hen I tell you that in the course of the trial of that one
batch I spoke of, which lasted four years, seventy-five of the prisoners
committed suicide, went mad, or died. Then when the authorities thought
Nihilism was stamped out by wholesale severity the matter assumed
another phase. The crusade by preaching had failed, and the Nihilists
began a crusade of terror. First police spies were killed in many
places, then more highly placed persons, officers of the police, judges,
and officials who distinguished themselves by their activity and
severity. Then in the spring of last year Vera Zasulitch shot at General
Trepoff, who had ordered a political prisoner to be flogged. She was
tried by a jury, and the feeling throughout the country was so much in
favour of the people who had been so terribly persecuted that she was
acquitted. The authorities were furious, and every effort was made to
find and re-arrest Vera; and a verdict of the court acquitting many of
the accused in one of the trials was annulled by the Czar.

"Well, you know, Godfrey Bullen, I am not one who meddles with politics.
You have never heard me speak of them before, and I consider the aims of
these men would bring about anarchy. An anarchy that would deluge the
land with blood seems to me detestable and wicked. But I cannot but
think the government has made a terrible mistake by its severity. These
people are all enthusiastic fanatics. They see that things are not as
they should be, and they would destroy everything to right them. Hate
their aims as one may, one must admit that their conduct is heroic. Few
have quailed in their trials. All preserve a calmness of demeanour that
even their judges and executioners cannot but admire. They seem made of
iron; they suffer everything, give up everything, dare everything for
their faith; they die, as the Christian martyrs died in Rome,
unflinching, unrepentant. If they have become as wild beasts, severity
has made them so. Their propaganda was at first a peaceful one. It is
cruelty that has driven them to use the only weapon at their disposal,
assassination.

"One man, for example, in 1877, Jacob Stefanovic, organized a conspiracy
in the district of Sighirino. It spread widely among the peasants. The
priests, violating the secret of the confessional, informed the police,
but these, although using every effort, could learn no more. Hundreds of
arrests were made, but nothing discovered. Learning that the priests had