Page:Siberia and the Exile System Vol 1.djvu/275

Rh A recent writer in the German periodical Unsere Zeit of Leipzig, who signs himself "A Russian Resident of Eastern Siberia," and who is, apparently, a sincere and earnest man, attempts to lay the whole responsibility for exile by administrative process upon the Russian revolutionists. He admits the truth of all I have said on the subject, and acknowledges that "no man knows at what moment he may be seized and cast into prison or doomed to exile without even a hearing"; but he declares that "all this has been brought upon us by a band so vile—so horribly vile—that their crimes are without parallel. . . . . But for the nihilists of Kará there would have never been any administrative exile." The passages of the "Russian Resident's" article to which I desire to call the reader's attention are as follows: "And now came the most terrible calamity of all—the delegation by the Tsar to the administrative authorities of the power of exile, which, until then, had been the imperial prerogative. It was a measure resorted to in a time of terrible necessity, when the nihilists, in the indulgence of their bloody phantasy, were recklessly wielding the assassin's dagger, and not hesitating even to hurl railway trains to destruction by dynamite. The power of exile was committed to the administration as a means of precaution. The governors-general were intrusted with power to banish all suspected persons. It appeared to be the only possible means to counteract the nefarious doings of these dark conspirators. It was an unfortunate decision and a serious error. It did not save the Tsar and has done nothing for the suppression of nihilism; but the incalculable evil and misery to which the wretched system has reduced us is indescribable. What Kennan writes on this head is true, every word of it. The word neblagonadiózhni [untrustworthy] has become a curse-word in the Russian language and will be recalled with a shudder by latest generations. This is the unspeakable misery that the terrorists have plunged us into with their murders. From the day this power was delegated, no man knows at what moment he may be seized and cast into prison or doomed to exile without even a hearing. All this has been brought upon us by a band so vile—so horribly vile—that their crimes are without parallel; young people from eighteen to twenty-three, without ideals, without moral restraint, without regard for family, fatherland, or station, spreading blood and ruin at the prompting of their presumptuous fancies. . . . . . The same author who knew so well how to stir our sympathies for undeserved sorrow wields his pen with equal facility in denunciation of the just fate The "Russian Resident of Eastern Siberia," however, is as much mistaken in the explanation that he gives of the origin of administrative exile, as in the character