In addition to secrecy, each conspirator bound
himself to implicit and instant obedience to Benyowsky, their chief,
and to slay each with his own hand any member of the band found guilty
of betrayal. But what gave the Pole his greatest power was his
relation to the governor. The coming of the young nobleman had caused
a flutter in the social life of the dull little fort. He had been
appointed secretary to Governor Nilow, and tutor to his children. The
governor's lady was the widow of a Swedish exile; and it took the Pole
but a few interviews to discover that wife and family favored the
exiles rather than their Russian lord. In fact, the good woman
suggested to the Pole that he {117} should prevent her sixteen-year-old
daughter becoming wife to a Cossack by marrying her himself.
The Pole's first move was to ask the governor's permission to establish
a colony of exile farmers in the south of the peninsula. The request
was granted. This created a good excuse for the gathering of the
provisions that would be needed for the voyage on the Pacific; but when
the exiles further requested a fur-trading vessel to transport the
provisions to the new colony, their design was balked by the
unsuspecting governor granting them half a hundred row boats, too frail
to go a mile from the coast.
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