between poverty and pomp.  In the abysmal void between the disappearing star and the aspiring glowworm men tramp upon, there seems to be sufficient latitude for the play of gratitude or grief.  A Napoleon exiled by the French or a Ney shot down by Frenchmen is unthinkable today.  In like manner, when the revolutionary passions of Russia have subsided, there may be men and women of the humblest estate who will wonder how it happened that their Emperor, whose darkest sin, apparently, was loyalty to Russia, could have been murdered by their countrymen in cold blood.

It will never be believed.

In reflecting on the experiments of their Revolution, finding much to be admired and more to be condemned, they will not accept without resentment an accusation from posterity that they lacked both gratitude and pity when the test of national manhood came.  In exculpation of such an imputation they will doubtless reverence the tradition of a House that fell only with the ruins of their native land.  Viewing as they may the fragments of their once majestic Empire annexed to alien States in compensation of successful perfidy and neglect, they will lament the lot of Nicholas II while reflecting on their fate.  If their democracy shall survive their own self-amputation, the lightness of their governmental burdens will stimulate the flow of mercy through their social institutions and direct their thoughts toward pity for the useless sacrifice.

In simple justice, therefore, “Rescuing the Czar” is offered in extenuation of this doubtful charge against the entire Russian race.  For nothing is better calculated to sanctify a martyrdom and make a race abhorred than a belief in its injustice.  Nothing is more potent to dissolve a race and scatter its suspected members from the altar of their fathers than the fable of their unrepentant hostility to the cry of Mercy from the sacrificial Ikon.  Nothing so quickly exposes their abandoned fields to the tramp of hostile feet and the subjugation of their soil.  Ambitious rivalry has no better ally than unexplained suspicion.

If “Rescuing the Czar” does no more than set at rest the fable of the “Romanoff Execution,” it will have done its work by characterizing the source and methods and objects of its inspiration.  If it raises the presumption of generosity in quarters generally subject to suspicion, it will be equally praiseworthy for expelling the darkness that has always hovered around Imperial thrones.  If it does nothing but portray the dignified composure of Russian womanhood in the presence of unspeakable affronts, it will have justified its publication by adding to the diadem of virtue a few more jewels to glorify the crest of motherhood.  If it performs no other service than to place upon the pale face of tragic possibility the red-pink blush of romantic probabilities, it will have justified its presence in the society of the learned by the sincerity of its purpose and the candor of its appeal to the conscience of the world.