. Siberia and the exile system. procureur then referred to the personnel of the revolution-ary party, and asked who were these people that had gratuitouslytaken it upon themselves to reconstruct society and change thewhole order of things. He showed that, with a few exceptions,they were mere boys — often minors. The average age of theaccused in the Ishutin case, for example, was only twenty-two anda half years, and in the Nechaief case only twenty-three and a half,while the average age of the forty-nine political offenders tried bycourt-martial up to that time in Kiev was only twenty-four and
. Siberia and the exile system. procureur then referred to the personnel of the revolution-ary party, and asked who were these people that had gratuitouslytaken it upon themselves to reconstruct society and change thewhole order of things. He showed that, with a few exceptions,they were mere boys — often minors. The average age of theaccused in the Ishutin case, for example, was only twenty-two anda half years, and in the Nechaief case only twenty-three and a half,while the average age of the forty-nine political offenders tried bycourt-martial up to that time in Kiev was only twenty-four and ahalf years. The level of their education was extremely low. Outof all the political prisoners brought before the Kiev court-martial,not one had been graduated from the higher educational institu- THE CHAEACTEE OF POLITICAL EXILES 443 tions, and only eight [two of them women] had even completed thecourse of study of the middle-class schools. The remaining forty-one either had not been at school at all, or had not been gradu-. ated. The degree of maturity at which their opinions had arrivedwas also very low, as might be seen from their publications andfrom their declarations in the court-room, while their knowledge ofthe Russian people was limited for the most part to an acquain- 444 SIBERIA tance with the waiters in trahtirs [public tea-houses] The procureur then passed on to the question of the real object ofRussian socialism, showed how that object was made evident bythe actions of the party, and cited a surprising number of attemptson the part of socialists to appropriate the goods of others. Hereferred to a long list of such cases brought to light in connectionwith previous political trials, beginning with that of Ishutin, andcalled the attention of the court to the fact that the victims of thecrimes of the socialists included even their own comrades. Fromall that he had previously said the procureur then drew the follow-ing conclusions: 1. That the welfare of the people
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