Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 41, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 June 1886 — Human Life in Russia. [ARTICLE]

Human Life in Russia.

On the Russian frontier it once happened that an officer was playing at cards with a friend, when a Jew was trying to smuggle himself into the Russian Empire without proper vise of his passport. The sentinel on guard arrested him and reported to the officer. “AU right,” said he. Hours afterward the sentinel again asked what die was to do with the Jew. The Captain, furious at being interrupted, shouted, “Why, the Jew! Hang him!” The Captain went on playing until the morning, when, suddenly remembering the prisoner, he called the soldier and said, “Bring in the Jew.” “The Jew!” said the amazed soldier; “but I hanged him, as you ordered.” “What!” said the Captain, “you have committed murder.” He arrested him, and the judgment—death—went up to the Emperor. Inquiring, before signing so serious a document, and learning how matters stood, the Emperor decided that the soldier who, without reasoning, had implicitly obeyed so extraordinary an order of his superior, was to be made a Corporal; that the officer who, while on duty, for the sake of gambling had given the murderous order, was to be sent to Siberia, and that his pay was to go to the family of the poor Jew who had been so iniquitously murdered.