Page:Labour - The Divine Command, 1890.djvu/161

Rh some traces. Do I seek to gain glory? No. I am old; of what use would glory be to me? To-day or to-morrow I will descend into the tomb, where the light of the sun will not enter; why, then, should I seek glory?

My task is now finished. I have withdrawn the primitive law from the hell into which men have cast it since the beginning of the ages. I have bedewed it with my tears, and sealed it with my blood, as I have said, and I have resigned it into the hands of the government, or rather into those of the most powerful man in the world; I have given it to the czar of czars, the monarch of monarchs, the king of kings—to the Emperor.

Let what will happen, I have done my duty. It is for you, O Czar, to act according to your power and your will!

One more word, and I have done. During the last days that are left of my life, I will consign myself to the sepulchre, and I will raise above it a monument in conformity with the primitive law, "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou knead bread." I will raise, I say, a monument worthy of this precept, which is more precious than all earthly treasures. I will show you my design in the following articles.

I, Bondareff, will make a written rather than a verbal will, in which I will say to my son Daniel: At my death, when you place me in the