THE ENDING OF A RUSSIAN'S ENGAGEMENT.

Press, Volume LI, Issue 8780, 28 April 1894, Page 9

THE ENDING OF A RUSSIAN'S ENGAGEMENT.

A TRUE STORY. Did I mention love letters? Yes, my friend, once love letters were sent to nie. I dreamt: but suddenly, almost as soon as it was begun, my dream ended.

I have told you somewhat of my former political life, but ia ISo4, I deserted it altoxsther. I took but little iuterest iv passing events for the simple reason I had lesrnt to love.

Ie was in & country house near jMoscotsthat I first Mari.i Suba. the daughter aad luuress of Counc Saba, who took no iuteresi whatever in politics, and lived i:i close retirement. More occupied, indeod, was he with his than with the wrongs of the people, and soon it came to pass that Marie Suba and myself wen* engaged to be married. In f.ict the day was fixed, when business called mc to Petersburg, aud then I bid her "au revoiv."

"An revoir," y.h« cried after ms, as the sleigh bore mc away ever the snow. Her sweet word-s mingled with the tinkle of the bells Mien, mid have oft-eu echocii in my ears since. I never saw he."' more.

Three nights afterwards there was a ball in the'eity. Count Suba and his daughter were there without a. thought in their minds that they were under suspicion, or that they had incurred fches euuiity of those in the high places of the state. But enemies they had. In the midst of the festivity, Marie looking her loveliest and dancing merrily, the father was summoned, and then the girl herself; the two were arrested on. the charge of complicity in a Nihilist plot, of which they had never even heard, and were forced into a droschky and carried to the Kremlin Casements. They were refused permission to change their ballroom attire, but were hurried, the girl in her white satin dancing shoes, across the snow-covered prison yard into the bitter cold and dreariness of those infamous prison cells. The next transport to Siberia was to go in a fortnight, and so they passed those two bitter winter weeks wichin the stone walls of ths casements.

The transport arrived. The father and daughter were chained together, and it was decreed thas they were to complete their journey en foot. On foot aud in that weather!—it was the doom of death. Not far bad they to go. Iv the Chal<aa Pass, where the pent up wiucls of the North whistle through the Ural Mountains, the girl—she was but seventeen —fell to the ground lifeless. The father, while they severed the chain that bound him to tho corpse of his loved one. stooped down to give a parting kiss. A Co3-»ack rode up to him and shoe him dead, on the plea that he had delayed the transport. So father aud daughter by a barbarous mercy wens allowed to lie together in death. The snow, kindly covering, served them for a winding nheet. ■ The Czar's Government adorned the Count's murderer with the Cross of St George, the reward bestowed in recognition of valour in the field. The Czar's favourite took possession of the murdered Count's estates. It was but an incident in the list of Russian tyranuies, but I was left loveless. Thus it is that I still remember she said " Au revoir." Hotspur.