Memoirs of a Revolutionist

his mission to Alexander Alexándrovich, who had been appointed to superintend the rearming of the army. During this interview, the Tsarevich, giving full vent to his violent temper, began to scold the officer, who probably replied with dignity, whereupon the prince fell into a real fit of rage, insulting the officer in bad language. The officer, who belonged to that type of self-respecting but very loyal men who are frequently met with amongst the Swedish nobility in Russia, left at once, and wrote a letter in which he asked the heir apparent to apologize within twenty-four hours, adding that if the apology did not come, he would shoot himself. It was a sort of Japanese duel. Alexander Alexándrovich sent no excuses, and the officer kept his word. I saw him at the house of a warm friend of mine, his intimate friend, when he was expecting every minute to receive the apology. Next morning he was dead. The Tsar was very angry with his son, and ordered him to follow the hearse of the officer to the grave. But even this terrible lesson did not cure the young man of his Romanov haughtiness and impetuosity.

Part III

Siberia

I

In the middle of May, 1862, a few weeks before our promotion, I was told one day by the captain to make up the final list of the regiments which each of us intended to join. We had the choice of all the regiments of the Guard, which we could enter with the first officer’s grade, and of the Army with the third grade of lieutenant. I took a list of our form and went the rounds of my comrades. Everyone knew well the regiment he was going to join, most of them already wearing in the garden the officer’s cap of that regiment.

“Her Majesty’s Cuirassiers,” “The Body Guard Preobrazhénsky,” “The Horse Guards,” were the replies which I inscribed.

“But you, Kropotkin? The artillery? The Cossacks?” I was asked on all sides. I could not stand these questions, and at last, asking a comrade to complete the list, I went to my room to think once more over my final decision.

That I should not enter a regiment of the Guard, and give my life to parades and court balls, I had settled long ago. My dream was to enter the university⁠—to study, to live the student’s life. That meant, of course, to break entirely with my father, whose ambitions were quite different, and to rely for my living upon what I might earn by means of lessons. Thousands of Russian students live in that way, and such a life did not frighten me in the least. But how should I get over the first steps in that life? In a few weeks I should have to leave the school, to don my own clothes, to have my own lodging, and I saw no possibility of providing even the little money which would be required for the most modest start. Then, failing the university, I had been often thinking of late that I could enter the artillery academy. That would free me for two years from the drudgery of military service, and, besides the military sciences, I could study mathematics and physics. But the wind of reaction was blowing, and the officers in the academies had been treated during the previous winter as if they were schoolboys; in two academies they had revolted, and in one of them they had left in a body.

My thoughts turned more and more toward Siberia. The Amúr region had recently been annexed by Russia; I had read all about that Mississippi of the East, the mountains it pierces, the subtropical vegetation of its tributary, the Usurí, and my thoughts went further⁠—to the tropical regions which Humboldt had described, and to the great generalizations of Ritter, which I delighted to read. Besides, I reasoned, there is in Siberia an immense field for the application of the great reforms which have been made or are coming: the workers must be few there, and I shall find a field of action to my tastes. The worst was that I should have to separate from my brother Alexander; but he had been compelled to leave the University of Moscow after the last disorders, and in a year or two, I guessed (and guessed rightly), in one way or another we should be together. There remained only the choice of the regiment in the Amúr region. The Usurí attracted me most; but, alas! there was on the Usurí only one regiment of infantry Cossacks. A Cossack not on horseback⁠—that was too bad for the boy that I still was, and I settled upon “the mounted Cossacks of the Amúr.”

This I wrote on the list, to the great consternation of all my comrades. “It is so far,” they said, while my friend Daurov, seizing the Officers’ Handbook, read out of it, to the horror of all present: “Uniform, black, with a plain red collar without braids; fur bonnet made of dog’s fur or any other fur; trousers, gray.”

“Only look at that uniform!” he exclaimed. “Bother the cap!⁠—you can wear one of wolf or bear fur; but think only of the trousers! Gray, like a soldier of the Train!” The consternation reached its climax after that reading.

I joked as best I could, and took the list to the captain.

“Kropotkin must always have his joke!” he cried. “Did I not tell you that the list must be sent to the grand duke today?”

Astonishment and pity were depicted on his face when I told him that the list really stated my intention.

However, next day, my resolution almost gave way when I saw how Klasóvsky took my decision. He had hoped to see me in the university, and had given me lessons in Latin and Greek for that purpose; and I did not dare to tell him what really prevented me from entering the university: I know that if I