I happened to see the four assassins of Alexander II. driven
through the streets of Petrograd on their way to execution. They
were seated in chairs on large tumbrils, with their backs to the
horses. Each one had a placard on his, or her breast, inscribed
"Regicide" ("Tsaryubeeyetz" in Russian). Two military brass bands,
playing loudly, followed the tumbrils. This was to make it
impossible for the condemned persons to address the crowd, but the
music might have been selected more carefully. One band played the
well-known march from Fatinitza. There was a ghastly incongruity
between the merry strains of this captivating march and the
terrible fate that awaited the people escorted by the band at the
end of their last drive on earth. When the first band rested, the
second replaced it instantly to avoid any possibilities of a
speech. The second band seemed to me to have made an equally
unhappy selection of music. "Kaiser Alexander," written as a
complimentary tribute to the murdered Emperor by a German
composer, is a spirited and tuneful march, but as "Kaiser
Alexander" was dead, and had been killed by the very people who
were now going to expiate their crime, the familiar tune jarred
horribly.
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