Catharines Peril, or The Little Russian Girl Lost in a Forest | Page 5

ambulances. He
was just on the point of leaving this desolate spot, when, casting his eye
on a heap of corpses being covered over with earth, he noticed a Polish
officer of high rank, decorated with numerous crosses and medals. He
thought he saw some signs of animation, so he had him removed, and
carefully conveyed to the house in which Catharine then was. Once
there, every possible care was bestowed upon him. By degrees he
recovered from his lethargy, and looked around the room.
Catharine was sitting at his bedside. Suddenly she uttered a cry: she
had recognised the Polish lord Barezewski, her preserver and
benefactor.
The Count recovered from his wounds, but he had only escaped one
peril to fall into another even more terrible; his name was on the list of
proscribed persons, and the mildest punishment for this in Russia
means degradation and exile to Siberia.
Catharine no sooner discovered the fresh misfortune impending over
the noble Pole than she determined to risk everything, and obtain an
audience of the Czar Nicholas, when, falling before him, she embraced
his knees, and with tears implored him to accord the pardon of her
generous protector, Barezewski.
Nicholas, much touched by her gratitude and her earnest entreaties on
behalf of the Polish lord, graciously granted his pardon.
Perhaps some of my readers may think Catharine need not have been so
frightened at what she had to do in seeking an interview with the
Emperor; but in our highly-favoured land we can scarcely enter into her

feelings, for in Russia the sovereign is all-powerful, and, especially in
past days, political offenders, or those taking their part in any way,
were punished with the greatest severity.
I will tell you what happened during the reign of the Empress Elizabeth
to the most beautiful and delicately nurtured lady at the court of Russia,
because, poor creature, she had the misfortune to offend her imperial
mistress. She was condemned to the knout, a fearful instrument of
punishment made of a strip of hide, which is whizzed through the air by
the hangman on the bare back and neck of the hapless victim, and each
time it tears away a narrow strip of skin from the neck along the back.
These blows were repeated until the entire skin of the lady's back hung
in rags; then this woman's tongue was plucked out by the roots, and she
was at once sent off to Siberia.
What does 'sent to Siberia' imply? Worse, far, far worse than any
criminal, however vile and hardened, endures in our beloved country.
We frequently hear of persons being condemned to penal punishment
for many years, or even for life; but this is absolutely nothing compared
to being exiled to Siberia, a place where the criminals of the Russian
empire, and persons suspected of intrigues, are often sent without even
knowing the cause of their banishment.
A faint idea of what the poor unfortunate exiles have to suffer may be
gleaned from the description which follows:--'Barren and rocky
mountains, covered with eternal snows, waste uncultivated plains,
where, in the hottest days of the year, little more than the surface of the
ground is thawed, alternate with large rivers, the icy waves of which,
rolling sullenly along, have never watered a meadow or seen a flower
expand. The Government supplies some of the exiles with food, very
poor and very scanty; those whom it abandons subsist on what they
obtain by hunting. The greater number of these hapless beings reside in
the villages which border the river from Tobolsk to the boundaries of
Tschimska; others are dispersed in huts through the plains. For these
unfortunates not a single happy day exists.'
To such a state of exile and misery would the noble Polish lord have
been reduced if Nicholas had not granted Catharine's petition. This tale

shows how the eye of a tender and watchful Father is ever over the
young and unprotected. How true are these beautiful words:
'No earthly father loves like Thee; No mother, e'er so mild, Bears and
forbears as Thou hast done With me, Thy sinful child.'

THE SHABBY SURTOUT.
My reader, need you ever say, With Titus, 'I have lost a day,' When
right, and left, and all around, God's poor and needy ones are found?
[Illustration]

THE SHABBY SURTOUT.
I had taken a place on the top of one of the coaches which ran between
Edinburgh and Glasgow, for the purpose of commencing a short tour in
the Highlands of Scotland. It was in the month of June, a season when
travellers of various descriptions flock towards the Modern Athens, and
thence betake themselves to the northern or western counties, as their
business or fancy leads. As we rattled along Princes Street, I had leisure