The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1904-05-27

. MAINTAINING MS connection with the COM
. mune or the landed corporation of which
. he is member.
The Russian merchant is at the head
; of the town classes, but is not, as a
. rule, an educated man. It would be
nothing unusual if he could not read or
write. He is the conservative of the
empire, as are his brethren in all lands.
A disturbance of the existing order of
things would be likely to disturb bust
ness. He therefore stands midway in the
scale between Imperialism and Nihilism
l-frst the Car, second the noble, third
the merchant, fourth the bloodless agita-
tor and fifth the Nihilist. The merchant
mounts upon the shoulders of the bank
rupt noble. He purchases his house, or
builds fine one himself as near like it
as possible. He places in his mansion
the same order of great mirrors, grand
pianos and rich furniture. His floors are
marble and his curtains are of the best
and most expensive material. But with
him everything is merely to have, some
times not even to show. The educated
noble entertains royalty. He is lin
guist, musician, politician, a travel
er, man of the broad world and fas-
cinating gentleman with>all his faults.
He CANDLES, he spends his money reck-
| lessly, but he throws himself and his
establishment open to society and revels
in publicity and the fruitfulness of his
resources. Except the merchant has
something to gain by it, he shuts up the
best rooms of his mansion and lives in
| the shabbiest. His life, experiences and
| reading having been confined and not
wishing to expose any of the secrets of
his business, conversation is naturally
circumscribed. The merchant dresses &C
cording to his rank, owns and exhibits
| fast trotters, and is proud of the patron
age of government officers, but scouts
the hereditary nobility. He subscribes
literally to churches, monasteries and be-
nevolent objects, but the price of his
subscription is often decoration.
st. Petersburg is worthy of the vast
empire which it represents; it vastness,
the width of its streets, the area of its
public squares, the gigantic dimensions
of its palaces, churches and houses are
simply oppressive. There is self-con-
seriousness about the city that its archi-
tect had deliberately set out to build the
most magnificent monument to kingly
| ambition in the world. st. Petersburg
was raised from the marsh on the graves
and shoulders of slaves, but it no doubt
impresses the world as its founder meant
that it should. He also wanted port
on the Baltic sea, there was not square
rod of the site which he had chosen which
would support massive structure.
The mobiles, the criminals, the men, wo-
men and children of the two Russias all
contributed toward the furtherance of
this mammoth work The mobiles were
obliged to build palaces and the proceeds
of the sale of lands to them helped to
erect the government structures. Every
boat upon Russian waters and every
cart on Russian soil furnished timber,
stone or brick. But the city was found
ed, fairly lifted above the mud, within
period of nine years, succeeding mon
archs seemed inspired with the determin-
alton of Peter the Great, and, though the
foundations of the bridges and buildings
might periodically disappear, new set
of pilings was driven upon the old and
the work of extending the city went on
Hare Island, it is called, where Peter
laid the first walls of his spacious cap
ital He superintendent the building of
one of the fortress bastions himself,
his chief officers taking charge of the
| other work. At first the Notifications
were only built of wood, but three years
afterwards they were re-erected in stone
by masons from Novgorod, who were as
sisted by the soldiers. The first fortress
was begun May Is, 1903, and finished in
five months. Wheelbarrows were un-
known, and the workmen scraped up the
dirt with their hands and carried it to
the ramparts in their shirts or in bags
made of mating. Two thousand thieves
and criminals sentenced to Siberia were
ordered to serve under the Novgorod
workmen. Peter constructed little brick
cottage just outside the fortress which
he called his palace. Every large vessel
on the Neva was forced to bring thirty
stones, every small one ten, and every
peasants cart three, toward the build
| ing of the new city.
St. Petersburg stands but fifty feet
| above the level of the sea, and every
year when the ice breaks up the lower
part of the city is threatened with in
undation. Warnings of any threatened
danger are given from the citadel, which
stands upon an island in the Neva; but
even the prompt discharged guns has not
J always proven effective in giving the citi-
zens timely warning. Evidence of this
fact is still found in some quarters of the
city in which red plates are seen affixed
to various houses, twelve and fourteen
feet above the street, marking the point
which the flood reached in 1924, in which
thousands of persons persisted. Little at
tention is given to the firing of the first
gun, that indicating merely an inunda-
ton. At the second gun, people bestir