Show SHE WAS A NIHILIST the terrible experience of a russian jewess among tho the refugees an anecdote which is absolutely ti true titie tie in every detail will illustrate and explain tho feelings of some of the refugees in america not far from a new york police station is a large three story brick building years ago it was a handsome dv dwelling velling but time aud and the small boy have played havoc with its facade doors windows in and rail railing in g it is occupied by a well to do russian who years ago fled his native land for alleged complicity in some plot against the czar it has long been the rendezvous of political ref refugees 0 ees of both sexes russian nihilists nihilisms lists po polish fisli liberators french Comman ards german socialists and cosmopolitan anarchists the circle met there is coin composed posed of educated and clever people nearly all ire are excellent linguists and more or less im successful in trade literature or professional life owing probably to the terrible scenes in in which they have been actors all are more or less eccentric in behavior speech or ideas not long since a party of a dozen men and women were spending tho the evening in the large old fashioned parlor all smoked a few sipped the vitriolic vodka between the whiffs of their cigar cigarettes ettes while all the rest assuaged thirst with the cheap wines of the rhine and moselle the conversation had been political and literary rather than anecdotal in character and had bad flagged until the room was almost silent the only person speaking was a handsome jewess of 24 or 23 25 whose name or arnom nom de guerre was theodora she was a rare typo of that race being a superb blonde with bright golden hair largo large lustrous blue eyes and exhibiting the powerful figure and splendid health which characterizes the hebrew women to so remarkable a degree As she paused at the end of an argument and drained a glass of Josephs hoefer some one asked 11 what made you a nihilist dora nothing very remarkable to us rug russians she replied 1 I belong to a good family in a small town in the warsaw province I 1 married the rabbi of our synagogue and we were very happy for a few months the czar then made a change chane b and sent down a new governor from st petersburg to replace our old one who was a good and just man although a russian general the newcomer had every vice and no virtue of any kind ile he was so bad and cruel that our friends and relatives wrote us when he be came warning us against him sly my husband the next sabbath in the synagogue told our people about him and advised them to be overcautious in not violating any of the thousand tyrannical laws with which we were cursed though he spoke in hebrew for fear of spies sama one betrayed him to the governor he was arrested tried flogged on the public square into insensibility and sent to siberia for life I 1 1 was present when he underwent his agony and stood it until I 1 became crazed I 1 broke through the crowd toward the wretch of an official and cursed him and his master the czar and swore vengeance against both I 1 too was arrested and tried at court martial and sentenced to receive a hundred blows with the rod in the public square 1 I a woman was taken by drunken and heathen cossacks to the place tied by my hands to the whipping post my clothing t torn tom from my body to the waist and beaten before all the soldiery and the people of the town at the twentieth blow I 1 fainted but the ropes held me up lip mid and the full hundred were counted on my body they cut me down rubbed rock salt an and dwater water and some iron that eats like fire into my back to stop the bleeding and carried me to the hospital 1 I lay there two months and was discharged I 1 had bad but one idea then and that was vengeance by patience I 1 managed to get employment in the governors palace a as seamstress ono one af afternoon he was in his bath and sent for towels the attendant was tired and I 1 volunteered to take them I 1 threw them over my arm and under them I 1 held a ion long 0 stiletto sharp as a needle I 1 entered th the e room and he was reading and smoking liing in the bath I 1 laid the towels by his side with my left land hand and at the next moment with my right I 1 drove the knife through his heart it was splendidly done he never made a sound and I 1 escaped to this land that is why I 1 am a nihilist do any of you doubt she sprang apran excitedly from her chair and in a balf half a minute had bared herself to the waist tho the front of her form from neck to belt might have passed as the model of the venus di milo but the back ridges welts and furrows that crossed and later interlaced as if cut out with a iron patches of white gray pink blue and angry red holes and hollows with hard hideous ed edges edes es halt half visible ribs and the edges of ruined muscles and all of which moved contracted and lengthened with the swaying of her body there was a gasp from avery every one present the aged host rose silently kissed her on the forehead and helped her to put back her garments then again the wine passed round and what secret toasts were made as the party drank will never bo be known Will william lilliain iain ES rales in chicago times |