he reports that have
lately appeared in the local papers of the melancholy and terrible
days of the last pogrom, there have very often been indications that
among the instigators of the pogrom who were paid and organised by the
police--the dregs of society, consisting of drunkards, tramps,
souteneurs, and hooligans from the slums--thieves were also to be
found. At first we were silent, but finally we considered ourselves
under the necessity of protesting against such an unjust and serious
accusation, before the face of the whole of intellectual society. I
know well that in the eye of the law we are offenders and enemies of
society. But imagine only for a moment, gentlemen, the situation of
this enemy of society when he is accused wholesale of an offence which
he not only never committed, but which he is ready to resist with the
whole strength of his soul. It goes without saying that he will feel
the outrage of such an injustice more keenly than a normal, average,
fortunate citizen. Now, we declare that the accusation brought against
us is utterly devoid of all basis, not merely of fact but even of
logic. I intend to prove this in a few words if the honourable
committee will kindly listen."

"Proceed," said the chairman.

"Please do ... Please ..." was heard from the barristers, now
animated.

"I offer you my sincere thanks in the name of all my comrades. Believe
me, you will never repent your attention to the representatives of our
... well, let us say, slippery, but nevertheless difficult,
profession. 'So we begin,' as Giraldoni sings in the prologue to
_Pagliacci_.

"But first I would ask your permission, Mr. Chairman, to quench my
thirst a little... Porter, bring me a lemonade and a glass of English
bitter, there's a good fellow. Gentlemen, I will not speak of the
moral aspect of our profession nor of its social importance. Doubtless
you know better than I the striking and brilliant paradox of Proudhon:
_La propriete c'est le vol_--a paradox if you like, but one that has
never yet been refuted by the sermons of cowardly bourgeois or fat
priests. For instance: a father accumulates a million by energetic and
clever exploitation, and leaves it to his son--a rickety, lazy,
ignorant, degenerate idiot, a brainless maggot, a true parasite.
Potentially a million rubles is a million working days, the absolutely
irrational right to labour, sweat, life, and blood of a terrible
number of men. Why? What is the ground of rea