and political agitators eagerly fanned the flame of animosity against the alien race, and saw with pleasure the spread of disturbances which would either lead to a collision between the people and the authorities, or open the eyes of the masses to the weakness of the latter, and to their own strength.”[159] The venerable charge of ritual murder was once more brought against the Jews, and within a few weeks all the provinces from the Baltic to the Black Sea were a theatre of arson, rapine, and slaughter, such as Europe had not witnessed since the tragedy of the Black Death in the fourteenth century. The civilised world shuddered at the appalling spectacle; but the local authorities, both civil and military, looked, for the most part, complacently on. The peasantry, having slaked their thirst for vengeance, plunder, rape, and gin, by sacking the Jewish houses, drinking shops, and brothels, proceeded to embody their grievances against the Jew in the following series of demands: 1. “That Jews, members of town councils and provincial assemblies, vice-directors of town banks, members of different institutions and committees, should voluntarily give up their present posts, casting off the cloak of pride and braggadocio; as persons not possessing civic honesty, they are unfit to hold such places. 2. “That the Jews should impress on their wives and daughters not to deck themselves out in silk, velvet, gold, etc., as such attire is neither in keeping with their education nor the position they hold in society. 3. “That the Jews should dismiss from their service all Russian female servants, who, after living in Jewish houses, certainly become prostitutes, forget their religion, and who are intentionally depraved by the Jews. 4. “To banish, without delay, all Jews belonging to other places who do not possess any real property in town. 5. “To close all drinking shops. 6. “To forbid Jews to abuse the Christians, and, in general, to scoff at them. 7. “To prohibit Jews from buying up in the markets the first necessaries of life with the intention of selling them to the Russians. 8. “To impress on wholesale dealers in spirits not to mix with vodka any foreign element which is sometimes injurious to health. 9. “Not to trade on the Sabbath before noon, and at Christmas and Easter not to trade for three days, and not to work on our holidays. 10. “To prohibit Jews buying wheat for trading purposes within thirty versts of the town of Pereyaslav, and therefore to remove all existing grain and flour stores. 11. “To prohibit Jews from buying up uncut wheat; also to lease land from private individuals. 12. “The Town Council is begged not to let, and the Jews not to hire, the grounds at fairs and at marketplaces, with the object of farming them out.”[160]