SUICIDAL FANATICISM IN RUSSIA. 



445 



abandoned drunkard and loafer. He was led to enter by the will of 

 his mother and sister, not by his own. It appears almost certain that 

 the second party did not know of the interment of the first party. 

 Vitalia enforced strict secrecy. 



On the, 5th of February Vitalia and six others were arrested on a 

 formal charge of not having passports, in coifnection with their refusal 

 to comply with the census and registration. When imprisoned they all 

 refused to eat or drink. They refused all gifts of food, saying that 

 their religion required them to earn their subsistence entirely by the 

 labor of their own hands. They persisted in this course for four days, 

 and it appears that they would have committed suicide in this way, but 



Theodoke Kovaleif. 



they were released and put under house arrest with police supervision. 

 Some rumor of the interments got out and the excitement in the 

 sect grew more intense, being mixed with doubt and some uncertainty 

 as to the right of what had been done. On the night of February 12 

 the third party was buried. It consisted of four women who entreated 

 Theodore to dig the grave for them. He did so and lifted his sister 

 down into it, she being too weak from the recent prison starvation to 

 descend into it. I'his was a large grave. The women lay close together 

 at the bottom. Theodore threw the earth first on their feet, then on 



