The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-09-10
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In Ruasia Today.

In Moscow, where Josiah Flint is gather ing news. comes the following anecdote. in Public Opinion, August 26, illustrative of the Russian child-Iike peasant character:
 one day. during 6 strike. a committee of mill hands called in the directors and super intendent of the mill. to present list of grievances. They were received in the di- rectors office. where they told him. with hats off and in their poitest language, of the reforms they desired to have executed. Finally. when the list of demands had been exhausttvely explained, the spokesman of the deputation. with bowed head and hands bashfully folded, said to the director: Baron we have decided to assassinate you. We hope you will not feel insuited-the men simply voted that way. We thought we ought to tell you because you might feel hurt if we had not told you beforehand Then the committee filed solemnly out of the room. and the director was left alone to take such action as he might see fit. It Is said that he laughed inoonsiderately at first. but not for long; he knew his mill hands too we'll.
 "'Those beggars are such children he said to a friend. that they are as likely as not to do just what they have voted on. I don't believe they really want to kill me, but some agitator has put them up to the job. and they think if Is the thing to do.' The director found it advisable to absent himself from the city for a time; according to the latest reports he had not yet been killed"
 A bit further on In the article the follow ing is of interest: "A striking feature of the disturbances in the Caucasus Is the mixture of races involved in them. Over ninety different dialects are spoken in this district. and probably over a score of diff ferent nationalities are represented. Many of the mountain tribes go armed the year round, and number Of sections are badly infested with robbers. Fights and robberies are frequent occurrences even in times of ordinary peace, so 1t is not difficult to i'm aRine what disorder would follow a general excitement. Rumor darkly hints that the Russian authorities urge the different races to clash--Tartars against Armenians. noun tain tribes against one another. and robbers gaInst all corners. This hardly sounds req sonable, but there Is much in Russia for which no reasonable explanation can be found that the foreign inquirer is compelled to listen to the widest stories. That which seems certain is that a number of persons are known to have been shot down both in Baku. the oil town on the Caspian, and in Batoum, on the Black Sea. How many have been killed in the hill districts the records fail to state and one seems to care.
 Indeed, except among 'revolutioners,' I have found a general apathy among the people high and low. regarding killings The peasant, of course, is not supposed to know about them unless they happen in his immediate neiGhborhood; but we would think that the Russian who can read and think. unless he Is dead to all human sen tinent would express himself somehow about the recent massacres As rule. have found that he shrugs his shoulders when the subject Is mentioned. and says. 'sh! that Is politics. and wants to talk about something else