Show ate 0 1 NADA has put her onklnl stamp of approval ap-proval on the Douk C liobbrs A Into report of the Canadian Interior department de-partment Is devoted entirely I to this Christian Community Communi-ty of the Universal Brotherhood ns the Doukhobors themselves them-selves In It are embodied em-bodied the results of a careful olllclnl In vpstlgatlon that was provoked by the flood of adverse criticism during the last ten years against these Spirit Wrestlers ever since they first settled In vm torn t-orn Canada Its obvious purport Is the Indorsement of the DouUloboiA ns citizens of the Dominion and the dlEcournontcnt of any further attempts at-tempts to mallcn them The report shows that Instead if being golclbrluied by the DOI hobors Canada really got nn ext11 lent body of citizens when she brought the Docks over to this one God the Holy Trinity Is beyond comprehension compre-hension They do not believe In praying In temples made with hands and say that all the ceremonies of the churches being useless were much better leftalone Luxury In food or dress Is condemned and going to war carrying car-rying anna or taking oaths of any description descrip-tion are forbidden Their mode of life Is strictly communistic all laboring for the common com-mon good They are abstainers from alcohol and tobacco and for the most part are vegetarians vege-tarians For many years the Doukhobors lived In the neighborhood of Icier In what Is called Little Lit-tle Russia In the reign of Alexander I they all wore banished to the Wet mountains of Georgia In the Caucasus There they lived for many years among the half savage Ma hometans who have been the rulers of that region for centuries The crisis In their fortunes for-tunes came In 1887 A universal conscription was declared throughout Russia Every healthy adult male was ordered to be ready for service In the army For the next three years the Doukhobors wero persecuted unremittingly There were Innumerable banishments Imprisonment floggings and tortures that cannot bo described de-scribed but the Doukhobors were Immovable Their condition was pitiable In the extreme when Count Tolstoy and the Society of Friends In England came to their relief by raising funds for their emigration to Canada There was little difficulty about obtaining sufficient land at little price for the 7000 Doukhobors who came to Canada during tho first year Each main over 18 years old was allowed to take up ICO acres subject to a payment pay-ment of 10 which was three years deferred The Dominion government also gave a grant of 5 to each man woman and child who reached Winnipeg before Juno 30 1899 The region whore these Russian exiles have fr ¼ t VeRrei n 17oSfl J rt 1 va ff tJ > j r < ill d d Jlt1 I N I i f d f Lt Xt > E < b M V V < if 4 y tt9 ° 1 7 1B Kt < W b 1 < V r 1id < I < < ih tc ifi J1ii Y k = Z4 fi DOUKHOBOR FAMILY > is Erwa > ° < y k > 5M < JI side of the Atlantic For years the Douks were looked upon as a Joke and Canada was laughed at and ridiculed but now there Is a different tale to tell Most of the stories that brought the Immigrants Into contempt were based upon the doings of a small minority of the communists religious zealots whose fervor led them into extravagance of conduct such as could be explained only by mental derangement de-rangement These zenlots went naked In the middle of winter on pilgrimages through the snow In search of the Messiah They would not work and they would not sanction work by others They oven tinned loose their horses cattle sheep and hogs given to them by the Canadian government because they didnt believe that horses or oxen should be made to toil for man or that sheep or hogs should bo eaten by man I Tho majority of the immigrants however were Industrious and painstaking and had lit I tie sympathy for thu fanatics These Industrious Indus-trious ones have built up the community property prop-erty until now the Doukhobor colonies are among the best In the Saskatchewan country They are as deeply religious as ever and they cling to their old Quakerlike customs tenaciously i tena-ciously but they no longer are looked upon as a problem by the Canadian government and there will lie no more talk of dispossessing them from the magnificent domain they occupy oc-cupy The Doukhobor has made good I I The first shipload of Doukhobors left Ba I toun In Asiatic Russia In January 1899 bound for Canada and by the middle of that year more than 7000 of them had settled In the far northwest Now the number of these peculiar pe-culiar religionists In Canada exceeds 10000 The creed of the Doukhobors Is somewhat I vague In many details The principal points of their belief however are these There is made their homes Is In the provinces of Asslnl bola and Saskatchewan Their total holdings are between COO and 700 square miles of splendid land for agricultural purposes tv pur-poses now In the heart j ° k of the wheat belt When n F tilt government allotted this land to them ten years ago it was considered y Y i f n a consid-ered by experts too cold ta for wheat but since then F knot the grain belt has moved nor hward several hun z dre Is of miles The Douk r hobor lands today are worth anywhere from 15 to 40 an acre according s r to location which would t 4 t4 make their total market value Considerably more than 10000000 If It had not been for KHp60 the forbearance of the p plCp Canadian government q 7 however the Doukhobors mllht hnn lnd nnl1 through their own stubbornness about obeying the laws They received their land under tho terms of tho Canadian homestead act which among other things requires that the person who takes up a homestead shall reside on it until ho proves up Now tho solitary life of the homesteader has no attraction for tho Doukhobor with his agesold fondness for village vil-lage living The result was that tho Douk hobors Instead of remaining on their homesteads home-steads established themselves In a string of villages between 40 and GO In number that sprawl across the plains for a distance of 100 miles northeast of Yorkton In due course the government gently reminded re-minded tho Doukhobor leaders that their people peo-ple were In danger of losing their homesteads through their failure to live on them Tho stolid refugees paid no attention to the warning warn-ing and In the end they had their own way The powers of tho Dominion decided to let them hold their land and live as they wished This Is not tho first concession tho Canadian Cana-dian government has made and it Is not likely like-ly to be the last Not long ago a movement was started In certain quarters where the hostility hos-tility to tho Spirit Wrestlers was marked to urge the authorities to make all tho men take tho oath of allegiance to King Edward As it Is one of the cardinal principles of this religious sect that they shall take no oaths of any description doubtless tho Instigators of this enforcement of one of the Dominions laws regarding alien settlers hoped that they would move and leave their lands open for purchase at a low price Tho government knew the Doukhobors probably would refuse to tako any oath partly on account of their belief and partly because they would fear that It might lead them at some tlmo to bo forced Into military service Therefore tho authorities authori-ties forbore to press the matter of the oath of allegiance but contented themselves with intimating In-timating to the Doukhobor leaders that his majesty King Edward VII would tako It as a personal favqr If tho brethren would come around when they found It convenient and promise to be good subjects This plan Is working fairly well Something like 800 ot the ablebodied men In the various communities have taken tho oath voluntarily during the last 18 months This has been duo almost entirely to the influence of their leader Father Verlgin Peter Verlgln has been tho greatest power among the Doukhobors for nearly 25 years For 15 years he was nn exile In Siberia toj gether with six of his brothers but they alt 1 were released finally and reached Canada about six years ago Ills followers almost deify him nsthoy had hlsslx great predecessors who ruled like tho kings or prophets of old during the time that tho sect sojourned In Russia During his long exile he became a linn convert to the theories of Tolstoy und 13 years ago wrote an epistle to his followers which Is made up chiefly of passages borrowed verbatim from Tolstoys Kingdom of God Is Within You and containing In particular one long passage from that booka quotation of Tolstoys translation of the Declaration of Sentiments which William Lloyd Garrison drew up In 1838 for a Peace convention held In Boston This epistle Is part of tho sacred lore of tho Doukhobors It contains no acknowledgment acknowl-edgment of the fact that It was taken mostly from Tolstoy There probably are more people in Asslnlbola and Saskatchewan today who can repeat the long passage from Garrisons declaration than there aro In the United States who ever heard of it The disturbers among the Doukhahors belong be-long to tho reactionary or fanatical element and these made themselves felt to such an extent before Veilgln arrived In Canada that at one tlmo there was serious talk of bundling up all of tho thousands of Doukhobors and shipping them out of Canada no one cared much whither At that time It was considered con-sidered that the czar had played a colossal Joke on Canada by letting the 7000 odd Dank hobors leave his realm and It was a mutter of congratulation among the Canadians that the 10000 or more who stayed behind In tho Wet mountains of time Caucasus were too stubborn stub-born or too fearful to emigrate It was this fanatical clement that was responsible re-sponsible for tho pilgrimage In search of Jesus in 1902 These fanatics belonged to tho Yorkton colonists and professed tho belief be-lief that the use of animals as beasts of burden bur-den was uuscflptural and that Christ would soon come again In person They set free nearly COO animalswhich wero caught by the authorities and sold back to tho more sober minded Doukhobors Meantime some COO men women and children set out across tho snow covered pralrlo where they expected tho Mea slab to meet them and lead them to evangelize the world They were poorly clad they were without food except such as they cuuld get from charitable people on tho way und their I only shelter was the winter sky Sumo went bareheaded and barefooted barefoot-ed and all rejected leather footgear Many went crazy nnd n few died from exposure The most startling feature of a portion por-tion of this mud pilgrimage however was that a small portion of these Doukhobor zealots not content with throwing off their outer clothing de tided themselves entirely to show mi tin o to humanity nail how imam should return Into his fatherland and give back the ripened fruit and its needs they said In passing through tunny of tho Doukhobor Villages this naked band wero driven out by heir corollglonlsts and beaten with twigs until tho blood ran At night In tho rain and snownnd wind they clustered Into one heap and lay on tho ground one on another for warmth StranRo ly enough It Ix flail that none of them Was seriously frozen This string march continued until 28 of tho unclad un-clad ones reached Yorkton where thor were met by the mounted police and wero arrested Three months Imprisonment Impris-onment was their lot After they wero released all but ten ot theso 2S undo marchers abandoned their curious curi-ous beliefs and wont buck to works These ten attempted another outbreak out-break destroyed some of the breth rests crops nnd burned some of their machinery but flnnlly wore subdued nnd Imprisoned once more Tuna next year there was another attempt at a pilgrimage but by that tlmo Father Veilgln was In control and It amounted amount-ed to nothing About the time that Verlgln came Into tho full powers nf leadership a movement was set afoot to persuade the government to take back the largest part of the original grant to time Doukhobors Thoso behind ho agitation claimed that tho community had more land than It over would bo able to use and that u part of the holdings ought to ho made available 1 3kf 3 3 tttl y fj rvh n it II rlV N Y < < X t < > M < < Y eSPINNIN for other and more profitable settlers Father Verlrta at once saw that It was up to IheDoukhobors to make j an adequate defense ami he set about it In a characteristic I character-istic way At tho fall meeting of tho community nearly 0 100000 was apt aside to be used for buying new laud Immediately adjacent to ho 1omikhmobor reservation and all talk of cutting down their holdings ceased forthwith Another evidence of the quality of Verlglns leadership leader-ship Is to be seen In tho system of elevators and gran arles that Is found In every center of population in the community The Doukhobor farmers are thus under no compulsion to sell their wheat and flax tho moment te harvested but can hold It for weeks or months If necessary nec-essary Within the last two years a system of flour mills also has been Installed and the export of flour is beginning to be a considerable Item of profit Plans are afoot for a narrow gauge railroad to connect tho various l vari-ous villages of the community They already are connected connect-ed by urlvnte telephone lines In each village there is lone l-one 1m I nenso granary or a modern elevator All the r farm It plcments are owned In common Much of the machtm ry used In cultivating the soil is of the most modern type obtainable steam plows being numerous As a class tho Doukhobors are a big tall race falrhalrcd with the flat noses that are peculiar to the Slavs Each household holds Its religious service at four oclock every morning They have no civil courts but settle set-tle their differences In a religious way base on their interpretation of the Scripture There is said to bo no crime among thtra They are famous throughout Canada for their live stock and will pay almost any price for the finest blooded breeding animals To the Touch of Love We have two Mary Valll1 es here said the inorguo keeper Funny thing too Roth brought in today Youll have to bring somebody some-body with you who can see somebody who Imew your wife before she can be identified Tint sensitive features of the man contracted contract-ed with sudden pain and his dull roving eyes sought tho direction of the morgue keepers oho His stick tapped beforo him on tbo las stone as ho moved a step nearer That Isnt necessary ho said Irel M know Mary among a million She has the softest hair M lIe extended a hand the slim dextrous lingers moved gently caressingly The morgue keeper understood He hesitated a moment and then grasped tho blind mans sleeve Come hwsald They wSlked through the ofllce Into the rear apartment The air was chill and the blind man shivered The keeper released his aim and there was a sound like a drawer being + be-ing pulled out II ore ho said rather gruffly He caught tho visitors hand again and t guided It to nn uncovered face The blind man started at tho contact so cold was It Then his fingers wandered swiftly over tile marble like countenance and dually rested for Just tan t-an Instant on the dead womans hair No npl ho said Thats not my Mary Tho drawer was closed and another pulled out Tho visitor groped his way forward a The instant his fingers touched the sharpset features of the dead woman his own fuco was transfigured Mary Mary I have found you dear ho whispered How thin your poor face has grown How cold you are Ills fingers strayed to the harsh thin hair of tho corpse hovering there caressingly Hut the softest hairthe softest hair he murmured mur-mured tuJ < 0 |