"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 betrayed them the peasants no longer went to confession, and to avoid betraying themselves in a state of drunkenness abstained from the use of brandy; but one man, tired and without food, took a glass. It made him drunk, and in his drunkenness he spoke to the man who had sold him spirits. He was arrested, and although he did not know all, gave enough clue for the police to follow up, and all the leaders and over a thousand persons were arrested. Two thousand others, who were affiliated to the society, were warned in time and escaped. You can guess the fate of those who were captured. "Last year, three months before you came here, General Mezentsoff, the head of the police, was assassinated, and since then we know that it is open war between the Nihilists and the Czar. The police hush matters up, but they get abroad. Threatening letters reach the Czar in his inmost apartments, and it is known that several attempts have been made to assassinate him, but have failed.