutes ... No music
... A quarter of an hour.... Some heavily loaded carts entered the gate,
and Kropotkin understood the cause of the interruption.
Immediately the violin trilled. Kropotkin listened with interest. The
musician was talented, and performed with much feeling. You felt that if
three of the strings broke, like Paganini he would still make ravishing
music on the fourth. Moreover his technique was perfect. He was playing
a mazurka from Kontsky--wild, eager, thrilling,--a mad mazurka. It
attracted Kropotkin like a magnet. It pulled him to the end of the
footpath. He trembled lest it should stop again, but the intoxicated
sounds floated over the prison yard, louder and louder, with
ever-increasing passion and freedom.
Kropotkin glanced at the sentry. This hero followed a line parallel to
his, but five paces nearer the gate. He was supposed to walk directly
behind the prisoner, but as Kropotkin always crawled feebly along at a
snail's pace, the able-bodied sentry who was too vigorous to creep, hit
upon the above device.
Five paces nearer the gate--that was bad. But the sentry was only a
sentry, while Peter Kropotkin was a mathematician and a psychologist. He
calculated that if he began to run, the soldier instead of heading
directly for the gate to cut off his escape, would obey his natural
instinct and endeavor to seize him as quickly as possible. He would thus
describe two sides of a triangle, of which Kropotkin would describe the
third alone.
Fortissimo--how loudly that violin played! Kropotkin ran!
No sooner had he taken a few steps than some peasants who were piling
wood, shouted, "He runs! Stop him"! It was for the people that Kropotkin
was in prison; it was for them that he descended from his high estate;
it was for them that he was ready to die at any moment. But the blocks
with the slanted brows did not understand. At night when they lay on
their rotting straw, they thanked the good gods for sending them such
good masters. Now they called out, "Stop him! Stop him!"[40]
When Kropotkin heard that cry, he fled with a speed equal to Commandant
Masyukov's, when Madame Sigida struck him. Already the sentry--doing
just what Kropotkin expected him to do--was at his heels. Three soldiers
who were sitting on the doorstep, followed. The athletic sentinel was so
confident he could outrun the invalid that he did not fire, but flung
his rifle forward, trying to give the fleeing patient a bayonet-blow in
the back. But it is never safe to take chances with even a sick runner,
when he is sprinting for his life.
"Did you ever see what a big tail that louse has under the microscope?"
asked the scientific comrade of the soldier at the gate.
"What, man! A tail? Why, man, you're crazy!"
"That's right. It has a tail as long as that."
"Come man, none of your tales now. Do you take me for a fool? I know a
thing or two about the microscope myself."
"But I tell you it has. I aught to know better. That's the very first
thing I saw under the microscope."
At this moment Kropotkin ran past them unnoticed, and tho usually much
interested in convex lenses, took absolutely no part in the animated
argument.
On gaining the street he was dumfounded to see that the huge man who
occupied the carriage wore a military cap. The unhappy thought came to
him that he had been betrayed. But on running nearer he saw it was a
friend.
"Jump in! Jump in!" cried this modern Mikoula Selaninovich in a terrible
voice, calling him a vile name. Leaning over to the coachman, he shoved
a revolver in his face, screaming, "Gallop! Gallop! I will kill you,
you----!!" using language abusive enuf to have made every foul-mouthed
cossack in the cavalry stare in mute admiration.
Springing into the air from a forefoot, the beautiful horse--a famous
trotter named Barbar--flew along as if it were shod not with steel but
with wings. When the cause of Revolution is triumphant, this flying
quadruped should receive a statue of purest gold, for two years later it
rendered another magnificent service to the movement by bearing to
safety the Nihilist Stepniak, after he helped assassinate the monstrous
Mezentsov--murderer of many.[41]
Like lightning it leapt thru a narrow lane; they entered the immense
Nevsky Prospect; they turned into a side-street; Kropotkin ran up a
stair-case; the smiling comrade-coachman drove away. At the top of the
steps waiting with painful anxiety was his sister-in-law. Physiologists
claim it is impossible to do two things at one instant, but Kropotkin
says that when he fell into her arms, she laughed and cried at once,
and at the same time bade him change his clothes and crop his beard. Ten
minutes later, he and his muscular Mikoula left the house, and took a
cab. About an hour after, the house was searched, but as Kropotkin was
not there, and it was necessary to arrest someone, the police took his
sister and his sister-in-law.
Kropotkin was puzzled where to spend the time till evening, but his big
friend knew. He called out to the cabman, "To Donon!" which has the same
significance in Saint Petersburg that Delmonico has in New York, or
Cecil in London, or Doree in Paris, or Bristol in Berlin, or Sacher in
Vienna.
The decision was wise, for the police searched the dirty slums, but not
the swell West End. So Kropotkin, dressed in an elegant costume, entered
the aristocratic restaurant, and as he walks thru the halls flooded with
light and crowded with guests, let us fill the biggest bumper with the
richest wine, and quaff congratulations to the noblest prince that was
ever imprisoned--and escaped.
Then softly let us retreat on tiptoe, and glance at his products for the
bookshelf.
FOOTNOTES:
[39] For a description of this disease, see Professor Osler's
"Principles and Practise of Medicine."----"In parts of Russia scurvy is
endemic, at certain seasons reaching epidemic proportions; and the
leading authorities upon the disorder, now in that country, are almost
unanimous, according to Hoffmann, in regarding it as
infectious."----This reference to a physician reminds me of an
interesting little book which has just appeared, "Glimpses of Medical
Europe," by Dr. Ralph L. Thompson. Writing of Russia he says, "In St.
Petersburg are fine parks and theatres and comfortable hotels in
abundance. But despite it all there is an odd feeling of oppression that
strikes one the moment he lands on Russian soil, and one doesn't breathe
freely till he is out of it all."... "Personally I wouldn't mind
foregoing health, friends and money, to fame; but if it came to a
question of living in Russia, I would choose to die unknown."
[40] For a work dealing with revolutionary workmen and peasants, see
"Mother," by Maxim Gorky. See also the admirable "Russia's Message" by
William English Walling. This book is illustrated with magnificent
photographs, including the latest one of Kropotkin.
[41] The Russian Revolutionists are too modest. Stepniak in "Underground
Russia," finds it necessary to mention that Mezentsov was stabbed to
death in the streets of Saint Petersburg in full daylight, but he does
not tell the reader that he himself was the author of the glorious deed.
To find this out, we must go to another work; for instance, Konni
Zilliacus's "Russian Revolutionary Movement," or Leo Deutsch's "Sixteen
Years in Siberia," (see the English translation by Helen Chisholm). On
the other hand Deutsch escaped in a romantic manner from the prison in
Kiev, but in his book he refers to it so casually that if we wish to
learn the facts we must go to another work; either Stepniak's, or
Professor Thun's "Geschichte der revolutionaren Bewegung in Russland."
FROM THE PRINTING PRESS
You poets, painters, sculptors, musicians, if you understand your
true mission and the very interests of art itself, come with us.
Place your pen, your pencil, your chisel, your ideas at the service
of the revolution. Figure forth to us, in your eloquent style, or
your impressive pictures, the heroic struggles of the people
against their oppressors, fire the hearts of our youth with that
glorious revolutionary enthusiasm which inflamed the souls of our
ancestors; tell women what a noble career is that of a husband who
devotes his life to the great cause of social emancipation! Show
the people how hideous is their actual life, and place your hands
on the causes of its ugliness; tell us what a rational life would
be, if it did not encounter at every step the follies and ignomies
of our present social order.--P. KROPOTKIN: _An Appeal to the
Young_.
Peter Kropotkin's writings range from obscure articles in unknown papers
read by a handful of faithful subscribers, to cloth-bound far-famed
volumes translated into several languages; include contributions to
periodicals as revolutionary as _Revolte_ and as respectable as the
_Atlantic Monthly_; embrace all subjects from machinery to music, and
from Tolstoyism to Terrorism.
Judged from a literary standpoint, his work is distinctly
disappointing. It is styleless. But it has one redeeming feature:
clearness. The man is straight. He is not ashamed of his ideas. He
speaks right out. He is one of the few authors who writes for the
peculiar purpose of being understood. He does not bury the flower of his
thought in a wilderness of words.
It cannot be contended that Kropotkin gave up his style because he
writes for workers who are unable to appreciate the beauty of literary
composition. A man may refuse a title with an oath as Carlyle did, or
give it up as Kropotkin himself did, but he who has a style relinquishes
it not, for this is a gift besides which the 'boast of heraldry' is as a
puppy's snappish yelp unto the lion's mighty roar.