The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1888-08-15
An Artist Exile in Siberia.

Mr.. KEENAN,, in the August Century,
describes his meeting with an artist
exile in Siberia as follows 81 find it
extremely difficult now, after a whole
year of intimate association with po-
litical exies, to recall the impressions
that | had of them before l made the
acquaintance of the exile colony in
Semipalatinsk. l know that | was
prejudiced against them and that
l expected them to be wholly
unlike the rational, cultivated men
and women whom one meets in
civilized society: but / can not, by any
exercise of will, bring back the unreal,
fantastic conception of them which
had when l crossed the Siberian
frontier AS nearly as l can now re-
member | regarded the people whom
] called 'nihilsts as sullen and more
or less incomprehensible 'cranks, with
some education, great deal of fanatical
courage and a limitless capacity for
self-sacrifice, but with the most vision
airy ideas of government and social or
ganization and with only the faintest
trace of what an American would call
hard common-sense.' | did not eX-
pect to have any more ideas in common
with them than | should have in COM
mon with an anarchist like Lewis Lingg,
and although intended to give their
case against the government fair hear
ing, believed that the result would be
a confirmation of the Judgment l had
already formed. Even after all that
Mr. Pavlovski had said to me l think
more than half expected to find in
the drop-curtain artist a long-haired,
wild-eyed being, who would pour forth
an incoherent recital of wrongs and
outrages, denounce all governmental
restraint as brutal tyranny and expect
me to approve of the assassination of
Alexander II. The Lighthouse occu-
pied by Mr. Lobonofski as workshop
was not otherwise tenanted, and we en-
tered it without announcement. AS Mr..
Pavlovski threw open the door l saw,
standing before large square sheet of
canvas, which covered one whole side
of the room, a blonde young man, APP
parently about thirty years of age,
dressed from head to foot in suit of
cool brown linen, holding in one hand
an artists brush and in the other a
plate or palette covered with freshly
mixed colors. His strongly built figure
was erect and we'll proportional;
his bearing was that of cultivated
gentleman, and he made upon me
from the first pleasant and favor.
able impression. He seemed in fact
to be an excellent specimen of the
blonde type of Russian young man,
hood. His eyes were clear and blue;
his thick, light-brown hair was ill-cut
and rumpled little in boyish way
over the high forehead; the full, blonde
his well-shaped head, and his frank
open, good-tempered face, flushed a
little with heat and wet with perspra
ton, seemed to me to be the face of &
warm-hearted and impulsive, but al
the same time strong and well-balanceC
man. 1t was, at any rate, face
strangely out of harmony with all my
preconceived ideas of a nihilist. Mr.
Pavlovski introduced me to the young
artist as an American traveller who
was interested in Siberian scenery, who
had heard of his sketches and who
would like very much to see some O.
them. Mr.. Lobonofski greeted me
quietly but cordially, and at one,
brought out the sketches-apologizing
however, for their imperfections anC
asking us to remember that they haC
been made in prison, on coarse writing
paper, and that the outdoor views wer,
limited to landscapes which could b,
seen from prison and etape windows
The sketches were evidently the worl
of an unframed hand and were mostl,
representions of prison and etape in
teriors, portraits of political eXiles ant
such bits of towns and villages as coul'
be seen from the windows of the variou
cells that the artist had occupied in thu
course of his journey to Siberia. The
all had, however, certain rude fore
and fidelity, and one of them served a
material for the sketch illustrating tn
Tiumen prison-yard in The Centur
for June. My conversation with MI
Lobonofski al this interview did no
touch political questions and was con
fined, for the most part, to topics sue
gested by the sketches. He describe
his journey to Siberia just as he woul
have described it if he had made
voluntarily, and but for an occasions
reference to prison or an etape Their
was nothing in the recital to remind on
that he was a nihilist and an exile
His manner was quiet, modest an
frank; he followed any conversation;
lead with ready tact, and although
watched him closely, | could not d.
tect the slightest indication of ecceI
tricity or crankiness.' He must hav
felt conscious that l was secretly r,
garding him with critical curiosity
looking at him, in fact, as one looks fo
the first time at an extraordinary tyr
of criminal-but he did not NANTES
the least awkwardness, embarrassment
or circumstances. He was simpl
a quiet, well-bred, self-possessed gel
tleman ~