DEPOSITION OF NADIEJDA YAKOVLEVNA.

Nadiejda Yakovlevna is twenty-one years of age. She confessed frankly that she had loved, and still loved passionately the cornet Semenov, but assured me that no intimacy had existed between them, and that the cornet was even ignorant of the passion he had inspired. She said the soldier Tsaryna had paid his court to her, and not being able to obtain her love had sworn to her that he would revenge himself upon the one who had obtained it. At first his suspicions rested on Hortinja, and he said he would soon get rid of the old rascal. Some time after he came to her and said, “Harken, Nadiejda! be mine, or I swear by St. Nicholas thou shalt witness the death of Semenov.” She cared little for his threats, knowing him to be a coward. About this time the cornet left Trehmiria. Tsaryna renewed his declarations, but still without success. Before setting out for Kostroma, he said, “The old one will do what I have threatened; before I return I will be revenged, I swear it by St. Nicholas.” She had never heard Hortinja threaten the life of the cornet; he was sad and melancholy—he even wept, but he was a man incapable of committing a crime unless provoked to it.

This is her account of the night in which she saved the cornet:

“I had a presentiment which oppressed my heart; before I lay down I found a cat upon my bed. A bad sign! As soon as I fell asleep I had horrible dreams. I awoke and cried out, ‘Wo to me!’ My father then ordered me to go upon the Volga and draw away the nets; there I heard cries, and thought I recognised the voice of Semenov. It was more than a year since I had seen him, and I knew him in spite of the obscurity. I rowed towards his boat, and as I neared it, I heard the splash of a body thrown into the water. Fortunately, I was close by and succeeded in drawing him out of the river. It was Semenov.”

The inquiry was completed by a few other declarations of less consequence.

The Armenian merchant tried to excuse himself, and said that he endeavored to save the two men in order that they might have time for repentance. In other things he confirmed what Hortinja had said.

The fisherman Yakov gave an account of the manner in which Tsaryna had threatened him, because he would not give him his daughter.

The inquiry terminated on the thirteenth of May, and the depositions were on the same day laid before the criminal tribunal of Novogorod by the captain Isprawnik.

On the twenty-ninth of May the tribunal pronounced the decree which condemns:

Paul Ivanovitch Hortinja to perpetual banishment in Siberia, and ten years labor in the mines.

Jerome Smilabej, Armenian merchant, to one year and six days imprisonment, a fine of one thousand rubles, and the costs.

Pierre A. Tsaryna, being a soldier, was sent before the military tribunal.

On the fourth of June, the military tribunal of the first corps of the army, assembled at Novogorod, condemned Pierre A. Tsaryna to pass three times through the rods of a squadron, and afterwards to be transported to Siberia, where he must labor in the mines for the rest of his life.

These decrees have been submitted to the emperor, and confirmed by him with this change: Hortinja is perpetually banished, but will not be obliged to labor in the mines.

On the third of June, the decree was executed on Pierre A. Tsaryna, who was so severely beaten that there is little hope of his recovery; he has been taken to the hospital of Novogorod.

L’Abeille du Nord, a Russian journal of St. Petersburg, reached us at the same time with the letter of our correspondent. It gives an account of this affair, and also adds that the emperor has deigned to decorate the girl Nadiejda with a medal of gold on the ribbon of Saint Waldimir.

The Cornet Semenov married Nadiejda Yakovlevna as soon as the trial was concluded.