heir idiotic glaring
get-up, or else from stupidity or carelessness--again these miserable men
have destroyed amid dreadful sufferings thousands of those honorable,
kind, hard-working laborers who feed them. And again this iniquity not
only does not cause those responsible for it to reflect and repent, but
one hears and reads only about its being necessary as speedily as
possible to mutilate and slaughter a greater number of men, and to ruin
still more families, both Russian and Japanese.
More than this, to prepare men for fresh iniquities of this kind, the
perpetrators of these crimes, far from recognizing what is evident to
all--viz. that for the Russians this event, even from their patriotic,
military point of view, was a scandalous defeat--endeavor to assure
credulous people that these unfortunate Russian laboring men--lured into
a trap like cattle into a slaughterhouse, of whom several thousands have
been killed and maimed merely because one General did not understand what
another General had said--have performed an act of heroism because those
who could not run away were killed and those who did run away remained
alive. As to the fact that one of these immoral and cruel men,
distinguished by the titles of Generals, Admirals, drowned a quantity of
peaceful Japanese, this is also described as a great and glorious act of
heroism, which must gladden the hearts of Russians. And in all the papers
are reprinted this awful appeal to murder:--
"Let the two thousand Russian soldiers killed on the Yalu, together with
the maimed _Retvisan_ and her sister ships, with our lost torpedo-boats,
teach our cruisers with what devastation they must break in upon the
shores of base Japan. She has sent her soldiers to shed Russian blood,
and no quarter should be afforded her. Now one cannot--it is sinful--be
sentimental; we must fight; we must direct such heavy blows that the
memory of them shall freeze the treacherous hearts of the Japanese. Now
is the time for the cruisers to go out to sea to reduce to ashes the
towns of Japan, flying as a dreadful calamity along its shores. No more
sentimentality."
The frightful work commenced is continued. Loot, violence, murder,
hypocrisy, theft, and, above all, the most fearful fraud--the distortion
of religious teachings, both Christian and Buddhistic--continue. The
Tsar, the chief responsible person, continues to review the troops, to
thank, reward, and encourage them; he issues an edict fo
|