and the body, which ached as if burned with fire. The more we struggled to get rid of our tormentors the more we opened the way to thousands more of them. On arriving at the huts of the Yakuts we kindled a great fire, which made such a smoke that it pricked the eyes and choked the breath, though we lay stretched on the earthen floor. The mosquitoes disappeared, but as soon as the smoke dispersed a little, new swarms penetrated into the hut, covering all of us thickly.'

Such is nature in these regions. Now, what are the inhabitants, and their means of protecting themselves from its rigor ? We will quote from the same authority a few lines describing the largest of these northern settlements, Sredne-Kolymsk, a "town" numbering fully 560 inhabitants. Most of them are of Russian extraction, but being for many generations isolated from all the world, and feeding exclusively on fish, they have lost the energy, industry, and versatility of Russian peasants. They are apathetic, lazy, and dull. It is considered a great sign of cleverness in a boy if he succeeds in learning to read and write in the course of eight or nine years. They know no trade, no industry, except fishing and occasionally hunting. The houses they live in can hardly be called houses, for they are badly-fitting wooden sheds, with no chimneys, because the inhabitants do not know the use of bricks. The houses are warmed with a fire lit in the middle upon the earthen floor, the smoke passing out through a big hole in the pointed roof. It is not surprising that such houses during the winter are infernally cold," to use the expression of the writer. Nothing grows, nothing can be got in these regions. Everything is imported from enormous distances, and is, therefore, exceedingly dear. Bread is sold at famine prices. Candles, soap, cotton wares, matches, are fabulously dear. "In such conditions of the market, philosophically observes this exile, one has naturally to give up bread, sugar, and the many other commodities we are accustomed to consider as indispensable for a civilized man. But fish, reindeer meat, fat, and wood for burning, can be obtained.'' (Russky Vedomosty,

These are also to be "given up" as a matter of course. Suffice it to say that the letters from Russia take six months to reach Sredne-Kolymsk. Thus the news received and the papers-supposing the exiles have money to spare for subscribing to any-are always six months old, and the post comes only three times a year.

Now let us see for what crimes scores of young, intelligent, well-educated people are exiled to these horrible places. First of all it must be remembered that, with a few exceptions we will mention later on, they are all administrative exiles, people who have never been tried at all, and never convicted of any offence. They have been exiled by order of the police on suspicion that they held dangerous opinions and were likely some day to commit some offence. What grounds for this suspicion are considered sufficient by the Russian Government for exiling people to such awful places we shall see best by a few examples. We take them from one place, Sredne-Kolymsk.

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Let us begin with Isaac Sklovsky, a journalist of Jewish extraction. He was a man of position-the editor of the Odessa Leaflet, a popular provincial paper. The charge against him was this having made the acquaintance of an Odessa revolutionist, named Dudin, who afterward. turned informer, he purchased from him two pamphlets, issued by the secret printing office, for the sum of 30 kopecks, which makes about 8d. in English coin. When a domiciliary search was made at Sklovsky's house the pamphlets were not found. But he did not deny having purchased them, and refused to disclose what he had done with them. For this offence he was kept in prison for about a year and then released on bail at the beginning of 1885, pending the decision upon his case. the summer of 1886 the decision came, and he was arrested again and marched off straight to Eastern Siberia for five years. Because he was a Jew he was sent to Sredue-Kolymsk, where he is still.

In

The case of another young Jew, Liadoff, of Riga, is still more remarkable. The reader may remember that about five years ago some notice was taken by the English Press of the arrest at Riga of a German sailor who took upon an English ship a parcel of revolutionary prints. It was this fact that brought poor Liadoff into trouble. He had a prosperous business

of some kind in Riga, and never thought of politics or revolution, when, one fine morning, he received from an unknown gentleman (the German sailor) a note requesting him to come on board a certain ship then in Riga harbor. Prompted by curiosity, Liadoff came and asked for the sailor. When they were alone the latter told him that he was in a great difficulty; he had a parcel of revolutionary pamphlets entrusted to him by a Geneva friend, but could not find the person to whom they had to be delivered at Riga. Not know ing what to do with his dangerous parcel, he wanted to know whether Liadoff would not be good enough to take care of it. Naturally, Liadoff declined, energetically saying that he had nothing to do with revolution, and expressed his amazement that the idea of applying to him could have entered the sailor's head. The latter apologized, and explained that he got Liadoff's name from his Geneva friend, who happened to have been Liadoff's schoolfellow, and thought he might be asked if he was still in Riga. The affair did not go farther. Liadoff went home without having taken one of the pamphlets. But when the sailor was arrested, Liadoff's visit on board the ship was discovered by the detectives, and he had to answer for it to the police. He explained candidly how the thing passed, and was released. This took place in October, 1885. Soon after he married, and was enjoying his honeymoon, when, in January, 1886, while he was at dinner with his young wife, a messenger came from the colonel of gendarmerie, asking him to come immediately to his office. Liadoff was on good terms with the colonel. The office was in the same street, a few doors off. Nothing suspecting, he left the table immediately just between the second course and the pudding" -as he said afterward to his companions, and went to the colonel. Here he was told that, according to a telegram from St. Petersburg, he was to be sent off to Eastern Siberia by the next train, which meant in two hours' time. It is easy to imagine the poor man's consternation. To his vehement protests and inquiries the colonel answered that he was himself exceedingly surprised at such an order, for which he was quite unable to find any plausible explanation. Liadoff begged for a respite, suggesting that there must be some error or misun

แ

As a

derstanding. The colonel said that the order was a peremptory one, but he would grant a respite if the governor of the province authorized it. The governor, who also knew Liadoff, was applied to, and fully entered into his position. He telegraphed to St. Petersburg, vouching for Liadoff's innocence, and asking whether it was not somebody else who had to be sent to Eastern Siberia. The result was an angry telegram from St. Petersburg saying that they " do not make mistakes, and reprimanding the governor for having delayed the execution of the order. Thus, after a respite of two days only, Liadoff was marched off to Eastern Siberia. Jew, he was also sent to Sredne-Kolymsk. The case of two boys in the same place, Landa and Hornstein, also Jews, who, when arrested, were-the first fifteen, the second sixteen years of age, is more shocking still. They were both studying in the Odessa gymnasium, when, in the beginning of August, 1885, a certain Fedorsher arrived in the town from Geneva. He had been slightly compromised in some carly propaganda business before he left Russia, so that on returning he had to be careful to keep out of the reach of the police. As the latter got wind of his arrival in Odessa he had to hide himself for some time in the houses of his friends, as is often the case with "illegal" people. One of these friends, not being sure that his own house was not watched by the police, had the unfortunate idea of taking Fedorsher one night to the lodgings of the two boys, who were his relatives, as the safest refuge. Of course the boys asked no questions and were satisfied with the explanation that their guest wanted simply a lodging for a night or two to avoid the expense of an hotel. Nobody thought of the possibility of the police coming to seek Fedorsher in the house of these children. But the police came on account of the boys themselves. It was rumored that in their gymnasium some sort of propaganda was afloat, and in one night 120 domiciliary visits were made to the houses of different pupils in order to discover some material proof of it. One of these visits was to Landa and Hornstein. When the police arrived the inmates were not yet in bed, and Fedorsher, on being asked who he was, explained that he was their neighbor, living a few doors off. They believed him, and he played the part he

assumed so well that the police let him go. But when his little portmanteau, which he had to leave behind, was opened a parcel of revolutionary publications was discovered in it. This was sufficient for the arrest of the two boys, though it was clearly proved that they knew nothing about it. They were kept in the Odessa prison, one of the worst in the Empire, in solitary confinement for about a year and a half, and then the police, without any trial, pronounced upon them the verdict of five years' exile to Eastern Siberia, as people dangerous to the existing order and implicated in revolutionary agitation. When the monstrous sentence was read to them, the younger of the boys, Landa, exclaimed: Поw! Am I also a revolutionist, a man dangerous to the authorities ?' '

"

At this the gendarme smiled and answered in these very words: No, certainly you are not. But you may become so some day."

We must not leave the reader under the impression that Jews alone are honored in Russia with this dreadful form of punishment. There are several born Russians among the exiles of Sredne-Kolymsk, but they have all somewhat heavier charges against them. One of them, Belousoff, was tried by an exceptional tribunal, it is true, but still tried, and condemned to exile for life in these gloomy regions for being connected with a dynamite manufacturing business; another, Victor Daniloff, though never tried, was involved in active revolutionary propaganda among the dissenting sects; the third had escaped once from Southern Siberia; the fourth was for several years the special correspondent and representative of a revolutionary paper. All these are small offences as compared with the punishment, but they are actual crimes when compared with the ridiculous charges against the Jews who share the same fate. The anti-Semitic agitation we have seen in Germany and Austria is very absurd and ridiculous, as would be the revival of some exploded superstition. But in Russia we see something worse. Here, in consequence of the personal bias of the Tzar, Alexander III., who is a fierce Jew hater, a special measure was passed in 1886, making one section of the citizens liable to heavier punishments than others for the same offences, simply because

they are of a certain race and creed. Is it not another form of religious persecution? Is it not a crying injustice, a flagrant and cynical violation of the fundamental laws of all modern States, Russia included, where the equality of all the citizens before the Tzar or his representatives stands in the written code ?

We need not mutiply our illustrations. The cases of Belousoff, Daniloff, and Miss Shmidova, a young girl of Jewish extraction, whose only offence is that she was the sweetheart of Ulianoff, the would-be Tzaricide, present the maximum of guilt; the cases of Liadoff and the two boys we have just spoken of, the minimum. All the rest of the thirty exiles in SredneKolymsk stand between.

The exiles of Verko-Yansk are in the same position as those of Sredne-Kolymsk -the same offences, or rather absence of offences, the same conditions of life.

The government of Alexander III. shows, since 1886, a decided inclination to multiply and extend the practice of administrative exile to the Arctic zone. The towns of Sredne-Kolymsk and VerkoYansk have been populated, as we have said, within the last three years. In Vilusk, a town in the same latitude, a special prison is being constructed for the unfortunate survivors of the Yakutsk massacres 1889-a fact which is unique in the his. tory of penitentiary institutions. It is reported that a project is afloat for instituting a new penal colony at Bykoff promontory, which is still farther advanced in the region of eternal ice.

of

The Russian Government has subscribed, through Galkin Vrassky, the head of the Prison Department of the Empire, to the monument to be erected to John Howard, the great reformer of European penitentiary institutions. The next International Prison Congress is to be held in St. Petersburg, and the Russian Government will certainly come forward with some plans of humanitarian improvements in its penitentiary system.

It seems to me quite opportune to draw attention to that new " improvement" of the Siberian exile system-the exile into the Arctic zone- -which is a fact, and the building of special prisons in the same region, which will be a fact before long.

I need not dwell upon the difference in the treatment of Jews and Christians, which is a monstrosity. I will only ask

-Macmillan's Magazine.

A NOTED PHILANTHROPIST.

good of others.

Mr. Childs has succeeded in

delphia: J. B. Lippincott Company.

The subject of this little work is rather a unique personage. That he is a personage is unquestionable. His reputation is more than national, it is international. Mr. Childs is not a man of great intellectual qualities, and we fancy that he makes no claim to this distinction. He has never been intimately associated with great events, except in the sense that he has been a trusted friend of great men. He has never had greatness thrust upon him, as has been the case with more than one wellknown American, nor was he born great. What, then, is the secret of the reputation which gives Mr. Childs an exceptional place in the public mind? This: He is one of the few men who, with high qualifications as a man of business, has conjoined the most extended and sympathetic benevolence; who has looked on money as a means of contributing to the welfare of his fellows. He belongs to the Peabodys, the Cases, and the Peter Coopers, the men who, like Abou Ben Adhem, have loved their fellow-men, and who care more for the love of others than for the admiration with which so many stand open-mouthed before the so-called great, those who have stunned the public mind by intellectual pyrotechnics or dazzled it by towering ambition. Whether in his relations to the men immediately in his employment or to the great outside world, the life of Mr. Childs has been that of the man who believes that either his own benefit is best served in the highest benefit of others, or that his own benefit is not to be considered in comparison with the

able means, and the spectacle of a millionaire who has reached his fortune by such manly, dignified, and reputable methods, is an interesting object lesson in an age which enjoins on its children the lesson, "Make money, honestly if possible, but make money.”

George W. Childs began life in the humblest way, and launched himself on his really active, independent career as a book publisher, in which he accomplished several notable successes, among them being Dr. Kane's Arctic Expedition, which sold an enormous number of copies. When he bought the Philadelphia Ledger that paper was by no means a valuable newspaper property, but under its proprietor's wise handling it has risen to be one of the most remunerative in the United States. The policy from the beginning was to make the Ledger a model family newspaper, in which the most moral and fastidious reader should never find anything to shock his tastes. This ideal met an immense response, and proves that a public journal, at least outside of New York, can succeed by appealing to the best and not to the worst. At an early stage in his dealings with his employés, Mr. Childs displayed the most kindly and liberal methods, and he has been not only just but often generous in his anticipations of their demands. Had all employers been moved by the same motives in dealing with wage-earners, there would not have been to-day nearly as many difficult labor problems to solve. Mr. Childs's name everywhere through the country among the printer's craft is held in the most exalted honor, and his arbitration would probably at once solve any dispute between employer and