Life — May 30, 1889 — page 9: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

ALEXANDER Ill, WHes the late Alexander Nicolaievitch was suddenly removed from conducting the old established busi- ness of being Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russias, the ill-will and fixtures of the business descended to his son Alexander Alexandrovitch, commonly known as Alexander IIL, and addressed by his intimate associates as ‘Smart Aleck.” This last title is derived from the agility he has displayed in dodging the bombs of the Nihilists, and in skipping over the mines laid for his destruction. Alexander early displayed a strong military leaning, and at the early age of six weeks insisted on being made the colonel of several regiments, He was gratified in this am- bition, and was promptly fitted out with the appropriate uniforms by the court tailor, Later on he became en- gaged to the sister of the Princess of Wales, and, having secured her father's consent, married her. It took Alexan- der two years after his father's assassination to get up the nerve to be crowned ; but he finally screwed up his courage and went through the ceremony in 1883, The Russians, owing to the fact that the principal fune- tion of the Russian Government is exiling people to Siberia, have conceived an unreasonable dislike for the ruling family, and never permit them to suffer from exnui, The little surprises, in the way of bombs and mines, to which Alexander is occasionally subjected, are planned and car- ried out by an energetic association of ladies and gentle- men known as Nihilists, so called from their anxiety to reduce the Russian Emperor to nothing by the aid of dynamite. ‘They have the bad taste to sympathize with wives and mothers whose innocent husbands and sons have been torn from them, imprisoned, tortured, and exiled, and to evi- dence their sympathy, see to it that Alexander's life is never dull, They arrange so that he is never sure whether his morning cocktail is flavored with Angostura bitters or nitro- glycerine. They make it necessary for him to go about in felt slippers, lest he accidentally explode a mine. Potato croquettes were formerly his favorite delicacy, but the sight of one now gives him a nervous attack on account of its resemblance to a bomb. ‘The people of Russia want a constitutional government, LIFE'S GALLERY OF BEAUTIES. No. 20. THE CZAR OF RUSSIA. and the Nihilists have taken it in hand to see that Alexander doesn’t have much fun until the people get their constitution, It is said that Alexander's own constitution is suffering under this treatment, but so far he has shown no signs of yielding to the pressure. He is also said to be growing cross-eyed from trying to watch Bismarck and Constantinople at the same time. On the tenth of March, Alexander celebrated his thirty-fourth birthday by going down into a bomb-proof sub-cellar and reading a copy of Lire. This is the first enjoyment he has known since his father's removal; but even this was somewhat marred by mysterious sounds beneath the boiler-plate floor, afterwards learned to have been caused by a rat, Owing to the peculiar style of the Russian calendar, Alexander was really thirteen days late in celebrating his birthday, but . + + “THIS 1S TRUTH THE POET SINGS, he had just as good a time. The announcement of Alexander's death may be THAT A SORROW'S CROWN OF SORROW IS REMEMPERING — found in another column, for his jovi is likely to come to an end HAPPIER THINGS,” at any moment, comicbooks.com