Los Angeles herald., 1909-05-17


any circumstances. The horror of cap
ital punishment is great when it falls
to the lot of courageous and hohest
people, whose only guilt is their excess
of love and the sense of righteousness
In such instances conscience reVolts
But the rope is still more horrible When
1t forms the moose around the HechS VI
weak and ignorant people. And, now
ever strange it may appear l look VIII VIII
a lesser grief and suffering upon the
execution of the revolutonlsts, sucl as
Werner and Musya, than upon tIe
strang1ing of ignorant murderers, ms
erable in mind and heart, IKE 1ansoii
and Tsiganok Even the last mao noI-
ror Of inevitably approaching eNecutlot5 'I
Werner can offset by his ennghleHeu
mind and his iron will, and Musya py
her nuritv and her innocence. But
how are the weak and sinful to race II
ig not in madness, with the most Nlo.
lent shock to the very foundatlon Vi
their souls? And these people now
that the government has steadled It's
bends through its experience with the
revolutionists, are pelhg So So
throughout Russian some places one
at a time: in others ten at once
Russia. in common with many other
F,uropean countries, abollshed cdplIai
punishment long ago. making, hoWeN
the CnaTdClellSLlt GAA0pNACAi ~
convicted of political crimes, ana an
authority reports recently that this eX-
ception has been construed OF ldte SO
1iherallv that within the nrst SIX
months of 1906 no fewer than IzoO exc
cutions occurred without trial III lne
Iettish region alone. AS AhdreyeN
bimself tells us: "Children at play
nr,,,1e ,Inon badlv buried bodies. and the
crowds which gather look with horror
unon the peasants' boots that are SUCK
inc out of the ground. prosecutors
Who have witnessed these executions
are becoming insane and are taken
away to the hospitals, While the peopie
are being hangedIbelhs haIseu' ,;+,,
We'll NAV Tolstoy, gazing Win
vearied eyes at the tragedy OF modern
life saw that the whole trouble with
us lies in this-that the world mas
suddenly grown savage" A reVersloh
4o nrinoitiye barbarism, largely due to
the determination of governments 10
repress, by all and every means lhe
rising aspirations of their peoples
Andreyev, reputed today as the mos
nopular writer in Russia. gave the
world recently in "Red Laughter the
horror of the struggle with Japan IN
particular and of war in general as
few pens have written it. But in Inc
seven Who Were Hanged" he has dealt
In a manner peculiarly Russian with
the taking of life by the state IN Its
coIdest and most deliberate mood, and
in this he probably has reached the
height of his achievement.
Dedicated to ToIstoy
The book is dedicated to Tolstoy,
the hierarch of the ages protest against
violence; the translation, by a Ger
man. is also dedicated to Tolstoy; IL
has been published in English by an
;s in this
country Truly a type of the modern
Internationally of thought and the
Worldwide republic of letters!
Recently I was present at lecture
in which Professor Baumgardt threw
on the canvas some wonderful repro
ductions of works by modern Russian
artists, with the remark that RUSSIA
was evolving the greatest of all schools
of painting In literature We Amerl- |
cans for the most part are familiar only
with the colossal figure of Tolstoy, ana
perhaps that of Turgenef, but students
are well aware that an army of eX-
traordinary writers has moved to the
front and is giving us views on life
that we get from no other source. In
Los Angeles we have had lately, with
the appearance of Nazimova, a glimpse
of the genius to which in other lines
the struggles of a great nation are Civ
ing birth.
I believe in the "via crucis' at our
present stage Of development. To me
the uniformly successful career is the
most profitless of failures; the long
prosperous society a stumbling block to
progress, the nation without history
of grief a barren study. From King
Lear on his throne we get only banali-
ties; but to Lear shOrn of power and
friends, facing the pitiless storm upon
the heath, we owe some of the most
pregnant utterances of Shakespeare.
From such a country as Switzerland,
fat with the profits of the wealthy tour
list, this generation is getting nothing
but hideously bourgeois sentiment. but
from Russia. in her agony, we are re-
ceiving a flood of thought that will be
of incaIculable value to the world in its
wrestle with vital, worldwide prob
lens. Just as from the downfall of
Witte, and the elaborate protective pol
icy that he so laboriously built up, we
shall finally learn the great historic
lesson that will give the death blow to
our own tariff swndle; so from the
atrocities of the Russian government,
and the profound mental revolt they
have engendered, will the world finally
learn the futility of violence as a cure,
and rest its faith in the still small voice
of reason 1t must be so. 1t is only
those who themselves have suffered
deeply who can sympathize with and,
therefore, understand pain.
Profound Psychological Study
1.-The Seven Who Were Hanged" is
essentially a Russian book. That is to
say, a psychological study. The writer
passes over in silence such physical SUI
perflcialties as the scene at the scat
fold; the pinioning of the arms; the
adjusting of the moose. The real man
is his mind, and it is in the mind, dur
ing the days that intervene between
sentence and execution, that the true
tragedy takes place.
The story begins with the discovery
of the plot against the life of an OBJ
noXious minister. He is warned in
time, and with the warning he expert
ences at first a sensation of pleasant
excitement. 1t is as if he had been
specially honored by being singled out
for attack. But with the night-the
night passed i'm a strange palace to
which he had gone for safety-other
mental images arise. Death, which as
a chronic invalid he had been con-
stantly Tending off, suddenly draws
strangely near; it stands in the corner
of the room and will not go away-it
cannot go away, "even as an obedient
sentinel stationed on guard by a su-
perior's will and order" The minister
PAGES the floor i'm profound agitation:
he recalls how men of even greater em-
inence than himself have been marked
for slaughter, and finally he falls in an