Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1891-05-09
AssAssINs LURKD BY LOVE.
Sophia Gunsburg. . RassaaA, Usso Her
Charms - Organiss Re01cidss.


Charms - OrEaniss Rsgicidss.
SHE FALLS IN LOVE HERsELF-HAvINa aArHxaRD
AROUND HER BAND OF You've MEN SWORN TO
KILL THE CAR sHK rs ARRESTED AND CON-
DEEMED.
q. Petersburg Letter IN the London telegraph
No authentic account has yet been given Of
the late political trial-or rather condemns
tions-of Russian nihilists for high treason;
for trial. in the English sense Of the term, there
was none. have Just had long conversation
with one Of the dignitsries who played the part
Of judge, jury and counsel for the crown dur
ing the brief ceremony. which began by ACCUSE
ton, Was continued by voluntary confession
and ended in condemnation to death; and the
details communicated to him-which are
worthy of implicit credence-throw q strong. if
not lurid, light upon Russian nihilists In par
ticular, and the Russian character generally,
and il properly worked up by Zolaistic realist
would make most sensational novel.
The ringieader of the couspirstors and now
the chief of the prisoners is-as 10 FIRE quently
the case in Russian politics. woman; in this
case a woman Of excellent education, of iron
will, Of ravishiIg beauty and of undaunted
courage, q woman In many respects superior
to the celebrated Sophia Perovsky, who directed
the operations that eliminated in the foul
murder Of the late emperor. whom she soon
afterward followed to the grave. This person.
Sophia Gunsburg by name, narrated the event,
full story of her checkersd life to her unsym-
pathetic judges and narrated it in most calm
unpassioned, objective way, which the most
impartial of historians might well envy.
She was Jewess by birth, she said and had
baer, hro rub in Tho Ia Of efflemapf mi
side of which jews are not allowed TO wander
at large. Her parents had given her the best
education that was TO be had Under the unfav-
orable public and private conditions in which
theiI lot was cast.
SOPHIA aUNsBURas PLAN.
Sophia saw many of the most estimable men
and women of her nation compelled daily to
barter their religion for q mess of pot
tsge, or, for less still, the barren right
to work for it. After having graduated
in the ordinary establishments OF interme-
diate education Sophia left her birthplace, to
which she refuses the name Of fatherland, and
went abroad to breathe the braeing air Of free
dom.
In Geneva her vague inclinations and ten
denotes were gradually nodded into perfect
system of cruel. cold blooded revenge which
has scarcely its parallel in history. 1t was in
that historic town that she meditated and
brooded over the wrongs inflicted by Russia
until, at last. she Matched plot. the bare ont
lines OF which make one shudder ,andwhich was
certainly more worthyof fury in human shape
than of a beautiful maiden standing upon life
Threshold, with all the joys and pleasures Of
existence before her. Holding the govern
ment responsible for the innumerable evils
that deluge the country she applied the auto
cratic principle to the extent Of admitting that
the government Is the car, and the car she
determined to slay. Such was the object Of
the plot.
She resolved to gather together a select band
OF young men, and, dazzling them by the
almost irresistible charms of her beauty. to adj
minister to each. unknown to the other, q
solemn oath binding him TO do her behe SITS and
| to assassinate the emperor on a day and in the
manner fixed by her. She was determined
that IL one failed another should take his
place, and still another after him. until at list
the foul deed should be done. The emperor S
successor, too, unless he struck out new line
of policy. was to be stamped out of existence
in the same ruthless way, and thus red terror
was to struggle with white until the evils COM
| plained Of were either abolished or intensified
to such an extent that the Most phlegmatie
Russian peasant could no longer endure them.
FELL IN LOVE HERSELF.
Sophia Gunsburg had no difficulty in attract
ing a sufficient number Of love-sick young Rus
slams, who were smitten by her beauty and
grace or made enthusiastic by her eloqnence.
| She sacrificed without hesitation or regret ali
that pure woman holds dearest in life in order
to maintain her hold over these young Cata-
| lines. She was not. however, wholly u mon
| ster nor was she exempt from all human weak
nesses. She herself fell in love with an edu-
Gated young Russian, whose paramour she be-
came, but whom she never initiated into her
political plots, that he continued down to
the moment OF his arrest in complete igno-
rance Of the part che was PLAYING as regicide.
One Of the unsuccessful attempts on the ear 8
life early last year was the work of one of
Sophia Gunsburgs body guards, and, had she no,
been arrested when she was, the present year of
grace would probably have been the last Of the
reign OF Alexander Ill
When the prisoner had finished the i'm
pressive discourse containing the history of
her life and crime, which had been occasionally
interrupted by the questions and rebukes VI
the presiding dignitaries, tine president asked
her II she felt no conjunction for the abomina-
BILE deed she resolved and attempted 20 execute
no remorse for the cynical way in winch she
had Invested herself of all female modesty.
| Her reply was an emphatic negative, which
rang through the hall like the peal of q musical
| bell tolling for the death Of a musical bride,
and was quickly followed by the solemn sing
song of the judge pronouncing the sentence Of
| ignominious death.
Her companions are condemned TO various
| terms of hard labor in the Mines sentence
SURPRISING in severity the most painful kind of
| death--all except one, her lover, who because
| perfectly ignorant Of her criminal plans was
| finally released after having languished in SOL
itary confinement for a length of time sufficient
| to make him wish for a release into the life of
this sublunary world or into the next The
emperor when informed Of the death sentence
commuted it to imprisonment for life.
MOTHERS SACRIFICE
Sophias parents are still living in the pale,
and when her old mother heard Of her con-
demnatiOn she offered to abandon Judaism and
become q Christian in order to obtain the
needtul authorization to leave the pale of set
| Element and come up to st. Petersburg 10 see
her dearly beloved daughter, who had gone SO
far astray from the path of duty since last they
had met. The interview took place few days
ago at the fortress, anu no more heartIe ending
spectacle was ever before witnessed by the
phlegmatic Jail officials, whose tears fell like
rain.
The trembling mother approached her daugh-
ter, whose beauty was brought out in greater
relief by the somber hue of the prison Dress
and who moved slowly and with dignity toward
her aged parent without the least symptom Of
tenderness, conjunction or other emotion.
Fanaticism had crushed ont or at least re-
pressed ali tender sentiment.
20 Sophia! sophia, don you love your poor
old mother, who bore you and nursed you 80!
Say you have not torn me from your heart,
child. I'll go to the end Of the world with you,
Sophia, my darling. Don't you remember the
old times when you knew no evil? Oh, will they
never come back again? I'll be q Christian.
any hing you like, il they only let me live with
| L.. L..