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The elder Drentell was not merely the civil Governor of Kief he was also one of the Generals appointed by the Czar with unlimited power to punish the guilty; with the right to exile all persons whose stay he might consider prejudicial to public welfare; to imprison at discretion; to suppress or suspend any journal, and to take all measures that he might deem necessary for public safety.
The metropolitan bishop of Ephesus, who was sent with these presents, was authorized, in the name of the church and of the empire, to place the crown upon the brow of Monomaque in gorgeous coronation in the cathedral church of Kief, and to proclaim Monomaque Emperor of Russia. This crown, called the golden bonnet of Monomaque, is still preserved in the Museum of Antiquities at Moscow.
As he cautiously approached Kief, he left his army in a secluded encampment, and with a few chosen troops floated down the stream in barges, disguised as merchant boats.
The drive of a few weeks, with many loiterings for pleasure in the cities on the way, took them to Kief on the Dnieper. This ancient city, the residence of the grand dukes of Russia, contained a population of about twenty-six thousand.
An insurrection was excited in Kief, the populace besieged the palace, and the king saved his life only by a precipitate abandonment of his capital. The military mob pillaged the palace and proclaimed their chieftain, Vseslaf, king. Ysiaslaf fled to Poland.
The poor proprietor was forced to accompany the rioters to his wine cellar, where they amused themselves staving in the barrels and breaking the bottles, while some of the drunken ruffians in the rooms above cut the throats of his wife and six children. It was the first blood shed in Kief and it served to stimulate the appetites of the vampires. Onward sped the rioters.
Kief now contains over twenty thousand Jews, whereas I am confident that the ancient laws limit the population to less than one-half that number. They have systematically robbed and plundered the gentiles and by their wiles defrauded the poorer classes. They control the trade in intoxicants and the vast quantities drunk by the moujiks pass through the hands of the Jews.
His body was conveyed in a canoe to Kief, and buried with much funeral pomp in the church of Notre Dame, by the side of the beautiful monument which had been erected to the memory of Vlademer. Ysiaslaf expunged from the Russian code of laws the death penalty, and substituted, in its stead, heavy fines.
It is for your safety I fear most, Joseph, and I advise you to absent yourself from Kief for some time at least, until this affair has been forgotten." "Never!" cried Joseph, bravely, "I have but done my duty and I will abide the consequences. To leave Kief would be to abandon the promising career I have mapped out for myself; besides, Kathinka may again require my assistance. I shall remain."
There was a melancholy pleasure in recalling the trials they had experienced, contrasted with which their present security was all the more comforting. Mordecai Winenki related with tears in his eyes how he saved his wife's honor by a hasty flight from home, and how he arrived in Kief just in time for the Pesach festival.
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