Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1907-11-12

street of that pleasant city, by It's
squares, its gardens, and Its famous
palaces, they descended at last at tho
door of the Hotel de France! and
there they heard the fateful news
which the city itself had discussed all
! day and would discuss far into the
night.
General Trubenoff, the new director,
had been shot dead at the gate of the
arsenal that very afternoon, men said,
and the Revolutionaries were already
armed and broad. What would hap
| pen In the next few hours, heaven and
the Deputy Governor alone could tell.
| We're this not sufficiently significant.
the aspect of the great square itself
was menacing enough to awe the
imagination even of the least impress
stonable of travellers Excited crowds
| passed and repassed; Cassacks were
riding by at the gallop-even the re-
ports of distant rife shots were to lie
heard and from time to time, the
screams and curses of those upoa
whose faces and shoulders the sol
diers' whips fell so pitilessly.
In the great hall of the hotel itself
pandemonium reigned Afraid of the
streets and their homes, the wives and
daughters of many officials fed hither
as to a haven of refuge which would
never be suspected. They crowded
the passages, the staircases, the re-
ception rooms. They besieged the
officers for news Of that which befell
without. Their terrified faces e
manned a striking tribute to the
ferocity of their enemies and the
reality of the peril.
Let it be said in Justice that this
majectic spectacle Of tragedy found
Alban Kennedy well prepared to
understand its meaning Had he tod
the truth he would have said that the
mob orators Of Union street had pre-
pared him for such state of things
as he now beheld The Cossacks, were
they not the Cossaks whom old PAIL
had called "the enemies of the human
racer" The gilt-belarded generals,
| had he not seen them cast upon the
screen In England and there heard
their names with curses? Just as they
told him would be the case, SO now
he had stumbled upon autocracy face
to face with its ancient enemy, the
people. He saw the brutal Cossacks
with their puny horses and tkeirt ter
rible whips parading beneath his
balcony and treating all the poor folks
with that insolence for which they
are famous He beheld the huddlei
crowds lifting white faces to the sky
and covering before the relentless
/ lash. Not a whit had tue patriot exiles
in London exaggerated these things
Or misrepresented them. Men, and
women too, were struck down, thei.
faces rippled by the thongs their
shoulders lacerated before his very
! oil tee Il al.
aerstood, that freedom might be de-
held from her citizens. Truly had he
travelled far since he left England I,
few short days ago
Sergius Zamoyski had engaged a
handsome suite of,rooms upon the first
floor of the magnificent modern hotel
which looks doown upon the Alicia
avenue, and to these they went vt
/ once upon their arrival It was some
thing at least to escape from the ex
cited throngs below and to stand
apart. alike from the rabble and the
soldiers. Nor was the advantage If
their situation to be despised; for
; they had but to step out upon the
veranda before their sitting rooms to
command the whole prospect Of the
. avenue, and there, at their will, to be
observers of the conflict To Sergius
Zamoyski, familiar W tn such. scenes
Warsaw offered no surprises whatever
To Alban it remained city of whirl-
wind, and Of human strife and suffer.
ing beyond all imagination terrible
He would have been content to re.
main out there upon that high bal.
cony until the last trooper had ridden
, from the street and the last bitter cry
been raised. The Counts invitation
to dinner seemed grotesaue in its re
version to commonplace affairs.
Cali this is an everyday affair here
now" that young man remarked with
amazing nonchalance; "since the
workmen began to shoot the patrols
the city has had no peace. I see that
, , 1t interests you very much. You will
find 1t less amusing when you have
been in Russia for month or two
Now let us dress and dine while we
can. Those vultures down below will
not leave a bone of the carcass If We
, don't take care" s
He re-entered the sitting room and
: thence the two passed to their respec
tive dressing rooms. An obsequius
, valet offered Alban a cigarette whi.t
, he made his bath, and served glass
of an American cocktail. The superb
luxury of these apartments did MOI
' surprise the young English boy as
much as they might have done, fol-
t he had already stayed one night at al
almost equally luxurious hotel in Der
? lin and SO approached them somewha
Familiarity; but the Impression, oddl,
: conceived and incurable, that he ha,
!, no right to enjoy such luxuries ant
} was in some way an intruder, remain
. ed No one would have guessed this
! the silent valet least of all; but /.
t truth, Alban dressed shyly, afraid o
! the splendor and the richness; an.
+ his feet fell softly upon the thici
/ Persian carpets as though some on
I would spy him out presently and cry
e Here is the guest who had not tn
d wedding garment In the dinin.
Il room face, to face with the gay Count
t some of these odd ideas vanished; S
h that an observer might have name
y them material rather than personal.