New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1879-04-16
ASPECTS or NIHILLSM.


The Russian secret police have succeeded,
for once, in arresting an assassin. Fifty
thousand roubles did not bring to light Mesent-
zei's murderers, although hundreds of arrests
were made, and the red-handed cOnspiratOrs
who have piled dagger or revolver in St.
Petersburg Moscow, Odessa. kazan, Kieff and
Kharkoff, have done their work in the public
highways, and often by broad daylight, and
yet have cOntrived to defy the vigilance of
the police. Drentelen's assailant, when followed
few weeks ago from the scene of his
crime, jumped from his horse, ran down the
street, and climbing into a sledge was driven
to a hiding place. SkolOff seems to have made
no effort to escape. He is not an ignorant
fanatic like Hoedel, the German tinker, or Mon
cast, the Spanish cooper, or Passanante, the
Italian pastry-coOk. He is q retired member
of the Russian civil service, and undoubtedly
has attended lectures at university.
He is an educated Socialist, like Nobing,
the German doctor of philosophy. He comes
from the school and treasury building, and not
from the shop or the wretched moujik's hut. IS
q representative of the middle class lie has
carried the fantastic philosophical teach
ings of Nihiism to their logical result. He
began by dismissing divine authority from the
universe, and he ends by pointing his re-
vOlver at the Emperor.
The social aspects of the revolutionary
craze in Russia render it IN some respects a
more dangerous movement than the Socialist
agitation in Germany Men and women are
leagued together against the Government
and the police. Since the days of
Elizabeth, the daughter of Peter the Great,
Russian women have held a position supe-
ror to that of their sex in other
European countries. Their husbands have
had no control over their property, and
under the civil law they have been
on q level of equality with men. Catherine
was the first to interest herself in wOman's
education, and although the doors of the
universities have not been permanently
opened to the sex, day schools similar to
those conducted in Germany have been
established for the training of girls of the
middle class. With these privileges I'M
der the law and in the schools it is
not strange that young women have en-
tered, heart and soul, into this revou-
tionary movement. Turgenefi, in "Virgin
"Soi," represents Marianne as the only one
of the group of Socialists who was capable
of devotion to lofty ideas; for Solomine
and MaIkelOf were visionary rather than
enthusiastic, and Neshdanof was sentimental
and cowardly. There are said to be rs many
women as men III the Nihilist societies, and
some of these are ladies of high rank. In a
recent outbreak at Kief three of the rebels
under arms were women OF noble birth. One was
a daughter of one of the most influential oill-
GERS in the Imperial service. and another was
countess whose motler-in-law was one of the
Empress's ladies in waiting 1t is this co0pera-
ton of the sexes which imparts a threatening
aspect to this social movement. 1t gives TO
persecution, self-sacriGce and death magic
powers that are irresistible. NIhilIsm
may be gospel of ncgations, but
when it calls upon its followers Il
labor and die for the good Of generations Il