The Maccabaean

I.

SEES /YENERAL DMITRI PETROFF es 2 GREGORIEFF, retired after long and I) E distinguished service to a sinecure k Ne post in Tobolsk, Western Siberia, was Yon NN one of the last survivors of the old En: cantonists and a rare example of the NN GEERN occasional success of the bold and cruel conversionist-military policy of Czar Nicholas I. The General was now in his seventy-sixth year, his health still unimpaired in spite of his numerous campaigns for the glory of the White Little Father, beginning with the Crimean War in 1852, where he served as drummer-boy, and ending with the campaigns in Manchuria in 1904. Tall, bald-headed, florid- faced, with a broad smooth-shaven chin and thick white moustache, the General presented a distinguished and stern appearance which bore out his reputation as a harsh and unrelenting disciplinarian. More than sixty-five years of Russian military life and Greek Catholic ceremonialism seemed to have stamped out every trace of his Semitic origin.

Filled with naive and genuine loyalty and love for his Monarch which amounted almost to adoration, the General had felt ill at ease in the atmosphere of corruption and cynicism which pervaded the officialdom of the Capital to which he at first had been retired. He had therefore asked for and obtained his present post in Siberia in a town small enough for his rank and station to be honorably in evidence. Here he lived a life of punctilious routine, in dignified contentment, unburdened by the duties and interests of family, for his wife had died many years before and his children had become scattered in various parts of the Empire.

The outbreak of the European War roused the old General from the state of complacent torpor into which he had sunk, and which seemed to border on senility. His soldier’s blood began to stir fitfully and the thought of danger and glory gave him no rest. He wrote an appealing letter to the Minister of War, in which he begged to be allowed to return to the colors. “It would not be just,” he wrote, “for Your Excellency to permit me to die like an old woman in my bed when my comrades have given their lives on the field for the glory of Russia.” He advanced, also, his knowledge of the German language as proof of his potential usefulness.

They went over his record, and after much deliberation, assigned him to a minor post on the staff of one of the armies operating in the south.

Early in September General Dmitri Petroff Grer- orieff joined this army which, after having captured Lemberg, proceeded to the invasion and occupation of the rest of the Austrian Province of Galicia.

II.

The small town of Wolacza in Galicia, on one of the tributaries of the Dniester, lay silent and deserted before the advance of the Russians. For an hour or two, a small detachment of Austrians with a few field-pieces had replied in a merely formal manner to the Russian bombardment and then withdrew across the stream.

Not a soul seemed left in the town when the invaders entered.

Among the officers who stopped to take up quarters in Wolocza was General Gregorieff. His orderly, a brisk young peasant with a Tartar face and large glinting teeth had entered the deserted home of one of the richest inhabitants and prepared it for his master's residence. Though most of the furnishings had been taken away by the owners in their flight, the orderly succeeded in bringing together all that was necessary for his old master's comfort.

Soon after installing himself, the General sat down before a tall mirror in a large high-ceiled room and prepared to shave his thick white-stubbled chin, an operation which he always performed himself with punctilious care and regularity.

The door at the opposite end of the room opened and, in the mirror, he saw his servant enter, half leading and half dragging a small human creature of strange appearance.

"Your Excellency," the servant saluted, "I found this person in a large building further down the street, a sort of public house. I found him hiding in the garret."

The General felt much put out by this interruption. "Why did you bring him here?" he shouted.

"Your Excellency," the orderly stammered, "I—I thought he might be a spy."

General Gregorieff laid his razor down and very heavily banged his chair right about.

The individual whom the orderly held by the collar, was draped in a long shabby coat of thin glossy material, too big for the wearer, whose hands were invisible in the sleeves. A cap of proportionate dimensions hid the upper part of his face but allowed two black thin and straggling forelocks to emerge and taper down almost to the corners of the mouth.

The General glowered both at the prisoner and the captor.

"Remove his cap!" he ordered.

The soldier seized the cap and threw it down.

Two large childish eyes, dark and frightened, stared feverishly at the General out of a small, thin and white face.

"Idiot!" the General snapped at his servant, "Don't you see it's a boy, a mere child? Take him away!"

The General's chair stamped around again towards the mirror.

Suddenly he heard the child behind him begin to weep. It sounded like some mournful chant broken by sobs and gasps.

There was a sudden and irrepressible tug at the old man's heart. Back again thumped the chair.

"Bring him here!" he shouted. "What are you weeping for? What do you want? What ails you?" he flung the questions at the boy whose sobs became convulsive in his effort to stifle them.

The General looked perplexed. Then he asked the boy, in German, and with a softer note in his voice:

“Wie heisst du?”

“Mendel,” came the sobbing answer.

"Why did they not take you out of the town?"

“Ich bin a vossem.”