This task, the labor, of directing the forces of young Russia occupied two whole years of my life. It is true I succeeded in the meantime in visiting America, where I was urgently called by the friends of freedom. I sent out from there considerable sums of money to cover the expenses of the organization, mainly for literature, the import of which into Russia was very expensive. In the United States I acquired many genuine friends, who have remained faithful to me ever since. They proved it by profuse attention to all my needs during the last years of my exile and imprisonment, and from 1907 to 1917 they never ceased even for a week to take care of me. When the blows of the open struggle of 1905 had reached me I again crossed the boundary into my country, but this time I passed it on foot, running across in the company of two "contrabandists" and a comrade who carried with him a supply of dynamite. That was the Russian revolution marching, challenging all Russia to an unequal combat. Everybody knows the events of 1905, 1906 and 1907. The efforts of the revolutionists of all parties were unable to withstand the physical force of the evil government, but they have not only shaken up the paralyzed mind of the great people, but enticed them into demonstrating their power and seeing themselves as a victor, though temporarily. The combat was already nearing its end; the banners were already lowered and hidden for the next spiritual and physical upheaval; already the executioners were hanging and slaughtering, shooting and torturing the best champions of freedom; but my spirit was yet far from submission, my heart was still heaving with hope, and with head forward I threw myself into the thick of events. After the wreck of the second Duma I anticipated a new outburst of indignation on the part of the people. But apparently the cup of doubts had not yet been exhausted, and the people ponderingly looked into the future, not risking to sacrifice their remaining feeble forces. VIII--"THE HANGMAN'S ROPE WAS AT MY THROAT" It was in the days of such oppression on one side and vain strainings of all energies, on the other that I was arrested in Samara in 1907, again in the month of September. It seemed to me that this time I would be unable to escape alive from the hands of the hangmen. This was what I thought. But I felt otherwise. Two years and nine months I was kept in the fortress of Peter and Paul, thinking not of that, but of the time when Russia, after the inevitable victorious and triumphant second revolution, would take up the work of construction and transform our powerless country, our almost illiterate people, into an exemplary state, which could serve as a model to other peoples in culture as well as in social reform.