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Cornell University Library 
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 Russia under Alexander III 
 
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JiUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
RUSSIA 
 
 UNDER ALEXANDER III, 
 
 AND IN THE PRECEDING PERIOD 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN OF H. VON SAMSON-HIMMELSTIERNA 
 
 J. MORRISON, M.A. 
 
 EDITED, WITH EXPLANATORY NOTES AND AN INTRODUCTION, 
 
 FELIX VOLKHOVSKY 
 
 MACMILLAN AND CO. 
 1893 
 
UNIVLRO'fY' 
 LIBRARY 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 I. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 ALEXANDER III. AS TSAREVICH I 
 
 II. 
 ALEXANDER III. AS ABSOLUTE RULER . . . .12 
 
 in. 
 
 THE EMPRESS AND HER SURROUNDINGS . . . .21 
 
 IV. 
 THE SMALL COURTS 29 
 
 V. 
 PERSONALITIES OF THE COURT AND THE STATE . . 37 
 
 VI. 
 VON GIERS 43 
 
 VII. 
 
 POBYEDONOSTSEV AS MINISTER 53 
 
 I* 
 
vi CONTENTS. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 SECRET POLICE 
 
 PAGE 
 62 
 
 IX. 
 
 THE NECESSITY OF KNOWING RUSSIA . . . -74 
 
 X. 
 MISDOINGS OF THE CLERGY 86 
 
 XI. 
 FINLAND • • 95 
 
 XII. 
 THE AKSAKOV FAMILY 1 33 
 
 XIII. • 
 M. N. KATKOV ' . .182 
 
 XIV. 
 ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS I9I 
 
 XV. 
 KRAYEEVSKY AND BYELINSKY 250 
 
 XVI. 
 RUSSIAN PIONEERS 277 
 
 APPENDIX .287 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 The amount of information circulating among the 
 English about the phenomena of Russian life is so 
 sparse and so out of proportion to the increasing 
 interest in the subject, that every new book concerning 
 Russia should call forth special attention from the 
 English public, especially if it gives information which 
 cannot be derived from any other source. And so it 
 is, undoubtedly, with the present volume. Characters 
 — both official and unofficial — of the most different 
 types, positions, and activity, pass before the reader 
 in vivid pictures. The Tsar with his surroundings ; 
 Pobyedonostsev, that evil spirit of the present 
 Russian Government; the original Aksakov family, 
 together with other old Slavophils; the Liberal land- 
 owner, statesman, and agitator Koshelev; the founder 
 of Russian Radicalism Byelinsky, who, though dead, is 
 still living; Krayeevsky, the typical representative of 
 business abilities, a figure without which Russian 
 life of our day would be not fully represented, — all 
 
viii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 these profiles, so strikingly different from one another, 
 show to the foreigner the variety of Russian life. 
 The author touches among other matters upon 
 clerical misdoings and the secret police, and gives a 
 very good sketch of Finland. In many cases we 
 cannot share his point of view. Yet it is perhaps as 
 well that he holds those views, as they spur him to 
 get hold of facts not generally known, and to make 
 some interesting revelations, while on the other hand 
 his attitude towards the burning question of Pan- 
 slavism furnishes us with the opportunity of discuss- 
 ing it at some length on a basis which, we believe, is 
 not usual in the English press. 
 
 The present volume is not a full, translation of 
 von Samson-Himmelstierna's book, but a collection 
 of sketches selected from it, a large part of the 
 original work being of no value to the English reader. 
 For from that part no knowledge of Russian life or 
 history is to be gained, and if it is characteristic 
 of anything, it is of the author himself, who is a 
 curiously pronounced specimen of an " Ostsee 
 Junker," a devout Roman Catholic who sees only the 
 brilliant side of Catholicism, and a " patriot " of the 
 type that would have nothing to say of the whole 
 world if there were no Germans on earth. As for 
 the Russians — -mind, not only for Russian im- 
 perialism, not for Russian officialdom, but for the 
 whole Russian people, the Russian race — they are in 
 the author's estimation nothing else than a horde of 
 
INTRODUCTION. ix 
 
 barbarians, fit for nothing but for being crushed down 
 by the united forces of civilised Europe, if Europe 
 does not wish to be invaded by cossacks and brutalised 
 by "Nihilism" — which in the author's mouth means 
 the same as barbarism. Spurred on by these ideas, 
 the author has written whole chapters which would 
 pass muster as practical jokes, but hardly as serious 
 matter. The English reader could not, however, 
 appreciate their comic character. When a Russian 
 reads, for example, the chapters upon the great 
 Russian painter Alexander Ivanov, or the present 
 Minister of Justice Manassein, who both are pro- 
 claimed by the German writer most atrocious 
 " nihilists " — the former in art and the latter in 
 statesmanship, — he is most pleasantly amused and 
 cannot help bursting into laughter outright. He has 
 read about Ivanov and perhaps seen his great work 
 — Christ coming to be baptized — in the " Ermitage " 
 in St. Petersburg; so he knows that the painter was 
 simply an advocate of truthfulness to nature in art, 
 and rather a creator than a destroyer. He under- 
 stands, also, why Mr. Manassein is called by the 
 Ostsee _7jm^£r " a destroyer " and "a nihilist." He 
 destroyed the feudal jurisdiction of the Ostsee nobility 
 over the peasants by introducing a better system of 
 law courts in the Ostsee provinces. The present 
 writer is, certainly, not an admirer of any of the 
 Tsar's ministers, who are, in the whole of their 
 activity, only tools of the Russian bureaucratic 
 
X INTRODUCTION. 
 
 absolutism, while he is the bitterest enemy of the 
 latter. Still, it would be absurd and unfair not to 
 see that the reform mentioned was in the interest of 
 the overwhelming majority of the population. The 
 bulk of that population consists of Esthonians, Lievs 
 (both of Finnish origin), and Letts (of Lithuanian 
 origin), — tribes having their own languages and 
 literature, but kept in subjugation by the Germans 
 (forming the nobility and the greater part of the town 
 population), who introduced their language in the 
 law courts as the official one, and still retained many 
 mediaeval privileges in jurisdiction. On the other hand, 
 it is ridiculous to call the minister who effected that 
 reform a deniagogue and a revolutionist in uniform, 
 as his motives were not at all of a democratic and 
 revolutionary character. It was in the interest of 
 Russian imperialism to weaken the strong in the 
 Ostsee provinces, and this he did without really re- 
 establishing all the rights of the weak, as, abolishing 
 the privileges of the German language in the courts, 
 he did not think of acknowledging the equal rights of 
 the native ones, but introduced, as the official language 
 — the Russian. Thus the system of jurisdiction was 
 bettered, some former injustices replaced by new 
 ones, and the whole was done in the interest of 
 Russification. On the whole, Mr. Manassein acted 
 only as an official of the present reign. 
 
 All these facts, however, are unknown to the 
 English reader. He, therefore, is unarmed for a 
 
INTRODUCTION. xi 
 
 criticism of von Himmelstierna's assertions ; he can- 
 not follow his polemics in other parts of the book, 
 and to present the English reader with chapters of 
 such character would only mean to waste his time^ 
 to bore him, and sometimes to mystify him. That 
 is why they were omitted altogether. 
 
 If we have indulged in these explanations at some 
 length, it is because the author's personality, his 
 peculiar point of view, tendencies and ways of deal- 
 ing with his material, must be always kept in mind 
 even when reading that part of his book which is 
 valuable as a statement of facts and which is given 
 in this volume. 
 
 Those facts are of different origin, of different 
 character and of different value. Some of the 
 chapters now given in English — as, for example, 
 those about Byelinsky, Katkov, the Aksakovs and 
 Koshelev — are simply compilations from Russian 
 sources, which the German author follows com- 
 pletely, though they are sometimes not quite consis- 
 tent with his low opinion of the Russian people. 
 Whenever the standpoint of the Russian writers he 
 followed was right — as, say, about Byelinsky, the 
 Aksakovs and Katkov — his own versions are correct. 
 On other points, however, he had no such guidance. 
 Koshelev in his memoirs is, very naturally, defending 
 his own policy in favour of the Polish landowners 
 when a minister in Poland, and blaming Nicholas 
 Milyutin, who was on the side of the Polish peasantry. 
 
xii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 The peasants' interests were, very naturally, opposed 
 to those of the nobility, and either the first or the 
 second had to be sacrificed. The great misfortune 
 of Milyutin and all the Russian statesmen who were 
 inclined to act democratically in Poland, was that 
 they had to act in the capacity of delegates and 
 representatives of an arbitrary, foreign power, which 
 had just put down a national rising and trampled 
 under foot the just claims of the Poles for national 
 \fliberty and independence. They had to enforce bene- 
 iicial measures by hateful means, as they acted as 
 conquerors and tyrants, and it must be acknow- 
 ledged that the most beneficial (to the working 
 majority) of their measures were only details in a 
 whole system of weakening the national Polish 
 element in Poland, of making of Poland a province 
 of the Empire, and of rendering a new rising in it, 
 if not altogether impossible, at least impossible for 
 many years. To that should be added that the best 
 men, like Milyutin, had to work through a legion of 
 officials of which an overwhelming majority had 
 absolutely nothing to do with any democratic and 
 beneficial ideas, but had come at the time to Poland 
 simply for the sake of double salaries and of the 
 expectation that in a recently conquered land they 
 could easily have their own way and fill their 
 pockets. 
 
 No just and reasonable man would blame the 
 Government of Alexander II. for having provided 
 
INTRODUCTION. xlii 
 
 the Polish peasant with land in a proportion, and 
 generally having raised his economic position to a 
 level unknown to the average Russian peasant. 
 The sin of that Government (but not of N. Milyutin 
 personally) was that it was not sincere in its resolu- 
 tion to act according to the interests of the over- 
 whelming majority of the Polish people at the 
 expense of the oppressing class, and that in that 
 direction it stopped halfway. The Polish peasant 
 wanted, besides a good economic position, also 
 justice, personal liberty, liberty of conscience, some 
 education, and the undisturbed use of his native 
 language. But these wants clashed with the level- 
 ling tendencies of the Russian autocratic and 
 bureaucratic imperialism. The Russian Government 
 therefore introduced the Russian language instead 
 of the Polish in the proceedings of the courts, and in 
 the educational system, and it began to persecute 
 the Roman Catholics as such. Thus, while sup- 
 porting the peasants against the nobility so far as it 
 was necessary for the purposes of conquest, the 
 Russian Government acted utterly against their 
 interest outside those limits. 
 
 For all that Nicholas Milyutin is not to be made 
 responsible. His position was not that of one who 
 directed the whole policy of the Imperial Govern- 
 ment in Poland. He was allowed a certain 
 position in a government composed of the most 
 different elements, partly altogether opposed to one 
 
xiv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 another, and headed by an insincere trimn 
 (Alexander II.), and of that position he avai: 
 himself as best he could to endow the peasj 
 with land. Brutes like the Count Michael M( 
 raviyov wanted to crush down all the classes 
 the Polish people, to extirpate the nation itself, 
 possible. Bureaucrats ^«r£-sfl;jg', like Count Valu 
 then Minister of Internal Affairs, opposed Mil; 
 tin's plans for peasant communal self-governme 
 High-placed representatives of the official routi: 
 like Count Berg, and some Russian Liberal lai 
 owners like Koshelev, thought it " impossibl 
 to sacrifice altogether the interests of the Pol 
 nobility. Nationalists of the semi-democratic ty 
 like Prince Cherkasky, again, wanted in the fi 
 place to Russianise the Poles. And besides 
 that, a clique of greedy, intriguing courtiers a 
 lacqueys in high uniform, caring for no principle 
 all, but trying to undermine every one of hi 
 standing for the mere purpose of taking his place 
 such were the surroundings in which N. Milyutin 1: 
 to carry out his problem. In such a position he 1; 
 to shut his eyes to what was done outside the lirr 
 of this problem, and even to compromise within 
 limits, inasmuch as the whole scheme was entir 
 dependent upon the good- or ill-will of a potent; 
 who had not much faith in his own plans, and v 
 open to the most contradictory influences, and coi 
 never be relied upon. It would be a great injust 
 
INTRODUCTION. xv 
 
 to put N. Milyutin — a sincere Radical — on a level with 
 Prince Cherkasky or any of his supporters (as the 
 German author does), simply because they worked 
 side by side at the same work, pursuing each his 
 own line. 
 
 Not all the information given by the German 
 author is derived from Russian literature. There 
 are spheres of Russian life which are strictly inter- 
 dicted to literature — indeed, to the eye and ear of 
 the whole Russian people. Such is, among others, 
 the sphere of government. The Russian people are 
 allowed to be informed now and then {post factum, 
 as it is not safe for the adored sovereign to expose 
 his sacred person to some manifestations of the 
 feelings he arouses among his people) at what 
 reviews the Tsar has made his appearance ; they get 
 regular intelligence about all the births and deaths 
 occurring in the innumerable royal family, as they 
 must know the proper time both for rejoicing and 
 sorrowing. But it is not expected that these feelings 
 of admiration, love, and sympathy should be based 
 upon the people's acquaintance with the Tsar's and 
 his relatives' personal character and activity, but 
 simply upon the fact that he is an hereditary poten- 
 tate. Besides, as the reader will see even from the 
 most moderate accounts given of that point by the 
 German author, it is safer for the imperial halo if 
 the earthly particulars of the reigning dynasty's life 
 and "activity" are kept under a veil. Consequently, 
 
xvi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 the Russian Tsar, the Tsarina, their kinsmen anc 
 helpers, the good and evil spirits surrounding anc 
 influencing them — that whole sphere is kept almos 
 an utter mystery, an enigma, both to foreigners anc 
 to Russians themselves. That sphere is, however 
 one which awakens not only the deepest curiosity 
 but also a just, legitimate interest. These men— 
 whether good or bad, whether first-class minds o: 
 the poorest mediocrities — enforce certain laws, take 
 certain practical measures, which, whether they wil 
 leave any trace in history or not, may inflict suffering 
 on millions of living men, or may relieve their misery 
 for the time being. In this volume the reader wil 
 find some most interesting characteristics of differen 
 personages of that mysterious Russian Olympus o 
 which the centre is now the Anichkov, now the 
 Gatchina Palace. These sketches cannot full} 
 enlighten him upon the subject, but they wil 
 certainly add a good deal to the scanty materia 
 which is to be found in the press by one who woulc 
 like to form some idea of the personages upon whon 
 Russian politics — internal and external — depenc 
 nowadays. 
 
 It is a sad dependence. For a Russian who has 
 a man's heart — more than that : it makes his hearl 
 bleed. 
 
 Even in the outlines given by an eulogist, wha1 
 is really the present head of the Russian Govern- 
 ment? An obstinate, narrow-minded man, who with 
 
INTRODUCTION. xvii 
 
 the pertinacity of strong conviction clings to the idea 
 that it is good to do evil. (We must not forget that 
 Mr. Stead, who interviewed the Tsar personally, and 
 is his most enthusiastic admirer, says plainly that 
 in Alexander III.'s opinion it is good to persecute 
 five millions of Jews, harass and tyrannise several 
 millions of Russian dissenters, &c.) He is a hot- 
 tempered person who has to keep himself in check 
 by means of reason, which he unfortunately is not 
 very abundantly provided with. He is supposed to 
 be very kind at heart, yet all around him tremble, as 
 he is convinced that to be independent he must be 
 stern. He is supposed to be honest, and so in a 
 certain way he is ; and yet he does things which are 
 not easily reconciled with honesty, simply understood. 
 Our author tells us that as early as the Turkish war 
 Alexander HI. lost all belief in the honesty of Russian 
 bureaucracy, and in the efficacy of the control exer- 
 cised over it at present. He had many opportunities 
 later on to see clearly how grossly he was cheated by 
 his own agents. For him personally the possibility 
 of controlling it is made still narrower, as he is so 
 afraid of committing some blunder in personal 
 relations that he avoids discussions, and does not 
 permit his ministers to go into the details of the 
 subject. Under such circumstances, a monarch of 
 the honesty of Peter the Great would certainly come 
 to the conclusion that if the present system of 
 control fails, another must be tried. There are only 
 
xviii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 two such systems : either the control is in the hands 
 of the head of the State, who entrusts his power 
 into the hands of special agents, who are supposed 
 to be responsible before him and his representatives 
 (the present Russian system) ; or it is entrusted into 
 the hands of the whole population, who watch, 
 Argus-eyed, incessantly and unremittingly, where- 
 ever any human breast is breathing. Such a control 
 could be easily and gradually developed by only 
 giving fair play to the local elective bodies (Zemsi- 
 vos), instituted in Alexander II. 's reign, by abolish- 
 ing the preventive censorship, and by instituting 
 reforms by which every official should be open 
 to a prosecution by any private citizen — in 
 other words, by making the chinovnihs directly 
 responsible before independent tribunals. This, 
 however, the present Tsar does not like to do. 
 He curtailed the microscopic amount of inde- 
 pendence from bureaucratic control the Zemstvos 
 had ; the evil activity of the censorship is harsher 
 than ever, and the fraudulent and tyrannical official 
 is protected in his misdoings by a law according to 
 which no private person can prosecute him in law 
 courts for any offence committed when on duty, but 
 has instead to apply to the offender's chief, that is, 
 to one of the bureaucratic caste, which is always 
 either purposely or instinctively trying to keep its 
 power out of reach of the citizens. As all this 
 tyranny cannot be easily endured, it creates an 
 
INTRODUCTION. xix 
 
 enormous amount of, so to say, artificial offences 
 — offences which would never either exist, or be 
 regarded as offences, if certain tyrannical restrictions 
 of useful activity were not imposed by bad laws. 
 "Offences" lead to punishment, to imprisonment, 
 exile, material ruin, and spiritual misery. All this 
 the Russian potentate knows, as he is yearly pre- 
 sented with the reports of the Minister of Justice, 
 the Chief of the Prison Department, the Chief of 
 the Administration of the Press, and so on. And 
 yet he prefers the existence of all this misery, side 
 by side with his impotence to put an effective check 
 on the ill-doings of the bureaucracy, rather than to 
 try the system of control of the people by the people. 
 And why ? Because Pobyedonostsev whispers in 
 his ear that in case national control of justice and 
 public life comes into existence, it may finally come 
 to inquire into the rights and doings of the Tsar 
 himself. Now Alexander III.'s honesty comes out 
 in its unmistakable character — the honesty of a good 
 householder and shopkeeper, but certainly not that 
 of the sovereign of a great state. He feels himself 
 entrusted by fate, history, or the orthodox Almighty, 
 with a certain position, a certain power ; this power 
 he must transmit undiminished to his children and 
 grandchildren. And so he will, at any cost. He is 
 too good a father, and too honest in filling the duties 
 of his position, not to " honestly " torture over a 
 hundred millions of men, women, and children, pro- 
 
XX INTRODUCTION. 
 
 vided his "duty" towards the dynasty and the 
 principle of autocratic bureaucracy be done ! 
 
 One of his predecessors, Peter I., was not 
 such a good father. He had put to the rack, 
 tried, and secretly executed (those were cruel^ 
 brutal times) his own son Alexis, because he con- 
 sidered him a traitor to the Russian nation. He 
 was not a very good father, no ; but he was 
 undoubtedly a really honest sovereign. I am afraid 
 Alexander IH. is not much like him. Even not 
 going, in our standard of a ruler's honesty, so far as 
 that, one may feel very disappointed when looking 
 into some particulars of the present Tsar's per- 
 sonality and activity. 
 
 A vile crime against the nation was committed 
 under the Minister of State Domains, Count 
 Lieven : 1,358,148 acres of national land, including 
 a virgin oak forest which had been taken away from 
 the peasants for State shipbuilding purposes, were 
 feloniously appropriated by Lieven himself, Makov, 
 the then Minister of Internal Affairs, the Governor- 
 General of the Orenbourg and Oufa provinces 
 (where the lands were situated) Krizhanovsky, 
 the governors of these provinces, and a number 
 of officials from the highest rank in the central 
 government down to the humblest of the locality. 
 When the scandal came to light, Alexander III. 
 became aware of all the particulars of that revolting 
 theft. Now what steps did he take to expose and 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxi 
 
 punish the crimes that had been committed, and to 
 restore to the nation its stolen property ? He 
 issued (through Ignatiev, then Minister of the In- 
 terior) a circular which condemns "plunder" alto- 
 gether, and dismissed from their official positions 
 four persons — the already-mentioned Minister Lieven, 
 Governor-General Krizhanovsky, and two local 
 officials. But all the stolen property remained in 
 the hands of the robbers, and not one of them was 
 brought to trial. Nor is this all ; that very Lieven, 
 whose dishonesty in his quality of Minister was 
 formally recognised by the fact of his dismissal, now 
 sits in the Council of State as a member. A certain 
 high official, Perfiliev, who took part in the land 
 robbery, and who was afterwards convicted of steal- 
 ing public money, and condemned for it by a law- 
 court, has been pardoned by the Tsar, and now 
 continues his prosperous career of " usefulness " by 
 serving in the Senate, Liovshin, the Governor of 
 Oufa (after receiving a public reprimand from the 
 Emperor), has been transferred to the Governorship 
 of Yaroslavl, &c., &c. . . . 
 
 ■ Is it not clear from all this that whatever be the 
 ideas of the present head of the Russian Empire on 
 honesty in other matters, he in any case regards 
 the plundering of the nation not as a great crime, 
 but as a sort of " delinquency " for which a repri- 
 mand or some other " disciplinary measure " is 
 punishment enough ? Indeed, after his Imperial 
 
xxii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Majesty proclaimed the best part of the Merv oasis, 
 acquired at the cost of the nation's blood and money, 
 his private property, he has to be indulgent towards 
 his faithful servants when they try to snap up here 
 and there a little bit for their own benefit. 
 
 Around this autocrat, who is more afraid of being 
 supposed to be influenced by any one than of any- 
 thing else, are arrayed the most hopeless medio- 
 crities, bigots or mere seekers of wealth and position,' 
 as his helpers and servants, who command an 
 innumerable army of minor officials, of whom many 
 are good, intelligent, honest men, who, however, 
 are compelled by the acting system of government to 
 act mostly in the capacity of tyrants, of stiflers of 
 every token of personal independence and intellectual 
 life, and agents for pressing taxes out of the econo- 
 mically exhausted population. The better part of 
 these officials try to avoid doing, so far as they 
 possibly can, what the system forces them to do ; 
 the worse part try to turn their power into a 
 means for personal profit ; and this creates a most 
 unnatural position of things in the country : both 
 parts practically (though silently) teach the popu- 
 lation that laws are created in order not to be 
 
 ' Although the German author says that the present Russian 
 Government consists of " honourable " men, the reader will 
 notice that so long as the Lievens, the Liovshins, and the lilce 
 are in ofifice, the statement of von Samson-Himmelstierna cannot 
 be taken literally. 
 
I NT ROD UC TION. xxii , 
 
 observed, and it must be confessed that the respect 
 for law is at a very low level in Russia. The last 
 famine, with its ghastly train of evils — -the typhus, 
 the scurvy and the cholera, and the latest news 
 about the Imperial Minister of Finance planning 
 to re-establish the salt-tax and the farming of the 
 spirits monopoly — those two scourges of the unfor- 
 tunate nation, that contributed so much to its 
 impoverishment and demoralisation — speak for them- 
 selves of what is the present Tsar's government 
 from the economic point of view. 
 
 On such a government is dependent a population 
 of over 110,000,000, consisting of several young, fresh 
 nationalities, which have already proved their 
 possessing a certain originality, a genius of their 
 own. We will not speak here of the Poles, of the 
 Finns ; nor will we touch upon nationalities of minor 
 importance, like the Caucasian Georgians, though 
 this race shows itself to be a very promising one. Let 
 us confine ourselves only to the bulk of the population 
 of the Empire, consisting of three large tribes of 
 the same Slavonic root : the Great Russians, the 
 Oukrainiens (or Little Russians), and the White 
 Russians. These tribes, generally known under the 
 common name of " Russians," are the predominant 
 ones both in number, in the dimensions of the terri- 
 tory they occupy, and also in the part they have 
 played in Russian history, and now play in Russian 
 life. 
 
xxiv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 The Russians who, a few centuries ago, occupied 
 only a small territory round the Lake of I'lmen, on 
 the Dvina, and all along the Dnepr river and its 
 tributaries, gradually spread over the half of Europe 
 and one-third of Asia, notwithstanding the fact that 
 they were all the time pressed from all sides by 
 other nationalities, especially by Barbarian hordes 
 from the east, and the south, — hordes that were 
 numerous, warlike, and powerful at that time. 
 This fact is generally attributed to the greediness 
 of the Muscovite Princes and Tsars, and later on 
 of the Russian Emperors, and the explanation is 
 true so far as concerns territorial acquisitions by 
 force of arms. But it is not generally known in 
 Western Europe, that side by side with that 
 official extension of the boundaries of the State 
 there has existed, ever since the Russian people 
 has existed, a system of peaceful extension of the 
 territory occupied by that people, by means of 
 colonisation carried on by the Russian peasant (who 
 sometimes called himself, and was called by others, 
 hozak — cossack), on his own account and at his own 
 risk. Without any warhke intentions, thousands 
 upon thousands of settlers set out " to get some 
 land" for tilling among some neighbouring tribe 
 with whom they lived on friendly terms as regards 
 their religion and customs — whether they were 
 Christians or not. Thus, for example, before 
 Siberia came into the possession of the Russian 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxv 
 
 Tsars in the sixteenth century, there existed there 
 a number of Russian immigrants. It was only 
 owing to that settled population, scarce though it 
 might be, that the Muscovite troops could be suc- 
 cessful in their operations. The same process is 
 going on nowadays as well, along the whole Asiatic 
 frontier of Russia. 
 
 Thus the conspicuous abilities of the Russian 
 peasant as a colonist were proved by centuries of 
 practice. For centuries he has been steadily ex- 
 tending the territory of the plough among the 
 nomads, without violating what they consider sacred, 
 without embittering them against the approach of 
 civilisation. If after that comes the soldier with his 
 bayonet, and the chinovnik with his bureaucratic 
 tyranny and pressure for taxes, it is not the peasant's 
 fault. He tried himself to escape Muscovite or 
 imperial officialdom, with which he has nothing in 
 common, by the very act of emigrating. And were 
 not his historic past so hard, did not that past 
 create for him the fetters in which he is moving 
 about now — the fetters of bureaucratic autocracy — he 
 would have brought long ago to the nomads of 
 the East other blessings besides the plough. The 
 Russian peasant created his popular song and his 
 popular tale, and the same spirit that created them 
 has gradually developed into the music of Michael 
 Glinka, of Alyabiev, of Dargomizhsky, of Tchay- 
 kpvsky, and of Serov, the poetry of Pushkin, of 
 
xxvi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Lermontov, of Nekrassov, of Shevchenko, the 
 humour and satire of Gogol, Griboyedov, and of 
 Saltikov, and in the Russian novel represented by 
 Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Leo Tolstoi, Goncharov, 
 Korolenko, and others. 
 
 Hardly any man of taste and critical insight will 
 deny nowadays that the Russian novel is a real and 
 honourable contribution to the treasures of universal 
 -civilisation. Russian music has already made its 
 way among other nations, and has been received 
 with much admiration. There can be no doubt that 
 when Russian art, especially painting, becomes 
 known in Western Europe, it will show still more 
 strikingly the powers of the Russian genius. Men 
 of science know that Mendeleev in some way re- 
 modelled the science of chemistry ; that Pirogov, 
 Botkin, Sechenov, Pashoutin, and others contributed 
 much to physiology and medical science ; while a 
 number of Russian names are most honourably 
 associated with other branches of knowledge. In 
 this very volume the reader will find, among others, 
 an account of V. Byelinsky which will give him an 
 idea both of the moral height a Russian can attain 
 when animated with lofty ideals, and of the amazing 
 power he can display when gifted by nature with the 
 talent of a critic and publicist. Another German 
 (Alexander Reinhold) says^ that Byelinsky did for the 
 
 ' Das Magazin fiir die LiteraHir des In-und Aiislandes 1884 
 ^-" Die Kritik in Russland," von A. Reinhold 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxvii 
 
 Russians the same as Lessing did for the Germans, 
 with the difference that while Lessing had to 
 address an educated public, who were ripe for 
 understanding him, Byelinsky had first to educate 
 his readers, to teach them to understand him. And 
 all that he contrived to do, notwithstanding the 
 unimaginable pressure of the censorship which 
 forced him to speak only in a very veiled language. 
 
 These few hints as to what the Russian people 
 could contribute to the rich stock of universal civili- 
 sation if free from the stifling plague — Imperialism 
 with its bureaucratic system — are given here inten- 
 tionally to contrast the Russian people with official 
 Russia, a contrast which is but little understood by 
 foreigners, the author of these sketches included. 
 At the close of chap. ix. and the beginning of chap. 
 X., and in some other places in his book, von 
 Samson-Himmelstierna treats with derision " Rus- 
 sian civilisation." He is as bitter against the 
 " Russian pioneers " among the Balkan and 
 Austrian Slavs as one can be, and he cannot speak 
 of "Russians " and " Russia " in other terms than 
 those of contempt and irritation. If he would speak 
 only of " official civilisation," " official or semi- 
 official pioneers," and "official Russia," every true 
 and reasonable Russian patriot would subscribe to 
 all the bitterness with which he treats " Pansla- 
 vism." Unfortunately our author is himself one 
 of those curious living specimens of patriotisjn of £(. 
 
xxviii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 different type, who would like to see the whole world 
 German, blessed with " good " Jtmkerthim, " good " 
 capitalism, and "good" Catholicism. So whether 
 the Balkan or Austrian Slavs are assisted in their 
 endeavours to preserve their nationality and their 
 personal and political rights by official and semi- 
 official Russia, or by the Russian people, its best 
 educated class included — it is all equally hateful to 
 him. Here, however, our points of agreement with 
 the German end, and here is the explanation why. 
 
 It is quite true that official Panslavisni, as repre- 
 sented on the one side by Count Ignatiev, with his 
 Slav Society, and on the other by Alexander III. and 
 Mr. Pobyedonostsev, is dangerous to Europe. But 
 why is it so ? First, because it is associated with 
 " Autocracy, Orthodoxy, and (narrow) Nationalism " 
 ■ — principles which are in bitter opposition to pro- 
 gress and civilisation ; and, secondly, because it is 
 backed by a standing army of over 2,000,000, which 
 can be put in the field at the first sign from an auto- 
 crat, who cannot be checked either by any represen- 
 tative body (or bodies), or by the will of the nation 
 expressed through the press, petitions, or manifesta- 
 tions. The reports about Alexander III. being the 
 most peaceful man personally, may be true. But 
 on the other hand we know that he is a hot-tempered 
 and self-willed man, and that he would not shrink 
 from war if he imagined it to be his duty. Now the 
 tricks played by him on Prince Alexander of Batten- 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxix 
 
 berg, the mission of Koulbars, and other more recent 
 tricks performed in Bulgaria, as well as his persecu- 
 tion of the Jews and Russian dissenters, show how 
 impossible it is to reckon on the Autocrat's ideas 
 about his duties. Besides, whatever be the personal 
 character of an autocrat, such is his very position 
 that — for dynastic reasons or otherwise — -he is far 
 more easily induced to wage war than any respon- 
 sible and democratic body of people's representatives. 
 Official Panslavism — the Panslavism that would 
 like to see imperial Russia absorbing, or at least 
 leading, the different Slav nations in the name of 
 " Autocracy, Orthodoxy, Nationalisn^" — was never 
 popular in Russia. Originated by a handful of men 
 who were always sitting between two chairs — auto- 
 cracy and democracy, — who opposed Western ideas, 
 and thus, practically, were on that point at one with 
 the hated officialdom of Nicholas I., which persecuted 
 and suppressed those ideas. Slavophilism and its 
 child Orthodox Panslavism, could not gain ground 
 among the educated class. That class suffered too 
 rnuch from official tyranny. As a matter of fact, the 
 educated class, except that part which was altogether 
 indifferent to any ideas and politics at all, was always 
 led by Byelinsky, Herzen, Granovsky, and later on 
 by Chernishevsky, Dobrolubov, Kostomarov, Ravelin, 
 Stassulevich, Mikhailovsky — the representatives of 
 progress and Western ideas. The German author 
 does not give in his book any sketch at all of th^ 
 
XXX INTRODUCTION. 
 
 great Russian Liberal movement which followed 
 immediately after the Sebastopol war, of the revolu- 
 tionary movement of the 'seventies, and of the 
 vigorous leading part the Liberal and Radical 
 literature, beginning with the time of Nicholas, 
 played in Russian life. For this he is not to be 
 blamed, as it simply did not enter into his intentions 
 to give a full history of modern Russia. On the 
 other hand, his main purpose being to trace the 
 origin of the now reigning official Panslavism, he had 
 to devote to Slavophilism more attention and space 
 than would be justifiable were it treated from the 
 point of view of its real popularity and importance 
 among the Russians as a school of thought. The 
 English reader must be cautioned therefore against 
 imagining that because the sway of Liberalism and 
 Radicalism is very insufficiently represented in the 
 present volume, they are less popular in Russia than 
 Slavophilism in any form. Quite the contrary. 
 Liberalism and Radicalism may be in vogue and 
 in power, as at one time under Alexander II., or 
 they may be suppressed and smarting, as under 
 Alexander III., but they always remain the dominant 
 mode of thinking and acting — either openly or 
 secretly — of the overwhelming majority of the 
 enlightened Russian class. 
 
 There can be no talk of conscious Panslavism in 
 any form among the Russian peasants, who are 
 eighty-five per cent, of the whole population, 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxxi 
 
 International politics, they most earnestly believe, 
 "are not their business." As for their instincts, 
 they are certainly not such as to favour any war- 
 like enterprise of the officially Panslavistic character. 
 On page 80, our author acknowledges the peace- 
 fulness of the mass of the Russian people. Nor has 
 the Russian peasant any inclination to force his 
 religious opinions upon any one. An orthodox 
 Russian peasant believes — so long as his ortho- 
 doxy is not shaken by some new doctrine — that it 
 is his duty to remain orthodox because his fore- 
 fathers were so, and because he was born so. But 
 at the same time he would tell you with the deepest 
 conviction that "every man can be saved according 
 to his religion." He will fight against any nation 
 as a matter of obedience, if ordered by the Tsar to 
 do so ; but he would not assault any nation so long 
 as he can keep peace with it. 
 
 It is evident now, we hope, that if the Russian 
 government were changed from an autocratic and 
 irresponsible into a democratic and representative 
 government, all danger for Europe, proceeding from 
 " Panslavism," would be at an end. The will of 
 the people — a peaceful, tolerant, and open-minded 
 people — would put a check on the now artificially 
 cultivated jingoism of a few conceited nationalists 
 and many fortune-seekers, and on a policy which, 
 though perhaps in the interests of the dynasty, 
 would be injurious to the bulk of the nation. The 
 
xxxii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Liberal and Progressive elements of the educated 
 class would acquire their natural predominance in 
 national life and national affairs. And the perma- 
 nently threatening ghost of " Panslavism," invading 
 Europe in the name of " Autocracy, Orthodoxy, and 
 Nationalism," would vanish from sight for ever. 
 
 This does not m.ean that all Panslavism would 
 vanish. Quite the contrary; and those who are 
 burning with racial hatred towards the Slavs should 
 prefer the present position of things, however 
 dangerous, because if the Russians liberated them- 
 selves from their present bondage and developed 
 their welfare and their national genius without hind- 
 rance, all the other Slav nations would feel them- 
 selves stronger, and instead of keeping cautiously 
 aloof from that scarecrow the Russian imperialism, 
 would lean towards Russian democracy ; then the 
 forcible Germanisation and Magyarisation of the 
 Slavs would be made as impossible as would be any 
 Russification of the Poles or Finns. But that is 
 just what people blinded by racial hatred do not like 
 at all. We are not addressing blind men, however. 
 We are addressing those who have eyes to see and 
 ears to hear ; who have a feeling of justice and 
 humanity in their hearts and reason in their 
 minds; who will readily understand that "Pan- 
 slavism " of which we are talking now is nothing 
 more than a tendency preserving the national 
 genius of any Slav nationality from being violated 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxxiii 
 
 by any other, securing to the Slav genius fair 
 play, and thus enabling the Slav race to attain a 
 similar position in the civilisation of the world to that 
 which is already held by the Anglo-Saxon, the Teu- 
 tonic and Franco-Roman races. Every reasonable 
 and just man must acknowledge that this would be 
 nothing but a gain for the whole of mankind ; while 
 those who think that no good can come out of the 
 Slav Nazareth must at least admit that, in any case, 
 there would be no harm and much justice in letting 
 the Slavs have their chance. 
 
 It is self-evident that all that has been said above 
 can be supported by facts. The history of Bulgaria 
 since its enfranchisement furnishes a splendid oppor- 
 tunity to contrast the working and effect of both the 
 " Panslavisms " — the official and the radical. The 
 level of civilisation in Bulgaria is even lower than 
 it is in Russia. Thus, taking into consideration the 
 nearness of both languages, which enables a Bul- 
 garian to pretty fairly understand a Russian talking 
 his own tongue, Russia could do an enormous good 
 to Bulgaria that no other country could do. Merely 
 making the Russian language popular in Bulgaria 
 (certainly without a fantastic effort to replace by it 
 the Bulgarian) would mean to throw open to the 
 .Bulgarians the gates leading to the whole of Russian 
 literature. Now what was done by official Russia 
 for the Bulgarians ? The vile intrigues and common 
 crimes perpetrated upon the poor, young, helpless 
 
xxxiv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 country by Russian ojficial Panslavism are in every 
 one's memory. To recall a few details and also to 
 show the work of unofficial Russian Panslavism, we 
 will quote M. P. Dragomanov, a man of deep know- 
 ledge and great intellectual power, who left Russia 
 because of his Radicalism, and is now Professor of 
 History at the Sofia University in Bulgaria : — 
 
 " The Russian diplomatic agents in Bulgaria 
 showed a peculiar combination of insolence and 
 want of ability; churlishness and immorality reigned 
 among the army officers, who seemed to have been 
 purposely badly selected for the young country from 
 the whole Russian army; and the central Russian 
 Government, for its part, displayed an unbecoming 
 eagerness to deprive Bulgaria of her independence. 
 The result of all this was that the Bulgarians were 
 beginning to hate everything Russian. 
 
 " It is difficult for any one who is not familiar 
 with the matter to realise, yet it is the fact that 
 this hatred began to diminish, while respect for the 
 Russians began to increase in Bulgaria exactly from 
 the time that the Imperial officers and diplomatists 
 left the country. In this very direction are working, 
 among others, those physicians, technical engineers, 
 and teachers, of whom the well-known note of the 
 Imperial Government to the Bulgarian complains. 
 These men, in their own persons, show to the Bul- 
 garians examples of Russian knowledge, skill, and 
 diligence on the one hand, and of respect to the 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxxv 
 
 Bulgarian spirit of independence on the other. 
 Such Russians — whether refugees or not — maintain 
 the use of the Russian language in Bulgaria and 
 spread the knowledge of Russian literature. In this 
 matter such Russians move in the same direction 
 with the Bulgarian Government, which energetically 
 defends the independence of the countrj' against both 
 open and secret foes, yet at the same time preserves 
 in the high schools the teaching of the Russian 
 language, as obligatory, supplies the schools and 
 public libraries with Russian periodicals and hun- 
 dreds of Russian books, allows lectures in the Sofia 
 University in Russian, side by side with lectures in 
 Bulgarian, and so on." ^ 
 
 The good that was done on a small scale in Bulgaria 
 can be done on a large one for the whole of mankind 
 when the Russian contrives to shake off the fetters 
 that tie him hand and foot- Let us hope the blessed 
 day is not far off. If the Russian people could 
 survive the Mongol yoke, the atrocities of John the 
 Terrible (in the North), and of the Polish magnates 
 (in the South and West), preserving their national 
 genius and finally triumphing over their oppressors, 
 — it will certainly triumph over the evils that are 
 the last legacy of its unfortunate past. Mankind 
 generally reaches good only through great evils, and 
 this seems to be the fate of all the Russians — the 
 
 • Free Russia (a monthly magazine), for April, 1891. True- 
 love, Holborn, London. 
 
xxxvi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Great Russians, the Oukrainiens, theWhite Russ 
 — more than of any other nationality. The 
 black years were so horrible that one cannot bel 
 that all the miseries brought by them were in v 
 Indeed the whole system of bureaucratic 
 perialism is shaken to its very foundation, and 
 thunder of popular despair is heard in the dista 
 not yet distinctly. Let us hope the night is con 
 to its end ; and after the dark of the night comes 
 dawn. 
 
 December i, 1892. FELIX VOLKHOVSK 
 
RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 ALEXANDER III. AS TSAREVICH. 
 
 " Autocracy became again its special aim, as it had 
 been before, from the death of Peter the Great to 
 the time of Alexander I. The maintenance of its 
 Dwn existence was once more the vital question with 
 the Government ; all else was subordinate and 
 conditional." 
 
 In these words the most competent of Russian 
 historians sums up the history of his country during 
 the three deca.des which followed the discovery of 
 the military conspiracy of 1825. " That is," he 
 continues, " what Russia has to thank her secret 
 societies and conspirators for." ^ 
 
 Were it not in the nature of historical comparisons 
 
 ind parallels to be somewhat halting, the same thing 
 
 night be said of the Government that followed the 
 
 ' See Appendix, Note i. 
 
 2 
 
2 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 reign of Alexander II. The accession of this i 
 was welcomed with the same acclamation as 
 been the change of sovereignty which raised the 
 Alexander to the throne fifty-five years before. ] 
 reigns ended in blood, and as the memory of Dec 
 ber I2th (24th) influenced the whole reign of 
 Emperor Nicholas, so does the policy of Alexai 
 III., up to the present time, bear the impress of 
 atrocious and insane crime of March i (13), i 
 Alexander, too, like his grandfather, is dominatei 
 the thought that "autocracy" alone is capabl 
 saving both people and ruler from collapse 
 destruction. 
 
 Here, however, the parallel ends. Never did t! 
 exist men so different as the father and the so 
 Alexander II. 
 
 The Emperor Nicholas never presented more t 
 the exterior of a great man. His natural capa 
 was as strictly limited as his education, but < 
 compensation for this he possessed the imm( 
 advantage of simple self-contained natures — 
 believed in himself. This was all the less to 
 wondered at, for Nicholas had developed ur 
 circumstances in which doubts were never en 
 tained with regard to the justification and expedie 
 of absolute power. Nicholas was twenty yi 
 younger than his brother and predecessor; he 
 never shared his political and military cares, anc 
 never looked beyond the dazzling ceremonial of 
 
ALEXANDER III. AS TSAREVICH. 3 
 
 brother's most popular Government. Although not 
 born heir to the throne, he knew from his early years 
 that the succession would in all probability fall to 
 him, as both his brothers were childless. He was 
 handsome and healthy, and of an essentially cheerful 
 disposition : limitation of intellect and a knowledge 
 of his own powers were so happily joined in him 
 that he was even less given to distrust himself than 
 to distrust others. The third son of Paul I. accepted 
 the doctrine of the Divine mission of kings so simply 
 and literally that he never doubted for a moment 
 that God in granting him a ruler's position had like- 
 wise granted him a ruler's understanding. 
 
 He possessed in a high degree the external quali- 
 ties requisite for his high office, for he was handsome, 
 imposing, and captivating in his manners. But the 
 strength of his character and the intensity of his 
 belief in himself caused him to deceive himself and 
 others in questions which were beyond his powers. 
 Nicholas was affable, persuasive, and winning when 
 he liked, but when it was necessary he knew how to 
 conceal the narrowness of his vision and the super- 
 ficiality of his intellect behind a reserve which barred 
 the way once for all to unwelcome influences, and 
 which in the course of years grew from a mask to a 
 second nature. Favoured for a quarter of a century 
 by unexampled good fortune, and surrounded for the 
 most part by men of inferior intelligence and charac- 
 ter, the ruler of the most extensive empire in the 
 
4 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 world came to regard himself as infallible, and to be 
 looked upon in the same light by those who sur- 
 rounded him. In private life he was cheerful and 
 simple ; he was fond of pleasantry and of jests which, 
 in spite of being constantly repeated, produced the 
 impression of heartiness. He thought it his duty 
 ^when once he had adopted a course of action to 
 follow it out with a fearlessness and severity which 
 cost him no effort precisely because of the narrow- 
 ness of his vision and the coldness of his nature. 
 
 Not a trace of his grandfather's qualities has 
 descended to his grandson. Alexander III. grew up 
 under the influence of the great agitation which 
 attended the abolition of serfdom, when all existing 
 institutions were called in question. When eleven 
 years old he was impressed by the total collapse of 
 the institutions set up by his grandfather, and by the 
 wholesale desertion of the men who had been looked 
 upon as the pillars of the old system. One after 
 another the fundamental institutions of Nicholas 
 crumbled to dust as soon as the breath of the new 
 time began to touch them. What was previously 
 regarded as sacred and venerable lost its significance 
 in a night, and we need not wonder that the boy 
 who had been brought up in the Winter Palace 
 failed to understand the new condition of things. 
 
 Until his twentieth year Alexander Alexandrovich 
 had no prospect of succeeding to the throne. He was 
 brought up as a soldier, as exclusively as his grand- 
 
ALEXANDER III. AS TSAREVICH. S 
 
 father had been before him; it was natural, therefore, 
 when his brother died, that he should have found 
 himself totally unprepared for the fulfilment of his 
 future duties. But it was impossible for him to shut 
 his eyes to his destiny with all the naivete of former 
 times, and to consider a ruler's calling and a ruler's 
 capacity as convertible terms. For he had been a 
 witness of the terrible crises of i860 and 1861 — the 
 first " students' disturbances," the abolition of serf- 
 dom, the rebellious outbreaks of the peasantry, the 
 hostile demonstrations of the nobility ; in 1862 — the 
 revolutionary May fires, ^ the issue of the statutes of 
 the new judicial and provincial administration ; and 
 in 1863 — the Polish- Lithuanian revolution. But the 
 task of remedying the defects of the past appeared 
 enormously difficult to one who had formerly con- 
 sidered it sufficient to fulfil the ordinary duties per- 
 taining to his office. Nevertheless he was not 
 daunted. He applied himself assiduously to his 
 studies, and it was while he was in the midst of 
 these that the first of the attempts directed against 
 his father's life was made. The event shook the 
 very foundations of his existence; he felt himself on 
 the verge of an abyss whose yawning depth was not 
 dreamt of by the wisest men of the time. 
 
 The events which followed this criminal attempt 
 were accompanied by a vexatious party warfare, 
 which continued during the following year, and was 
 ' See Appendix, Note 2. 
 
6 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III- 
 
 never completely settled. This was the year 
 Alexander Alexandrovich's marriage with the i 
 tended bride of his deceased brother. The m; 
 contents, as always happens, tried to ingratis 
 themselves with the heir to the throne, and 
 perplex and entangle his straightforward nature 
 the meshes of their interminable intrigues. It w 
 known that the Emperor had betrayed a certa 
 amount of sympathy with European Liberals, ev 
 when their influence was on the decline, and that 
 took an interest in the successes of Prussia, whi 
 had come to the front since 1866. This was gi 
 and wormwood to the fanatics of the national pari 
 It enabled the supporters of Aksakov and Katk 
 to play upon the Tsarevich, and by pointing to 
 return of dangers which were only apparently allay 
 to inspire him with fears of impending danger 
 it also sufficed to cast suspicion on the ministf 
 Valuev and Shuvalov, who favoured a Europe 
 policy. 
 
 Tschikalov, a discharged provincial governor, h 
 attacked Valuev with singular virulence since t 
 winter of 1867-1868, the year of famine. He w 
 a base intriguer, who, as a member of the co 
 mittee of distress, of which the Tsarevich w 
 president, tried to establish a party hostile to t 
 Minister of the Interior ; and he managed to entani 
 his august patron in a correspondence with Aksak 
 which fell at last into the hands of the sec 
 
ALEXANDER III. AS TSAREVICH. 7 
 
 police, and involved the Grand Duke in angry disputes 
 with Count Shuvalov. Subsequently Bogolyubov, a 
 painter, succeeded in becoming one of the confidants 
 of the Tsarevich. He made skilful use of the 
 general discontent with Alexander II.'s friendship for 
 Prussia in 1870, and raised against the Tsarevich 
 the suspicion of carrying on a systematic opposition 
 to his father's policy. At that time certain radical 
 worshippers of Gambetta were momentarily successful 
 in gaining the ear of the Tsarevich, and of obtaining 
 for him the reputation of entertaining ideas of a 
 decidedly constitutional character. The Commune 
 and the events of May, 1871, quickly dispelled these 
 foolish notions ; but the Tsarevich never retreated 
 from the position into which he had been driven. 
 
 These velleities, which were so little in keeping 
 with the transparent honesty of his character, and 
 which had been forced upon him, were only brought 
 to a close by the outbreak of the Turkish war. What 
 this war brought in its train was worse than anything 
 that had been seen before. After a promising begin- 
 ning, disappointment followed upon disappointment ; 
 one authority after another crumbled into dust, and 
 the Tsarevich was once more forced into opposition 
 with his father. The Tsarevich knew better than 
 the Tsar that the charges of embezzlement and 
 dishonesty made against the commander-in-chief 
 were only too well founded, that the impression pro- 
 duced by the defeats before Plevna had caused a 
 
8 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 threatening agitation in the minds of the soldiers, 
 and that the retirement of the Tsar to Gorny-Stjuden, 
 and his disappearance for weeks from the eyes of 
 the people, were fraught with serious dangers. The 
 memorial forwarded through Vorontsovto the seat 
 of war was addressed not to the Emperor, but to the 
 Tsarevich. In this memorial Aksakov proposed 
 the appointment of a central committee consisting 
 of delegates of all the zemstvos (provincial elective 
 boards), which should take the business in hand, and 
 find out more capable men than those who were 
 formerly army captains ; and it was not the fault of 
 the Tsarevich that this document was disregarded. 
 Deeply moved by the horrors of the war, which, as a 
 conscientious commander of an army corps, he had 
 become acquainted with in all their terrible details, 
 the Tsarevich on his return from the seat of war 
 produced on all those who happened to see him the 
 impression of a thorough pessimist. And how this 
 pessimism was nourished by subsequent events ! 
 The Berlin Congress tore up the Treaty of San 
 Stefano, and gave a terrible dementi to the policy of 
 his friend Count Ignatiev. Some months later the 
 era of uninterrupted outiages set in, causing panic 
 in the Court, the town, and the provinces, and shat- 
 tering the nerves of the threatened. And as if that 
 were not enough, the scandal which Alexander II. 
 had caused by his double marriage began to be 
 generally known, and wounded the strictly moral 
 
ALEXANDER III. AS TSAREVICH. 9 
 
 heir to the throne in his tenderest feelings. It was 
 only with difficulty that he succeeded in preventing 
 the projected publication (1880) of his father's second 
 marriage. 
 
 Experiences of so staggering a nature might have 
 disturbed the balance of the strongest and most 
 resolute character. But such a character the second 
 son of Alexander 11. had never been, and could not 
 have been under the given circumstances. Naturally 
 severe and simple-minded, the Tsarevich, from his 
 twentieth year, had stood under the weight of a task 
 whose magnitude was above his powers and his 
 education. He was torn hither and thither by 
 impressions of the most contradictory kind. He 
 was deceived in everything which he had accepted 
 as fixed and authoritative. He was excluded from 
 all participation in the business which should form 
 the work of his life, and from the nature of his posi- 
 tion he was prevented from sharing with trusted 
 friends the burden imposed upon him. The conse- 
 quence of all this was that he lost confidence in 
 himself and in his powers. His grandfather had 
 tried one system, his father the opposite, and both 
 were baffled — both had found out that the instrument 
 of war had failed at the critical moment, just as the 
 painfully elaborated civil order had done, and that a 
 desertion had followed the failure, making the pro- 
 fessions of the most loyal people in the earth appear 
 a mockery and a lie. Where should belief in the 
 
lo RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 future and confidence in oneself be found, in the 
 midst of a chaos which seemed incomparably worse 
 than anything which had ever been experienced in 
 the so-called " pagan " lands of the West ? 
 
 The catastrophe of March ist (13th) happened, as 
 is well known, on the day on which Alexander II. 
 had resolved to call an assembly composed of re- 
 presentatives of all the provincial zemstvos. He 
 acted on the advice of three of his most prominent 
 ministers — Loris Melikov, Milyutin, and Abaza, the 
 Minister of Finance. It was only when the horrified 
 son stood before the shockingly mutilated corpse of 
 his father that he became acquainted with the par- 
 ticulars of the resolution which had been taken.' 
 
 Its authors had stood aloof from the new Emperor, 
 and did their best to keep him in as complete igno- 
 rance of the important measure as he had been of all 
 that had been proposed and undertaken during the 
 last stormy years. Could it be wondered at, then, 
 that the opposite policy which had always been 
 powerful at the Court, amongst the generals and 
 the bureaucracy, should in the hour of universal 
 panic prevail ? The phrase used in the time of 
 the Commune, " C'est la que menent les idfees," 
 expressed the feeling in men's minds, and by impli- 
 cation the future course of action. Liberal ideas 
 had been powerless to avert crime and confusion : 
 consequently the alternative was Absolutism — abso- 
 ' See Appendix, Nofe 3. 
 
ALEXANDER III. AS TSAREVICH. ii 
 
 lute power as the absolute end. Modern ideas were 
 responsible for the Nihilistic corruption of the rising 
 generation : by this was meant that the " orthodox " 
 Church — the immaculate - Byzantine patriarchal 
 Church — was the only salvation for society. The 
 objection that a systematic war against modern 
 ideas would tend to the same disastrous results as 
 had been experienced under Nicholas, was met by 
 the most effective cry of modern times — National- 
 ism. Nationalism, pure and simple, that is, the 
 absolute elimination of every Western European 
 element, had not been tried as a solution of the 
 problem, either under Alexander II. or Nicholas: no 
 disaster had at any rate followed from its application. 
 It might be that this talisman at once old and new 
 would prove an efficacious remedy.^ 
 
 The simplicity of this logic corresponded in every 
 respect to the mode of thought of the young ruler, 
 who had remained untouched by Western culture. 
 The only question was, and is, how far the character 
 of Alexander III. was fitted to undertake such an 
 enormous task. Agitated by a hundred doubts, 
 fundamentally at variance with the contradictions of 
 modern life, naturally uncertain, filled with the 
 deepest distrust of himself, this son of the reformer 
 Alexander II. felt himself constrained to pursue a 
 line of policy which had brought the strong-willed 
 Nicholas to grief. 
 
 ' See Appendix, Note 4. 
 
II. 
 
 ALEXANDER III. AS ABSOLUTE RULER. 
 
 Friends and foes are agreed that the present abso- 
 lute ruler of all the Russians possesses in an un- 
 usual degree the virtues of an estimable private man. 
 He is an excellent husband, a loving father, an 
 economical and conscientious master of his house. 
 He has an antipathy to all kinds of untruthfulness, 
 immorality, and frivolity, and he is distinguished for 
 the industry and punctuality with which he fulfils 
 the duties of his high calling. Disinclined to every 
 kind of coquetry, he goes his own way without court- 
 ing the favour and applause of the people, and with- 
 out using any of those little arts by which men in 
 his station are wont to ingratiate themselves. When 
 one sees him for the first time he looks as severe and 
 imperious as his grandfather. Like him, too, Alex- 
 ander III. is firm, resolute, averse to all concessions, 
 and so completely penetrated with the right of his 
 personality and his exceptional position, that inac- 
 
ALEXANDER III. AS ABSOLUTE RULER. 13 
 
 cessibility to foreign influences and to considerations 
 of doubt or apprehension can be easily understood. 
 
 If direction of the will and peculiarity of character 
 were synonymous, and if it were possible for any 
 man so to mould his character as he chose, then this 
 conception of Alexander III. would be accurate. 
 But it is not so. And because no man can be 
 otherwise than as he has been formed by nature, so 
 Alexander is not the man he would wish to be and 
 to seem, but entirely different. These words of the 
 poet apply to him :— 
 
 " Wie an dem Tag, der dich der Welt verliehen, 
 Die Sonne stand zum Grusse der Planeten 
 Bist alsobald nur fort und fort gediehen, 
 Nach dem Gesetz, wonach du angetreten, 
 So inuszt du sein, rfzV kannst du nicht entflielien." 
 
 The present Emperor's innate nature is impres- 
 sionable, and ever prone to beat variance with itself; 
 his contact with the world (as we have seen) has 
 driven him to distrust and doubt both himself and 
 others : in spite of his most strenuous endeavours to 
 become a self-sufficient autocrat, he has never suc- 
 ceeded in the process. His characteristic reserve 
 arises partly from an inborn and invincible shyness, 
 partly from a want of self-confidence. The unde- 
 viating persistence in following out a given line of 
 action represents a sense of duty which has been 
 painfully acquired ; it does not proceed from an inner 
 necessity. The Emperor is almost impervious to 
 
14 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the counsel and opinions of other people — not 
 because he always has his own private opinion in 
 which he puts implicit trust, but because he holds it 
 as a duty to be and to appear incapable of being 
 influenced, and because he fears the appearance of 
 dependence still more than dependence itself. Von 
 Manteuffel, the Prussian minister's much-ridiculed 
 saying " that a strong man can afford to take one 
 step backwards," applies to the Emperor e contravio. 
 If he were stronger than he is, he would be more 
 yielding, and if he had greater reliance in his own 
 powers and a stronger will, the appearance of yielding 
 would not trouble him. It cannot be disputed that 
 life has taught him distrust of others; but the source 
 from which this springs is distrust of himself and of 
 his capacity. He arrives at a decision with a certain 
 vehemence, because all decisions are troublesome to 
 him. " Lorsqu'il prend une fois un parti, il veut 
 avec fougue pour n'^tre pas oblig6 de vouloir long- 
 temps." Alexander III. 's repugnance to the Western 
 European system is closely bound up with this inner 
 instability of his nature. It is in part founded upon 
 the wish of the Emperor, at least in this one point, 
 to possess a bond of union with the instinct of the 
 people, and a reserve power in case of need, but 
 more especially upon the thought that the Western 
 development is, in his eyes, an uncanny and incom- 
 mensurable quantity, which must be introduced as 
 little as possible, and reckoned with as quickly as 
 
ALEXANDER III. AS ABSOLUTE RULER. 15 
 
 possible. The peculiarities so often mentioned in 
 the daily life of the Tsar are explained by this con- 
 tradiction between his own real nature and the 
 nature of his duties, which excludes all dependence 
 on others. He prefers to transact business with his 
 ministers and generals rather by writing than by 
 word of mouth, as he wishes to avoid the discussion 
 of subjects with which he is unacquainted. As a 
 matter of duty he receives hundreds of his subjects 
 from all parts of his enormous Empire ; but he never 
 allows them to discuss minute points, because he 
 fears explanations which may lead to difficulties. 
 He avoids as far as possible direct and lengthy trans- 
 actions with foreign diplomatists, because he has no 
 confidence in his power of estimating them at their 
 proper value, and because he has less facility in 
 expressing himself in French than he would like to 
 avow. Conscientious and industrious, he has gradu- 
 ally learnt to master the little round of his official 
 - duties : what lies outside this is carefully avoided, and 
 for this reason meetings and intercourse with foreign 
 monarchs are limited to the utmost (his friendly and 
 unpretentious father-in-law naturally excepted). The 
 fear of being forced to play a second part follows 
 the grandson of the "infallible" Nicholas like a 
 phantom. As is natural, the depression of the Tsar, 
 who is constantly preoccupied in, fulfilling the duties 
 of his position, communicates itself to his entourage, 
 and this depression produces a feeling of discomfort 
 
1 6 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 in the life of the Court which cannot be disputed by 
 the most friendly witnesses. Although personally 
 courageous he feels the prudential considerations that 
 have to be taken with regard to the thousand dangers 
 that surround him so galling as to deprive life of all 
 its joy. Crushed by his official position, and com- 
 pelled to constant repression of his true nature, he 
 rises above the contradiction between being and 
 seeming most of all during those periodical visits 
 which he makes to the Court of Denmark. Here, 
 where the feeling of responsibility is cast aside, he 
 can give free play to his frank, pleasant, robust 
 nature, but in the ordinary course of things he 
 represses his feelings with a painful conscientious- 
 ness. Still the inner discord betrays itself to the 
 attentive observer everywhere — in the salon, on 
 parade, and even in the midst of festivities. The 
 appearance of the tall, stately, vigorous man with 
 the fine broad forehead betokens a mixture of 
 strength and weakness, disdainful pride and invin- 
 cible shyness, a mind constantly occupied with 
 itself. This explains how he, who as a prince was 
 merely unsociable, ^ has arrived at a degree of isola- 
 tion within the last few years which surpasses any- 
 thing ever shown by his predecessors. 
 
 Intercourse with his so-called intimate friends is 
 strictly limited. Relations with persons standing 
 outside the usual circle are almost excluded, and. in 
 " See Appendix, Note 5. 
 
ALEXANDER III. AS ABSOLUTE RULER. 17 
 
 the place of a personal exchange of views with the 
 advisers of the throne there has arisen more and 
 more a preference for documentary work and written 
 intercourse, which, according to the views of the 
 initiated, works very successfully. 
 
 From what has been said there will be no diffi- 
 culty in drawing a conclusion. If the strange 
 saying that private morality vitiates political mo- 
 rality were not a hundred years old, it would be 
 easy to imagine that the phrase had been coined 
 specially for the present Emperor and his mode of 
 government. Since the failure of the ministry of that 
 " man of genius," Count Ignatiev, in t88i, Alexander 
 III. has preferred to surround himself with ministers 
 whose blamelessness in private relations shall serve 
 as a guarantee for their political trustworthiness and 
 professional usefulness. That " honourable medi- 
 ocrity leads to no difficulties " has been so abun- 
 dantly proved by one part of the gentlemen appointed 
 that nothing further need be said on this point. But 
 the other part consists of the most dangerous of all 
 classes of statesmen, namely, of the " conspicuously 
 upright " fanatics of reflection, men whose upright- 
 ness is exceeded by a still more conspicuous narrow- 
 ness and shortsightedness.^ To make matters worse, 
 these are the only high functionaries to whom the 
 Emperor (always anxious about his independence) 
 occasionally allows a predominating influence. The 
 ' See Appendix, Note 6. 
 3 
 
1 8 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 power of recognising capacity and ability and supe- 
 rior talents, and of making use of them, is limited to 
 strong, self-confident natures : where these qualities 
 fail, talent is opposed by a distrust which fails to 
 assert itself in the presence of a fanaticism which is 
 and appears honourable. That strong convictions 
 make an incomparably greater impression on Alex- 
 ander III. than well-reasoned-out opinions may be 
 honourable to his moral character ; the gain to 
 Europe and to Russia would be incomparably 
 greater if the contrary were the case. Perhaps the 
 greatest part of our troubles in international ques- 
 tions is to be traced back to the apprehension of the 
 Emperor with regard to foreign and especially 
 German influences.^ 
 
 The more the opinions and proposals, which had 
 penetrated from the West of Europe, were un- 
 impeachable, the more suspiciously were they re- 
 ceived ; while it was the custom to look upon 
 the productions of the national and ecclesiastical 
 fanaticism of races as a special advantage, inasmuch 
 as "they spoke not to the head, but to the heart." 
 As if the convictions of the heart possessed a privilege 
 of infallibility which has been denied to the intel- 
 lectual judgments, and as if subordination on rational 
 grounds were less honourable than subordination to 
 the strong impulses of others 1^ There are indeed 
 
 ' See Appendix, Note 7. 
 
 ' And are there stronger impulses than those ot envy, which 
 is the mainspring of Russian Chauvinism ? 
 
ALEXANDER III. AS ABSOLUTE RULER. 19 
 
 instincts which are more certain than carefully 
 elaborated reasonings, but such instincts are not 
 found among "the conspicuously upright" or fana- 
 tical natures, but only among " gifted natures." 
 Men of genius are to be found in the entourage of 
 Alexander III. as rarely as they were under his 
 predecessors, and, if they ever should be discovered, 
 their fate would be very little different to that of the 
 philosopher's stone : — 
 
 " Und fanden sie den Stein der Weisen 
 Die Weisen mangelten dem Stein." 
 
 But this will be treated more fully afterwards. 
 Here nothing but the personality of the Tsar 
 comes under consideration, and this has given rise 
 to many false criticisms. Of these only one need be 
 mentioned. Alexander, in contradistinction to his 
 father, whose nervous, emotional, and weak nature 
 was alloyed with a considerable element of internal 
 frigidity, is in his disposition violent and passionate. 
 Accustomed to keep his inner nature in check and 
 under the control of reason, he can, when once he 
 breaks loose, storm and rave with as little heed to 
 consequences as his dreaded grandfather ever did. 
 The reports which are current on this point are not 
 without foundation, but they are for the most part 
 greatly exaggerated. The atmosphere of painful 
 restraint which pervades the Court shows that these 
 outbursts of passion are not infrequently directed 
 
20 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 against intimate and dear friends (at times the 
 dearest), but it proves at the same time that these 
 explosions arise from physical causes, and that they 
 have nothing in common with the strictly estimable 
 moral nature of the man. 
 
III. 
 
 THE EMPRESS AND HER SURROUNDINGS. 
 
 More female sovereigns have reigned in Russia 
 than in any other modern State, and for this 
 reason nowhere have the wives of the ruling 
 monarchs exercised so small an influence on the 
 Government as they have in Russia. So it was 
 under Paul, under Nicholas, under the first and 
 second Alexander, and so it has remained under 
 Alexander III. It is even of greater importance, 
 as the marriage of the present Emperor has turned 
 out happier and more untroubled than that of any 
 of his predecessors. It has contributed to this 
 happiness that the absolute ruler has never felt 
 himself obliged to offer any opposition to the influ- 
 ence of his wife. Whether a correct appreciation 
 of her husband's character, or an innate lack of self- 
 assertion, has had the chief share in the habitual 
 self-effacement of the daughter of Christian IX., is 
 an open question. As a matter of fact Maria 
 Feodorovna always showed herself satisfied with 
 
22 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 her position as wife of the Tsar, and in this way 
 laid the foundation for the happiness of her house 
 and her married life : it is for this reason that she 
 has obtained immense popularity in Russia.^ It may 
 be incidentally remarked that the Danish-Russian 
 marriage had been since the beginning of the 'sixties 
 a project which was regarded with favour by both 
 Courts, and that the removal of the obstacles which 
 had repeatedly come in the way was a source of real 
 satisfaction to the Russian people, inasmuch as they 
 desired that the next Empress should not be a 
 German. The first obstacle presented itself in the 
 winter of 1863-1864. Democratic Denmark's friendly 
 demonstrations in favour of Poland in 1863 were 
 still rankling in Gorchakov's breast when the 
 outbreak of the Schleswig-Holstein war, and the 
 insults heaped in consequence by the Copenhagen 
 mob on the ladies of the Glucksburg dynasty, caused 
 uneasiness to the friends of this marriage project. A 
 year later the eldest son of Alexander II., who had 
 been betrothed to the Princess Dagmar, died, and it 
 appeared questionable whether the same intimate 
 relations could be maintained between the two 
 houses. That this was practicable has materially 
 contributed to the favourable reception the Empress 
 has received from the very first, and her winning 
 ways have since ingratiated her in the hearts of the 
 people. 
 
 ' See Appendix, Note 8. 
 
THE EMPRESS AND HER SURROUNDINGS. 23 
 
 Natural vivacity and an optimistic temperament 
 have enabled her, in spite of a nervous excitability, 
 to cheer her husband in the midst of his incessant 
 conflicts with himself and the v^^orld. The Emperor 
 has nothing to fear from female influence, for it is 
 never directed to subjects of a political nature. It 
 has been occasionally rumoured that the Empress's 
 sympathies are with the Finns, but it has never been 
 suggested that these sympathies would be translated 
 into acts, as it well might have been when the 
 question of the exceptional position of the northern 
 province arose. Maria Feodorovna's aspirations are 
 the most moderate possible. If the Empress now 
 and again takes a womanly interest in the " lions " 
 of the Court balls or the admirers of her favourite 
 ladies, it is done in so naive and simple a way that 
 no one can well be angry with the high go-between 
 even in cases of failure. 
 
 It is precisely because the Emperor has become 
 unsociable, and because his participation in Court 
 festivities gives him pleasure only in exceptional 
 cases, that he is glad that his wife finds inexhaustible 
 joy in dancing and amusements, even though she 
 runs up bills to the goddess of Fashion, which are 
 not seldom as long as those of Josephine, the first 
 wife of Napoleon, who spent half her life in her 
 dressing-room. 
 
 The Empress has the virtue of living peaceably 
 with everybody (including her brother-in-law and 
 
24 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 sister-in-law) and in threading her way with equal 
 cleverness through the cliques and intrigues which 
 are simply unavoidable at Courts. That she meets 
 the Emperor's occasional outbreaks of violence with 
 extraordinary tact can be easily understood in the 
 case of a woman of so happy and discreet a nature. 
 
 Maria Feodorovna's buoyancy and cheerfulness 
 have, it must be confessed, already received one 
 shock. Although the Empress was able to overcome 
 the heavy trials and dangers of the last year of the 
 former reign and the first years of Alexander III.'s 
 reign with apparent lightness of heart, yet the rail- 
 way catastrophe at Borki unhinged her completely. 
 For weeks her highly- strung nerves were unable to 
 recover from the impression of those terrible pictures 
 of destruction, and for a considerable time a regimen 
 of care and rest had to be observed — a striking con- 
 trast to her former habits at Court. The fear that 
 the terrible day would leave permanent traces be- 
 hind, and necessitate the entrance of the Empress 
 into a hospital, has, however, not been realised, and 
 the imperial Court has almost regained its former 
 appearance. 
 
 In the palace of Anichkov, as well as at Gatchina, 
 the old breathless rush of society prevails : this is 
 regarded by its devotees as desirable and pleasant, 
 as it leaves no spare time for quiet contemplation 
 and reflection. Montenegrin and Greek, Hessian 
 and Mecklenburgian visits, betrothals, marriage 
 
THE EMPRESS AND HER SURROUNDINGS. 25 
 
 schemes, travels and projects of travel, have pressed 
 thick on one another for the last few years, as if to 
 show that considerations for the physical and moral 
 health of the Empress were no longer necessary. 
 
 A change in the personnel of the Empress's 
 household was effected in the year of the catas- 
 trophe at Borki which deserves casual notice. The 
 position of chief mistress of the Court (grande 
 maitresse de la maison) became vacant through the 
 decease of the Princess Helena Kochubei. The 
 place was filled by the Countess Stroganov, widowed 
 Princess Byeloseliskaya, nee Bibikov. The well- 
 known Princess Helena was regarded by exclusive 
 society as the chief and most prominent representa- 
 tive of the best aristocratic traditions of the " good 
 old times." She was the daughter-in-law of Victor 
 Pavlovich Kochubei (formerly Minister of the In- 
 terior, and afterwards Chancellor of the Empire), 
 who died in 1834, ^^^ who was loaded with decora- 
 tions and distinctions by Alexander I. and Nicholas. 
 Coming to the Court at an early age, and being as 
 intimately acquainted with its traditions, customs, 
 and prejudices as with distinguished society abroad 
 (especially the Courts of Prussia and Baden), she 
 rendered very important service to the Empress for 
 many years ; she exercised an extensive and bene- 
 ficial influence upon her demeanour, and played a 
 part which has been compared to that assigned to 
 the Countess Voss at the Court of Queen Louisa of 
 
26 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 Prussia. Naturally these services were limited to 
 such questions as the strict and conscientious 
 observance of etiquette and advice in personal 
 questions. The old princess, knovi^n to everybody 
 by her grave outward appearance, was looked upon 
 by society as a grande dame who was distinguished 
 from the rest of her class only by reason of her 
 greater pretensions and the sharpness of her tongue. 
 The priests and devotees of etiquette maintain that 
 it would be impossible to find another grande 
 maitresse de la maison either in Russia or elsewhere 
 equally prominent and equall}' well fitted to all the 
 duties of her office. Sober-minded people, on the 
 other hand, are of opinion that the Empress who 
 has been the centre of society for a decade is no 
 longer in need of a grande maitresse to act at once as 
 her duenna and adviser. Antonina Bludov, maid of 
 honour to the Empress, has no influence with her. 
 She belongs to the fanatical ecclesiastical school of 
 Tolstoi and Pobyedonostsev ; she was regarded in her 
 time as a woman of intellect and enterprise: accord- 
 ingly she possesses none of those qualities which are 
 attractive to a young princess whose mind is directed 
 to the luxury and splendour of life. 
 
 Prince Ivan Galitsin, the well-known and dis- 
 tinguished "master of the Court," who is imbued 
 with the traditions of Kochubei, has troubled 
 himself as little about the business and financial 
 direction of the household as did the deceased 
 
THE EMPRESS AA'D HER SURROUNDINGS. 27 
 
 grande maiiresse de la maison, who was even 
 more " distinguished." This unthankful function 
 has long devolved upon Oom, secretaire des com- 
 mandements, and a privy councillor. Oom has been 
 in the service of the Court for a generation. He 
 is the son of a highly respected mother (long 
 since dead) who was directress of the large Found- 
 ling Hospital {Vospitatelni Doni), which belongs to 
 the department of the reigning Empress. The 
 directress was also brought up at the Court, and 
 has left behind her a reputation for great energy. 
 Among the ladies of honour (who, in contradis- 
 tinction to the maids of honour, are married, and 
 do not live in the palace), Princess Elise (Betty) 
 Baryatinsky (widow of the field-marshal) is the best 
 known, because she was in her day one of the 
 queens and leaders of the fashionable world, and 
 gave it its tone — qualities which have nothing in 
 common with intellectual importance and actual 
 influence. For this reason it is not worth while 
 to enter into the connection of Baryatinsky with the 
 Dolgorukies, and the part played by this family. 
 They are of no account either politically or officially. 
 Only a few of the higher officials maintain regular 
 relations with the Court and Court society : the 
 majority of the Emperor's advisers and dignitaries 
 belong to circles of an entirely different description. 
 They are immersed so deeply in official cares that 
 they have no time left for the excitement of the 
 
28 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER ID. 
 
 salon. In spite of all " Conservative " traditions, 
 the days are past in which " elegant men " and high 
 dignitaries were convertible terms, and this applies 
 to St. Petersburg with as great, if not greater, force 
 than to the rest of the European capitals. The 
 doings of exclusive society have lost the last rem- 
 nant of their significance and content, from the very 
 time when Liberal ideas went out of fashion, and 
 when political salons exercised no longer an in- 
 fluence on the State. Such circles as were to be 
 found thirty years ago in the Michael Palace, and at 
 times in the Marble Palace, exist no longer, and 
 cannot exist, for the watchword has gone forth from 
 the highest place, that affairs of State concern the 
 Emperor alone and his officials, and that society 
 must confine itself to pastimes and representations. 
 The example set by the Empress in this domain is 
 authoritative, and the society which she leads is not 
 in a position to raise itself above the level marked 
 out for them by her. It has always been considered 
 bon ton to show readiness in yielding to the highest 
 wishes, with the exception of the short period of the 
 Liberal exuberance which lasted from i860 to 1864. 
 The present position is more absolute than ever: 
 a generation has grown up which takes a delight in 
 opposing, for the sake of opposition, the tendencies 
 of the former reign, and which believes itself to be 
 " national," when it stands aloof from West 
 European and other ideas. 
 
IV. 
 
 THE SMALL COURTS. 
 
 The private lives and characteristic peculiarities of 
 the brothers, uncles, and cousins of the Emperor 
 Alexander III. are as well and perhaps better known 
 both in and out of Russia than they deserve 
 to be. The romantic relation (probably ending in 
 a secret marriage) which subsisted for years between 
 Alexis, the Emperor's second brother, and a lady 
 who is at present living in Dresden and married to 
 an officer, has long been a favourite subject with 
 German novelists of the third class. The so-called 
 Count Paul Vasily has thought it necessary to go 
 into a multitude of details with regard to Alexis's 
 more or less Platonic affection for the beautiful 
 Countess Zeneida Beauharnais {nee Skobelev). What 
 goddess is at present being worshipped by the Grand 
 Duke I do not know, and perhaps the inconstant 
 Amadis does not know himself. Alexis is forty-one : 
 he has remained a bachelor — a thing which has never 
 happened before in the annals of the house of 
 
30 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 Gottorp-Romanov. His position in the imperial 
 family is an exceptional one. As is fitting for an 
 admiral of the Russian fleet, he as a rule spends part 
 of the year abroad, and when at all possible in 
 a "port town of the future," namely, Paris. Admiral 
 Shestakov (successor of Pechurov) superintended 
 the marine department .from 1882 : he has been 
 succeeded by Admiral Chichagov, for many years 
 the director of the Black Sea Company. It is as 
 well known that Alexis has preferred dry land to 
 the sea, and has worshipped other goddesses than 
 Thetis, as that the influences (female as well as 
 male) brought to bear upon him have usually been 
 as violent as they are short-lived. His preference 
 for cities, " dont le diable a fait son paradls," he 
 shares with his youngest brother, the Grand Duke 
 Paul, whose bachelor days, however, have be^n cut 
 short through his marriage with the Greek Pripcess, 
 Alexandra. 
 
 The position which the Grand Duke Vladimir, the 
 eldest of the Emperor's brothers, occupies, or has 
 been made to occupy, in the State and in society, is 
 an incomparably more important one. On several 
 occasions the " favourite brother of the Emperor " 
 has stood in the foreground of public notice. The 
 first time was when the Emperor, in the event of his 
 early death, conferred the regency upon him while 
 the successor to the throne was still an infant 
 (1881), the second time (1887) when he was com- 
 
THE SMALL COURTS. 31 
 
 missioned by the Emperor to visit the Baltic 
 provinces, in order to put down the political dis- 
 content which was raging there. In the first case 
 he had not the opportunity of proving his qualities 
 as a statesman, in the second the desired oppor- 
 tunity remained unimproved, because it was in the 
 main factitious, and because Vladimir had received 
 instructions from Russia against which his counter 
 proposals were in vain, and which excluded from the 
 very first all possibility of success. The whole 
 undertaking presented on a small scale a pendant 
 to Von Kaulbar's Bulgarian mission ; the only 
 difference was that no imperial chamberlain of the 
 quahty of Sluchevsky had been attached to the 
 latter to act as the chronicler of its failure. Since 
 that time the favourite brother of the Emperor has 
 been talked about so little except by scandal- 
 mongers, that his ill-humour is easily explained. 
 Agricultural and other exhibitions, in which the 
 Maecenas of " agriculture " had taken an interest, 
 have not been held for a considerable time. The 
 duties of the generalship of the first garde du corps 
 and of the first military district might have been 
 entrusted to Kostanda, the general of artillery 
 and chief of the staff, without leaving unsatisfied 
 Vladimir's very moderate desire for business. 
 
 Vladimir's wife, Maria Pavlovna, the Mecklenburg 
 princess, is of an active disposition ; she is un- 
 doubtedly the most intellectual woman in the 
 
32 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 imperial family, and next to the Empress is 
 talked about than any one else. Her position 
 the beginning has been a difficult one. She ha 
 courage and the honour, on the occasion o; 
 marriage, to make conditions guaranteeing tha 
 should be allowed to retain her old religious \ 
 A similar case had not happened for a hundred 
 fifty years.i Her difficulties have increased sii 
 has become known that she possesses a ce 
 independence of judgment, and is not th 
 prevented from enjoying the friendship of 
 imperial sister-in-law. Absurd stories, inv 
 by French pamphleteers, and echoed by Ru 
 dunces, have been circulated about her. SI 
 represented as the champion and agent pf Bism 
 ian ideas, as the fomenter of far-re^hing Ge 
 intrigues, and as the destroyer of everything e 
 tially Russian. These charges are not woi 
 moment's notice. The princess is persecuted 
 slandered because she is Lutheran, and ha 
 mained so, and because she has indepeni 
 enough not to deny her German origin and cu 
 Besides, with her experience of life she unders 
 too well what she owes to the position whicl 
 occupies as a member of the imperial family 
 the duties entailed by the dependence oi 
 husband on the head of the State, to thii 
 
 ' Peter the Great's daughter-in-law, Charlotte of Brui 
 (the wife of Alexis, the Tsarevich), did not change her n 
 
THE SMALL COURTS. 33 
 
 defying the Russian national sentiment, or of 
 interfering in the smallest degree in questions of 
 a political nature. In the present condition of 
 things even the appearance of a certain indepen- 
 dence or the tendency to appreciate nationalism at 
 its true value is sufficient to rouse the slanderous 
 disposition of the "loyal" autochthonous champions. 
 In all cases where the claims of the national mania 
 remain unsatisfied, its prophets immediately spread 
 accusations and calumnies which would have been 
 morally impossible under former Governments. It 
 would be difficult to say positively whether Maria 
 Pavlovna alw^ays takes the right course from a social 
 point of view. It is a matter of fact that she shows 
 tact in defending her married position without 
 injuring herself, that her relations with the imperial 
 family are entirely satisfactory, and that she has 
 been able to make herself respected even in those 
 quarters where nothing but malevolence was shown 
 her. But with all these advantages she has to suffer. 
 Persons of princely rank are more harshly judged 
 than ordinary mortals if they are real personalities, 
 and differentiate themselves as such from the non- 
 entities, who enjoy the popular favour because they 
 regard swimming with the stream as the essence 
 of all wisdom. 
 
 Besides the Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna the 
 imperial family includes two other members who 
 do not belong to the Greek Orthodox Church — a 
 
 4 
 
34 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 circumstance which may be connected with the 
 new ukase with respect to the creed of the Empress 
 and with the preference for Montenegrin marriages 
 which has come into fashion. The amiable Princess 
 Elizabeth of Hesse, niece of Queen Victoria, who 
 was married five years ago to the Grand Duke 
 Sergius, third brother of the Emperor, remained 
 true to her creed until within a short time since, 
 and the wife of the Emperor's cousin, the Grand 
 Duke Constantine Constantinovich, nee Princess of 
 Sachsen-Altenberg, still retains her old faith. These 
 ladies are too young and too diffident to make their 
 influence felt in society or to cut out a path for 
 themselves, but they enjoy a deserved popularity, 
 especially the former, whose position in society is in 
 this respect different from her husband's. The fact 
 that the good examples of rulers are not so eagerly 
 followed as their blunders and their outward 
 demeanour, has been shown also in Russia, where 
 the example of the Emperor's excellent domestic 
 relations has unfortunately been imitated least of 
 all where it was to be expected. 
 
 The social position of the two uncles of the 
 Emperor deserves only a moment's notice. The 
 Grand Duke Constantine Nikolaevich,^ who was 
 at one time general-admiral and vice-regent of 
 Poland, passed out of notice, when he retired from 
 the influential position which had been assigned to 
 ' Died in 1892.— Et>. 
 
THE SMALL COURTS. 35 
 
 him during the lifetime of his brother the Emperor. 
 In spite of the severe strictures which have been 
 made against the character and conduct of this 
 exceptionally capable prince, and in spite of the 
 seclusion in which he and his benevolent and noble 
 wife have lived for a number of years, it must be 
 confessed that Constantine Nikolaevich's removal 
 left a perceptible gap. The second son of the 
 Emperor Nicholas dominated his immediate environ- 
 ment not only by reason of his natural endowments, 
 but even more by the cultivation of his faculties. It 
 was of special value that at least one Court could be 
 named in St. Petersburg where learned men and 
 artists could frequently meet together, and where 
 other interests than those of society and external 
 show were cultivated. Even after the Grand Duke 
 had laid aside the violoncello in which he was 
 fairly proficient, and after the death of his brother 
 artists, Knecht and Davuidov, musical entertain- 
 ments were not unusual in the Marble Palace, 
 recalling the classical times long since passed away 
 of the Grand Duchess Helena, of the two Counts 
 Wielchorsky, and of General A. Livov. No trace 
 will be left of this and of much else when the Grand 
 Duke dies. His eldest son is a " lost man," who is 
 not permitted to leave the place appointed for him 
 years ago on the Asiatic frontier ; the two younger 
 Princes, Constantine and Dimitri, are imperial aides- 
 de-camps, and enjoy a good reputation ; the elder, as 
 
36 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 has been said, is the husband of Princess Elizabeth, 
 the younger is unmarried. 
 
 The second uncle of the Emperor, Grand Duke 
 Nicholas, who was commander-in-chief from 1877, 
 general field-marshal, general inspector of cavalry, 
 &c., has long since ceased to play a public part."^ Of 
 his private doings it will be better to say nothing. 
 The Grand Duke Michael, besides holding other 
 offices, is president of the chamber, the highest 
 position of rank there is in the Russian Empire. 
 The former governor of the Caucasus has, on account 
 of his military vigour, his temperate zeal, and the 
 integrity of his character, won the favour of his 
 imperial nephew, and retained it in spite of differences 
 of opinion. His wife, a Princess of Baden, who is 
 reputed to be extremely clever and active, has made 
 him the father of a numerous and good-looking 
 family, consisting of six sons and one daughter (the 
 wife of the Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin). 
 Although — or because — the Grand Duke is president 
 of the Reichrath's plenum,^ he has never taken a 
 conspicuous part in politics, but has devoted himself 
 entirely to his military duties. He is a member of 
 the committee of the ministry, a general director of 
 artillery, general of the ordnance, and general field- 
 marshal. 
 
 ■ Died in 1891. — Ed. = See Appendix, Note 9. 
 
V. 
 
 PERSONALITIES OF THE COURT AND THE STATE. 
 
 In Russia there is no ministry and no ministerial 
 council : there are only individual ministers, who 
 as chiefs of departments are directly subordinate to 
 the Emperor, and transact affairs directly with him 
 (which is called in official language "making a Do/{/ff(i" 
 — a " report ") : the so-called committee of ministers 
 over which Bunge, the former minister of finance, 
 presides, is an administrative court of appeal whose 
 strictly limited power is of a formal nature, and 
 excludes essentially political decisions. 
 
 Of the advisers of the Crown only one belongs to 
 the small number of the Emperor's personal friends, 
 — Count Vorontsov-Dashkov, minister of the house- 
 hold and the Court. His position differs from that 
 of his colleagues in this also — that he belongs to the 
 so-called "elegant world" and mixes in all its 
 gaieties. Vorontsov-Dashkov is of the same age, 
 and married at the same time as the Emperor. He 
 has never manifested political ambition or shown 
 
 37 
 
38 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER ID. 
 
 any desire to take an active part in great political 
 questions. He manages his considerable " un- 
 squandered " (nepromStannoye) property with dig- 
 nity, and has gained the reputation of being as 
 honourable as he is unpretentious. As minister of 
 the imperial Court, he has used his influence mostly 
 in personal questions — outside this sphere he has 
 never made himself felt ; within it, very seldom. 
 Count and Countess Vorontsov rarely allow them- 
 selves to espouse the cause of third parties, because 
 they know they are surrounded by calumniators and 
 slanderers of all kinds and by persons who are 
 envious of them, and because they anxiously avoid 
 the suspicion of misusing the confidential position, 
 which they occupy, by forming a clique. Never to 
 become tiresome by asking favours for one's self or 
 others is the surest, the cheapest, and the only 
 means of gaining a reputation for unselfishness in 
 the eyes of royal personages. The observance of 
 this duty is carried out without difficulty by people 
 in the position of the Vorontsov-Dashkovs, as may 
 be easily understood. 
 
 There are only two dignitaries among the Court 
 officials who deserve to be mentioned — Prince 
 Obolensky and General Von Richter. Obolensky, 
 aide-de-camp and representative Marshal of the 
 Court, married the clever and intriguing Countess 
 Apraksin, formerly lady-in-waiting to the Empress, 
 when she was still Grand Duchess. Because he is 
 
PERSONALITIES OF COURT AND STATE. 39 
 
 on terms of the greatest intimacy with the Emperor, 
 he is the most respected and influential person at 
 the Court. This respect he will undoubtedly 
 maintain, as the possibility of entertaining an 
 opinion different to the Emperor's has never occurred 
 to him. Von Richter, the commander of the imperial 
 head-quarters, director of the commission of peti- 
 tions, imperial counsellor, and general adjutant, is 
 marked out by the Slavophils and other national 
 ultras as the head of the German party (as if there 
 was one !), because he is a German and a Protestant, 
 and does not deny the fact, and because he has no 
 sympathy with the persecution of the Germans 
 which has become fashionable. This has been 
 sufficient to brand him as a partisan of Prussia and as 
 a man of pronounced German sympathies, although 
 he is extremely retiring in his disposition, prudent, 
 and never occupied with questions of high politics. 
 In truth the general, who has had close relations 
 with the Emperor for years, and who is highly 
 respected by him for his integrity and his loyalty, 
 knows only too well the danger of the prevailing 
 tendency, and the odium which rests upon his 
 native province (Livonia) to allow of his entering 
 upon a course which would neither benefit himself 
 nor those concerned. Von Richter is a man of the 
 old school, the chief articles in whose creed are : 
 a belief in the traditional friendship subsisting 
 between Russia and Prussia, and a certain faith in 
 
40 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 aristocratism : he is not a devotee of the new 
 national political theory (Montenegro-ecstasy). The 
 charges that have been levelled against him are the 
 invention of a clique, to whom it is gall and bitter- 
 ness that a German and a Protestant should hold a 
 high position of trust at the Court of the national 
 Tsar, and that this circumstance recalls the times 
 when the names of Liewe, Benkendorff, Stuckelberg, 
 Mayendorff, Pahlen, &c., were as popular on the 
 banks of the Neva as those of certain Boyar races of 
 old Muscovite origin. What is said of Von Richter 
 holds good with respect to Von Giers, who has been 
 excused his non-Russian origin, but at the expense 
 of an attitude of caution and reserve from which 
 his opponents and rivals believe themselves to be 
 exempt. 
 
 Reference will be made later to the director of the 
 synod, and to the ministers of foreign affairs, the 
 interior, and justice. Next to these the name of 
 General Vannovsky, the minister of war, is oftenest 
 mentioned. He came into the Emperor's favour 
 when he was acting in the capacity of chief of the 
 staff of the army corps, commanded by the Tsare- 
 vich in 1878, and immediately after Milyutin's 
 retirement from office (April, 1881) he was ap- 
 pointed as his successor. He is highly respected 
 in the army for his soldierly qualities. With his 
 predecessor he has hardly anything in common, 
 except a pronounced dislike of the Prussian-German 
 
PERSONALITIES OF COURT AND STATE. 41 
 
 system, and a certain preference for France.^ The 
 present minister of war in questions of organisation 
 and fortification has taken an entirely new departure. 
 It is not Vannovsky, but General Obruchev, the 
 chief of the general staff, who is regarded as the 
 principal advocate of the Franco-Russo Alliance — an 
 idea which has been spread throughout the Russian 
 army. Obruchev's repeated visits to Paris during 
 the last years of Alexander II., apparently for 
 purposes of art, but really for the preparation of 
 plans of alliance, have become impossible under 
 the present regime. Neither the minister of war 
 nor the chief of the staff ought to aspire to antici- 
 pating the decisions of the Emperor and the future, 
 "which is known only to Providence;" but it is 
 none the less certain that they have certain ideas of 
 their own about the future, and that they hold fast 
 to the opinions of Skobelev, the great national hero.^ 
 The minister of education, Count Delyanov, has 
 thrown in his lot with the men of the future and 
 with nationalism : he is a man who really stands 
 with both feet on the ground of the past. Behind 
 this Russian sounding name there is hidden an aged 
 Armenian, whose real name is Delajanz. As the 
 protege of M. A. Korff, Delajanz first rose to power, 
 then he played the part of a Liberal for some time, 
 and finally made his way as the obedient pupil of the 
 great Katkov, who some ten years before dictated 
 ' See Appendix, Note 10. ' See Appendix, Note n. 
 
42 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 to the then assistant of Count D. Tolstoi the pro- 
 gramme for the organisation of the intermediate 
 scholastic institutions, and for the reform of the 
 universities — that is, a scheme for emasculating 
 them and making them innocuous. In spite of his 
 Armenian and plebeian origin the upstart Count 
 Delyanov plumes himself in belonging to the highest 
 society. His wife is regarded as fashionable, she 
 holds receptions, and receives diplomatists. His col- 
 league, Volkonsky, however, is really distinguished, 
 and being the descendant of the late field-marshal 
 and minister, Peter Volkonsk}', is connected with 
 half the nobility. Lastly, Privy-Councillor Polovtsov, 
 who is imperial secretary and chief of the chancellerie, 
 is intimately connected with the highest society. He 
 is of a gay disposition, and married the adopted 
 daughter and heiress of the richest banker of St. 
 Petersburg, Baron Stieglitz. He entertains largely : 
 high politics are sometimes discussed at his house, 
 but it is questionable whether the discussions lead to 
 anything. 
 
 Most of the statesmen of the former reign are dead 
 (Count Valuev, Count Milyutin, Abaza, Reuter, 
 &c.). The survivors have so completely vanished 
 from the scene that an examination of their charac- 
 teristic peculiarities would go beyond the scope of 
 the present work. 
 
VI. 
 
 VON GIEKS. 
 
 In 1864 Alexander II. said to a general governor of 
 non-Russian extraction, on his dismissal from office, 
 that it was only with the help of Russians born 
 and bred that he (the Emperor) could keep national 
 and orthodox fanatics in check : ihtnon- Russians and 
 non-orthodox were suspected by the national masses from 
 the very beginning, and consequently were bound hand 
 and foot. 
 
 These words of the Emperor (intended as a con- 
 solation) explain why Von Giers, the present 
 minister of foreign affairs, occupies a more difficult 
 position than any one of his colleagues : the remark 
 also applies to the only German minister of the 
 present Government, General Hiibbenet (from Li- 
 vonia), who was entrusted some months ago with 
 the direction of public buildings and roads.^ Both 
 men left their homes years ago ; both were brought 
 up in St. Petersburg educational establishments, and 
 both were steeped in Russian modes of thought ; but 
 ' He has already received his dismissal. — Ed. 
 
44 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 because German blood flows in their veins they are 
 looked at with envious eyes, and they must show 
 themselves as doubly national if they do not wish to 
 be branded as " traitors." Alexander III. intended 
 to take the direction of foreign affairs into his own 
 hands, and to emulate his grandfather in this 
 department. Nothing could have been more favour- 
 able for the carrying out of this idea than the 
 transference of the inheritance of Gorchakov to an 
 official with a foreign name, a Finn, who was al-- 
 together dependent upon the person of the Emperor, 
 and was surrounded by those who envied him and 
 were his enemies. Von Giers has, however, not 
 only become minister — he has remained one (which 
 means much more). For this he has clearly to thank 
 himself, and not the dependent position to which the 
 un-Russian sound of his name seems to condemn 
 him. 
 
 It is assumed that the reader knows that the 
 present minister of foreign affairs had filled the 
 higher offices of the State even in the time of Alex- 
 ander II., that he began his career as consul-general 
 in Moldavia- Wallachia, and there married a relation 
 of Gorchakov's ; that he subsequently filled several 
 positions in various embassies (Teheran, Stockholm, 
 &c.) ; that about the middle of the 'seventies he was 
 appointed to the senate, and that he undertook 
 from 1877 the double office of director of the 
 Asiatic department and assistant minister. It must, 
 
VON GlERS. 45 
 
 however, be called to mind that the nomination 
 of 1877 (the eve of the Turkish war) caused extra- 
 ordinary sensation at the time and gave rise to 
 many comments. It was the general opinion that 
 Privy-Councillor Stremukhov, the then director of 
 the Asiatic department, had long been destined to be 
 the successor of Westmann, who time out of mind 
 had been the chancellor's associate, but who was 
 then hopelessly ill. But to the astonishment of 
 everybody, Stremukhov was passed over : he was 
 so mortified that he sent in his resignation, and thus 
 the two most important positions in the ministry of 
 foreign affairs had to be filled up at the same time. 
 Two different versions were current as to the cause 
 of this notorious incident. According to one, private 
 matters of a very dubious character had made Stre- 
 mukhov impossible as an aspirant to the ministry ; 
 according to the other, considerations arising from 
 the hostility which existed between Stremukhov 
 and Ignatiev decided the question. It is a matter 
 of fact that they had been deadly enemies for years, 
 and that the ambassador at Constantinople was at 
 the height of his power in 1877. Suffice it to say 
 that Von Giers profited by this hostility, and that 
 Ignatiev also gained an indirect advantage from the 
 election which had turned out in favour of the Fin- 
 nish baron. Had it not been for the intervention of 
 Giers, the prophet of the " infallible bankruptcy of 
 Turkey," who had been brought to book for the 
 
46 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 numerous lies he had circulated during the conduct 
 of the war, would hardly have been permitted to take 
 part in the proceedings of San Stefano — a circum- 
 stance which, be it noted, contradicts the opinion 
 that Von Giers is a determined opponent of the 
 traditions of the Russian Eastern policy.^ Even 
 during the last years of the chancellor's life he was 
 virtual director of the foreign policy of the Govern- 
 ment, and after Gorchakov's death he was ap- 
 pointed minister. 
 
 That the best-abused Russian statesman of the 
 present day has been successful in maintaining his 
 position is due to several circumstances, and es- 
 pecially to the preference which the Emperor has 
 shown for men of an orderly, reliable, and respectable 
 character. The " renowned " Prince Gorchakov 
 could hardly be said to belong to men of this 
 category. Personally avaricious, he was entirely 
 indifferent to the expenditure which had to be borne 
 by an already overburdened State. As long as 
 Westmann remained in good health and capable 
 of performing his duties, he had looked after the 
 bureaucratic and financial administration in the 
 department of foreign affairs ; but after the death 
 of this hard-working and capable official an economic 
 system prevailed, which, taking even the traditional 
 standard, seemed unauthorised. Von Giers had 
 already, as colleague of the minister, brought about 
 ' See Appendix, Note 12. 
 
VON GIERS. 47 
 
 some change in this respect, and because his quiet, 
 serious, and modest disposition was personally 
 agreeable to the Emperor, he was entrusted, first 
 provisionally, afterwards definitively, with the chan- 
 cellorship. Silent, cautious, with no inclination for 
 the frivolities, intrigues, and vanities of high society, 
 he possessed two special qualities which endeared 
 him to the Emperor — minute acquaintance with 
 actual political relations and the method of trans- 
 acting business, and the power of making his authority 
 felt at the right time and the right place. He goes 
 from point to point, and knows and says exactly what 
 has to be done under the given circumstances ; on the 
 other hand, he is a thorough disbeliever in stereotyped 
 systems and principles, and sets himself resolutely 
 against explanations of a general nature. By never 
 anticipating the wishes of the Tsar, and by always 
 confining himself to the practical questions of the 
 moment and their solution, Giers makes it possible 
 for the Emperor to feel that he himself is the real 
 head of Russian policy. Von Giers, who is of a 
 retiring and taciturn nature, has never yet disclosed 
 his views to anybody on the Slav or the Eastern 
 question; nor has it ever leaked out whether he has 
 embraced the cause of France, or of the powers of 
 Central Europe ; whether he strives after a per- 
 manent or a provisional condition of peace, or what 
 he thinks of the future of Russia and Europe. He 
 seems to have been so moulded by nature as to feel 
 
48 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 little desire to form definite opinions of his own ; 
 hence it may be easier for him simply to act as the 
 docile executor of his monarch's orders, in which 
 capacity he is ably assisted by the highly-gifted 
 Sinovjev, a colleague of Ignatiev.' 
 
 Von Giers deals only with the immediate present, 
 and then only when the necessity for action has 
 arisen. There are good grounds for the opinion that 
 he is always to be found on the side of discretion, of 
 peace, and of reason, and that he is an opponent of 
 the Panslavist fanatics and the French-disposed 
 enemies of Germany ; but pronouncements and 
 avowals to that effect cannot be produced. If Von 
 Giers ever expresses himself on these questions it is 
 done in the form of dry interrogatories. With the 
 greatest possible quietness and attentiveness he 
 interrogates the sages of the bold and " truly 
 national " policy as to the chances which the moment 
 offers for the attainment of their national aim,s, as to 
 the resources at their command for undertaking their 
 great enterprises, as to the prospective operation of 
 a disturbance of the peace, on economic relations 
 and the budget of the current year, as to the names 
 of those Parisian statesmen with whom alliances 
 can be concluded against both the central European 
 monarchies, and with whom arrangements of a more 
 certain nature could be made than with the leaders 
 of the policy of the above-mentioned powers. " Poli- 
 ' See Appendix, Note 13. 
 
VON GIERS. 49 
 
 ticians of genius," to whom a handful of bank-notes 
 are of no consequence, regard such considerations as 
 paltry and narrow, and complain with a shrug of 
 their shoulders that the cold Finn fails to compre- 
 hend the "expansive Russian nature." Their dry 
 interlocutor's questions, however, remain unanswered. 
 
 The Emperor has the feeling that Von Giers is a 
 faithful, clear-headed, and serviceable statesman who 
 never encroaches upon the rights of others. This 
 quality has had more weight than all the charges 
 and calumnies that have been levelled against the 
 so-called "un-Slav" policy of the minister for 
 foreign affairs. Well acquainted with the difficulties 
 that surround him, this minister observes a prudence 
 which makes the work of his calumniators a 
 thousandfold more arduous. 
 
 Von Giers, who is neither Russian nor a Boyar, 
 wisely avoids the kind of trump-cards affected by 
 the deceased Count P. A. Shuvalov, and is careful 
 not to fly directly in the face of public opinion. He 
 has never fallen short in questions of patriotism or 
 passing phases of public feeling, nor has he ever gone 
 too far. He acts as a diplomatic man of business 
 who transacts current affairs in accordance with the 
 lofty intentions of the Emperor. Von Giers never 
 says that he is in truth more, nor does he allow him- 
 self to appear more ; it may be that he has no strong 
 self-consciousness to suppress. He apparently values 
 public distinctions, honours, and tokens of good-will 
 
 5 
 
so liUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 as much as others ; but he is resigned if they are not 
 bestowed upon him. He knows the considerations 
 which weigh with the Emperor, and which often 
 coincide with his (the minister's) interests, and he 
 never makes himself inconvenient to his master by 
 putting forward claims or expressing desires. If 
 measures which he has opposed are put down to his 
 charge, or if successes which he has brought about 
 are attributed to another, he is equally indifferent, 
 for the actual possession of influence is of more value 
 in his eyes than its mere appearance. He stands 
 out among modern Russian statesmen in this respect 
 as an avis rarissima. 
 
 Since the death of Jomini, the last of the diplo- 
 matists of the old school, the director of the minis- 
 terial chancellerie, Prince Valerian Obolensky (to be 
 distinguished from Prince Peter Obolensky, adjutant 
 to the Grand Duke Vladimir) has been looked upon 
 as the most competent man at the foreign office. In 
 contradistinction to his chef the prince is a lion of 
 the salons, and a man of great conversational 
 powers ; his praises are especially sung by female 
 lips. The future will show whether that will avail 
 him much. Cleverness, as a profession, has lately 
 gone out of fashion in Russia, as it has in the West. 
 Privy-Councillor Vlangali, who is descended from 
 a Wallachian Boyar family, occupies the position 
 of adjutant minister. Baron Osten-Sacken is at 
 the head of the Home Department. The Asiatic 
 
VON GIERS. SI 
 
 Department is administered by Sinoviev. Sinoviev 
 is considered by many as much more important and 
 influential than the real assistant of the minister. 
 It would be impossible to name the presumptive 
 successor of the present minister. In former times 
 it used to be taken for granted that ministers' 
 assistants never became ministers. That the rule, 
 "Tel brille au premier rang qui s'eclipse au second," 
 has not applied for a long time, is shown in the 
 case of Makov, A. Lieven, Giers, and recently 
 Durnovo. The present assistant of Von Giers, who 
 has reputation for extraordinary shrewdness, has 
 not, however, hitherto been looked upon as his 
 presumptive successor. 
 
VII, 
 
 POBYEDONOSTSEV AS MINISTER.' 
 
 There are two classes of fanatics, the cold and the 
 hot — that is, fanatics from reflection and fanatics by 
 temperament. It is easy to know to which class 
 Pobyedonostsev belongs. His looks betray him. He 
 is old and of a spare build, his nose is pointed, his 
 eyes are keen and penetrating, he wears spectacles, 
 his forehead is fringed with a few grey hairs, his face 
 is clean-shaven, and his expression is keen. There 
 is no need of a physiognomist to tell us that he is 
 one of those cool, calculating natures whose tempera- 
 ment enables them to steer clear of difficulties, 
 because they are guided by the head and not by the 
 heart. At first sight the oberprocouror of the Synod 
 might be taken for a Prussian privy councillor or 
 a Dresden Court councillor. Serious and thoughtful 
 in his manner, he is more like a savant than a 
 statesman. 
 
 He lives exclusively for the office, which was 
 
 ' This designation corresponds to the position better than the 
 official title. 
 
 52 
 
POBYEDONOSTSEV AS MINISTER. 53 
 
 transferred to him in 1880 on the retirement of Count 
 D. Tolstoi, and for the ideas according to which he 
 administers it. This office, which Tolstoi (the 
 Minister of the Interior from 1882 to 1887), had 
 filled for fifteen years from 1865 to 1880 in conjunc- 
 tion with the Ministry of Public Instruction, is a 
 ministry by itself, and might be defined in Western 
 European terminology as being nearly equivalent to 
 the " Ministry of Public Worship." The oberprocouror 
 of the Synod, as a representative of the Emperor, 
 is invested with full powers, and is the only secular 
 member of the highest ecclesiastical administrative 
 body of the Empire. This institution comprises 
 the metropolitans of Novgorod-St. Petersburg, of 
 Moscow-Kolomna, and of Kiev, and nine bishops 
 and higher clergy who are called upon from time to 
 time. No decree of this institution is valid without 
 the previous approval of the oberprocouror of the 
 Synod ; in important cases he appeals to the decision 
 of the Emperor, and sends in his reports directly to 
 him ; the ecclesiastic educational establishments 
 (academies and seminaries) of the orthodox faith 
 are under his superintendence and direction, and 
 the parochial Consistories depend immediately upon 
 him. He is a member of the ministerial committee • 
 and of the imperial council, he stands on an equal 
 footing with the other ministers, and has to be heard 
 on all subjects either directly or indirectly affecting 
 the State Church. 
 
54 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 The importance of this office, which was instituted 
 by Peter the Great, has always been very great 
 (Gahtsin's short period under Alexander I. excepted), 
 but never greater than in the present reign, and 
 in the hands of its present occupant. Pobyedo- 
 nostsev having gained repute as a jurist and as an 
 authority on Russian legislation, was, on the death 
 of the Tsarevich Nikolai in 1865, entrusted with 
 the instruction of the present Emperor, who was 
 then twenty, in the principles of Russian public law 
 and administration. Unlike the majority of his 
 colleagues at that time, Pobyedonostsev knew how to 
 impress his august pupil first by the earnestness and 
 zeal with which he devoted himself to his duties as 
 an instructor, and secondly by the rigid dogmatism of 
 his political and scientific views. Instead of making 
 things easy and pleasant to himself and his listener, 
 Pobyedonostsev went to work seriousl}' and energetic- 
 ally, and fearlessly emphasised the importance and 
 difficulty of the task which he had undertaken. The 
 important point, however, was that Pobyedonostsev 
 had pressed his pretty extensive historical and 
 juridical knowledge into the service of an idea, the 
 idea, namely, that absolutism and orthodoxy, as being 
 divine and founded on history, formed the only sound 
 basis for a Russo-Slav state system, and that they 
 were mutually supplementary. Pobyedonostsev has 
 adopted the same methods and made use of the same 
 abstractions as enabled Joseph de Maitre in his day 
 
FOB YEDONOSTSEV AS MINISTER. 55 
 
 to reconcile the ideas of popery and legitimacy, and 
 to form them into a modern articulated system 
 apparently satisfying the demands of science ; he 
 understood how to deck out the famous doctrine of 
 the providential destiny of the Eastern Church to re- 
 generate the heathen West in such a way that it 
 was perfectly manifest to his pupil. The self-con- 
 fidence and self-abandonment ^ of the preacher of this 
 new wisdom were in such marked contrast with the 
 instability of the other doctrines, which oscillated 
 between Liberalism and Loyalism, that it could not 
 fail to make a permanent impression on a nature 
 which always felt the need of leaning upon authority. 
 The inexorable logician, whose eye was always 
 directed to the attainable, who never thought of self, 
 never obtruded his own personality, and whose 
 system recommended itself by its " grand " simpli- 
 city — this logician appeared to stand in character 
 as well as in intellect far above those opportunists 
 who were constantly changing their point of view, 
 whose conclusions lay open to the most contradictory 
 explanations, and who above all tried to ingratiate 
 themselves. When it is added that the national 
 garment in which the orthodoxy of Pobyedonostsev 
 stalked about, corresponded to the inclinations of his 
 august pupil, it will be easily understood why this 
 man immediately obtained an authoritative position 
 
 ' Pobyedonostsev's opponents have tried to cast doubts on his 
 integrity, but unjustly. 
 
S6 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 which was denied to others. Long recognised as an 
 energetic worker, and recommended to the highest 
 position on account of his educational success, 
 Pobyedonostsev was installed in 1880 in one of the 
 two offices which until then had been vested in 
 Tolstoi. Priv)-Councillor Saburov, a Liberal imbued 
 with European ideas, was entrusted with the other 
 office : his appointment was strictly in keeping with 
 the contradictory character of the former reign, and 
 was regarded by its adherents as a " particularly 
 happy solution." 
 
 In spite of the regard in which he was held by 
 the late Emperor, the new oberprocouror of the Synod 
 had to be satisfied during Alexander II. 's lifetime 
 with a subordinate position. Even after Alexander 
 Nikolaevich's liberal enthusiasm had cooled down, 
 he remained "European" in his ideas, and, as 
 such, looked askance at all kinds of fanaticism, and 
 especially all religious eccentricities. It had also 
 to be taken into account that the ministry of the 
 Interior, which has numerous relations with the 
 Synod from having to transact the affairs of the 
 "foreign religions," as well as those of the ancient 
 superstitious beliefs, was at that time in the hands 
 of Loris Melikov, a man who was thoroughly 
 acquainted with the views of his imperial master, 
 and who was neither fitted nor inclined to play the 
 part of the old Russian-Byzantine zealot. 
 
 All this was changed when the pupil of Pobye- 
 
POBYEDONOSTSEV AS MINISTER. 57 
 
 donostsev ascended the throne. A complete revolution 
 took place when Count Tolstoi, Pobyedonostsev's 
 predecessor, was entrusted with the direction of tiie 
 ministry of the Interior (May, 1882). Tolstoi had 
 won his first spurs as the author of a violent 
 polemical treatise against Catholicism : he never 
 deviated from the course which he had once taken, 
 and his overmastering idea was that the restoration 
 of strict " orthodoxy " (pravoslav'ie) formed the 
 essential basis for the renovation and establishment 
 of national absolutism. Pobyedonostsev went hand 
 in hand with him : he began his work of Church re- 
 form, and favoured by Katkov and his successors, he 
 carried it out with extraordinary apparent success. 
 He is the originator of those persecutions of the 
 Catholics and other bodies in Poland, Little Russia, 
 and Lithuania, which even Anatole Leroy-Beaulieu, 
 the most zealous partisan of Russian ideas in 
 France, has declared to be unwise and barbarous, 
 and which he has been obliged unconditionally to 
 condemn. The orders of 1864, by which Alexander 
 IL had allowed religious freedom to children born 
 from mixed marriages in the Baltic provinces, were 
 re-instituted at his instigation. It is due to him 
 that new Catholic and Protestant churches, even in 
 the Polish and Baltic provinces, can only be built 
 after the previous consent of the Greek-Orthodox 
 bishops of the district ; that all missionary activity 
 on the part of Catholics and Protestants, whether at 
 
58 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 home or abroad, is interdicted under penalty ; that 
 dozens of Polish and Livonian priests have been 
 proceeded against or removed on the faintest sus- 
 picion, and that processes of this kind are no longer 
 conducted before Catholic and Protestant consistories, 
 but before secular judges, who are influenced by the 
 State. And all this is done with a quiet, pedantically 
 cold rigour, and with the help of a juridical sophistry, 
 which avoids the appearance of violence as far as 
 possible, but at the same time leaves room for tricks 
 of interpretation, which impose upon the ignorant 
 and "captivated" Russian masses and the un- 
 principled press. The doctrine that the end justifies 
 ■ the means has been taken for granted everywhere 
 at all times, and long before the publication of the 
 " Medulla" of Busenbaum by men of Pobyedonos- 
 tsev's stamp ; but the author of the circular to the 
 " Evangelical Alliance " has spoken out with regard 
 to his aims and his blind hostility to the churches 
 of Western Europe with a frankness which has been 
 received with indignation by the whole civilised 
 world. 
 
 In private life Pobyedonostsev is quiet, cool, serious, 
 and sensible. He takes a certain pride in displaying 
 his knowledge of the most recent legal and theo- 
 logical literature, and in showing his acquaintance 
 with modern thought. He occasionally appeals to 
 the solidarity of interests of all who believe in 
 positive Christianity, and (as he said to Pastor 
 
FOB YEDONOSTSE V AS MINISTER. 59 
 
 Dalton) he looks upon disputations with believers of 
 other confessions as an important means to mutual 
 advancement. That does not prevent him, however, 
 from using the most violent means, where mere 
 arguments produce no impression, or from pursuing 
 a policy in ecclesiastical matters which differs in no 
 particular from that of the coarse and brutal fanatics 
 of former times. 
 
 The oberproconror of the Synod shows the upright- 
 ness of his character not only by his perfect indiffer- 
 ence to external honours and distinctions, and by his 
 integrity and devotion to the service of the State, 
 but by the frankness with which he recognises in 
 his yearly reports certain failings and faults of the 
 clergy who are placed under him, and notes the 
 alarming increase of superstitious heresies and of 
 heathen, aj^i^st Thibetan, idolatries. He holds fast 
 to the conclusion that drastic and fearless measures 
 are more necessary now than ever, and that the 
 propaganda which is the privilege of the State 
 Church should be used to the uttermost to extirpate 
 all superstitions and heresies. " Standing on the 
 heights of culture," he acts as his reactionary 
 predecessors did before him, with this difference — 
 that these spared themselves the trouble of theolo- 
 gical or other reasonings. The means of modern 
 culture, which Pobyedonostsev has at command, 
 serve him simply to furbish up the brutal and 
 monstrous practices which have been handed down 
 
6o RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 to him by his predecessors of the old school — 
 men whose severities against sectarians, Catholics, 
 and others twenty years ago excited the horror of 
 civilised Russia. The apostles and prophets of 
 "orthodoxy" in the time of Nicholas were men of 
 the world without strong convictions, pleasure- 
 seekers without claims to culture and without 
 religious feeling, officials whose religiosity and 
 morality differed in no respect from those of other 
 people, and laid claim to no pretensions. But 
 Pobyedonostsev is honourable and pious, so honour- 
 able and pious that he makes no secret of his bigotry, 
 but retires periodically for a certain time to some 
 cloister or other which is encircled with the odour 
 of special sanctity, in order to be able to devote 
 himself undisturbed to religious exercises and pro- 
 found meditations. 
 
 In the good times of the Emperor Nicholas it 
 often used to be said by a certain class of quasi- 
 Liberal officials (and at times by even non-Liberal 
 officials) that in Russia the zealous, honourable, and 
 convinced dependants and tools of the prevailing 
 system (and these especially included the German 
 Russians) were the worst and the most dangerous. 
 Even the worst coercive measures remained tolerable 
 as long as they were administered by Russian 
 nationalists, and were suited to "circumstances." 
 But alas! it was a bitter day when pedantic Germans 
 and other honourable persons took the matter in 
 
POBYEDONOSTSEV AS MINISTER. 6i 
 
 hand, formulated the Government ideas into a 
 system', and drove things to extremes! " Les z6les, 
 les fideles — les croyants sent les pires." The con- 
 temporaries of Pobyedonostsev's regime have been the 
 first to understand in all its fulness this expression 
 which was so often in the mouth of Alexander 
 Herzen. Honour, zeal, and fearless and sincere 
 devotion to an object which is base, false, and hollow 
 at the core — power over the modern means of culture 
 in the service of a worthless retrograde end ! Is 
 there a worse or more dangerous combination 
 possible ? 
 
VITI. 
 
 SECRET POLICE. 
 
 I. — The Minister of the Interior. 
 
 Privy Councillor Ivan Nikolaevich Durnovo, 
 as has been mentioned, was appointed successor to 
 Tolstoi in the ministry of the Interior.^ He is 
 ^a precise, cool-headed ofHcial, without any great 
 ''antecedents or high connections. He is a minister 
 who observes a certain routine, who has no initia- 
 tive, and who acts on the instructions of others. 
 Durnovo has set himself to carry out the work of 
 Tolstoi — that is to say, to deprive the provincial 
 assemblies of the last vestige of their former sig- 
 nificance, to re-establish the corporative and social 
 position of the nobility, and to uproot the weeds of 
 nihilistic and revolutionary ideas. This last point 
 is the most important, as it most nearly concerns 
 the Emperor. Since the abolition of the "Third 
 Division of his Majesty's Chancery " (which was the 
 department of so-called State police), in the time of 
 
 ' See Appendix, Note 14. 
 62 
 
SECRET POLICE. 63 
 
 Loris Melikov, both classes of police, the ordinary 
 police and the political police {gendarmerie), have 
 been placed under the ministry of the Interior, and 
 the chief of this department is thus responsible in 
 a double sense for the security of the Emperor and 
 the imperial family. The momentous importance oN 
 the duties of this office is seen in the organisation 
 of the ministry. Of the three '^ ministerial subordi- 
 nates who assist the Minister of the Interior (all the 
 other ministers have only one assistant), one is 
 almost exclusively occupied with the direction of 
 the political police and its ramifications. General \ 
 Orchevsky, a "fashionable" officer conspicuous for 
 his ambition, unscrupulousness, and love of intrigue, 
 filled this office some years ago. But the reign 
 of this so-called Richelieu was of short duration. 
 There is nothing to be said of his successor, Shebeko. 
 It is generally known that nihilism is less talked 
 about than formerly, that its resources are exhausted, 
 and that the attractive power of its secrets has lost 
 its former charm. But no one could say with 
 certainty that its danger had decreased. It is the 
 opinion of those who have a minute acquaintance 
 with the inner working of Russian revolutionary, 
 secret societies that acute nihilism has decreased, 
 while chronic nihilism has increased. The number 
 of fire-brands who are ready to sacrifice themselves 
 in perpetrating criminal acts has become smaller, 
 ' Now two, — Ed. 
 
64 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 but the mass of the discontented, who at the present 
 moment expect salvation from disastrous events, un- 
 successful foreign wars, and the like, — this mass has, 
 on the other hand, constantly increased. Not to 
 speak of the distrust with which our modern 
 nationalists meet every stranger, the spread and 
 ramification of secret political agents and informers 
 inside as well as outside St. Petersburg has increased 
 so enormously that political discussions are avoided 
 with an anxiety which is foreign to the habits of 
 Russian life and Russian character. Even the in- 
 clination to play the part of the opposition, and to 
 gird at existing institutions and persons in authority 
 — a tendency which is deeply rooted in the national 
 character, and which is really harmless — is almost 
 entirely crushed: people are more cautious than they 
 were in the time of the Emperor Nicholas, to say 
 nothing of the days of Alexander II. The discussion 
 of public affairs has almost entirely ceased in those 
 circles of society in which bold radical expressions 
 formerly passed from mouth to mouth like every- 
 day words. The educated classes who take a 
 serious interest in politics confine their exchange 
 of views to intimate circles. The former freedom 
 of discussion only prevails where it is a question of 
 abusing or criticising foreign countries. The public 
 emulates in this respect the attitude of the periodical 
 press, which displays its courage and its firmness 
 so abundantly in its criticisms on Prince Bismarck, 
 
SECRET POLICE. 65 
 
 Count Kalnoky, Lord Salisbury, and M. Stambulov, 
 that the guarded silence which is observed with 
 regard to internal questions appears in this way to 
 be almost compensated for. 
 
 II. — Voluntary Secret Police. 
 
 " Misunderstanding and distrust have spread like 
 a blight over Russia ; they have marred the propor- 
 tion, form, and colour of all the manifestations of 
 our life. Between the nobility and the people, the 
 Government and society, the educated and the igno- 
 rant, nay, even between members of the same classes 
 of society, there exist distrust and harassing mis- 
 understanding. Everything is out of joint, every- 
 thing has lost its foundation, discontent is every- 
 where : 
 
 " ' Wir reden klug, doch sind es leere Worte, 
 
 Vom Leben reden wir, doch ohne das wir leben.'" 
 
 With these words, which were printed in the last 
 days of the year 1881, Ivan Aksakov concluded his 
 characterisation of the first ten months of the reign 
 of Alexander III. That this severe judgment was 
 literally true must be recognised even by those who 
 wished to know nothing of the celebrated Ivan 
 Sergyevich and his periodical "Rous."i Such a year 
 
 ' Rous as well as Rossi'a means " Russia," but the first is an 
 ancient and popular term, while the second is of later and 
 official origin. 
 
 6 
 
66 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 as this had never been experienced in Russia since 
 the days of the great interregnum. Nicholas had 
 ascended the throne after quelling a conspiracy, and 
 had roused the dread fear of reaction throughout his 
 wide empire — the heir of the murdered Alexander 
 II. awakened apprehensions threefold greater in 
 their intensity. Along with the dread of new 
 revolutionary crimes arose the fear of blind reaction 
 and the fear of fear. 
 
 The last was the most grievous, for the most 
 painful surprises might be expected from a terrified 
 Government. The Liberals were prepared for the 
 worst, after the new ruler had dismissed three "free- 
 thinking" ministers of his father on one day. The 
 honourable Conservatives complained that an ad- 
 venturer (Count Ignatiev) had been chosen as the 
 most confidential adviser of the Tsar : the masses 
 stood under the weight of two new criminal attempts, 
 the fact that a revolutionist — Soukhanov — together 
 with six companions, was detected among the officers 
 of the imperial fleet, the revolutionary fermentation 
 discovered in the military school of St. Michael, and 
 the gross carelessness which had been brought home 
 to several police officials. As the secret printing 
 presses of the nihilists could not be discovered, it 
 was believed that fresh outrages might be perpetrated 
 at any moment. It was an open secret in the highest 
 society that the Emperor was not sure of his life for 
 a moment, that the apprehensions of the omnipres- 
 
SECRET POLICE. 67 
 
 ence and omniscience of the nihilist conspiracy had 
 accompanied him to Gatchina, and that these phan- 
 toms continued to haunt him night and day in this 
 asylum. The slightest rumours were believed, the 
 most trustworthy servants suspected, the most 
 ordinary occurrences magnified to tales of horror. 
 Undermined bridges and streets, bombs of d3"namite 
 hidden in the park of the castle, threatening letters 
 found on the Emperor's table, assassins masked in 
 Court livery — these and similar horrors were sjch 
 a constant source of terror to high and low tha: at 
 last it was impossible to say where the real dar.jer 
 ended and the imaginary began. 
 
 Under the iniluence of this unrest and excitemer.i 
 an extraordinary scheme was originated in the circles 
 of the younger Court officials and officers, which had 
 for its object the formation of a secret society similar 
 in every respect to the nihilist conspirac}-. The aim 
 of this society was to entrust the safety of the im- 
 perial family to the best blood of the land, and at 
 the same time to meet the conspirators with their 
 own weapons— that is to say, to find out the nihilist 
 plans both at home and abroad by means of a con- 
 servative secret organisation. The existence of a 
 State institution devoted to this purpose, viz., the 
 political police, was just as little thought of as the 
 wonderful impression it would make if the flower 
 of the Russian nobility formed themselves into a corps 
 of political secret police, and raised espionage to the 
 
68 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 rank of an elegant pastime. The word of command 
 was given, the high-sounding name of the " holy 
 J band " (swishchennaya drouzhina) was adopted by the 
 new organisation, and the enterprise was so far ad- 
 vanced that some young men of the noblest families 
 put themselves at the head of the movement. The 
 necessary resources were to be raised by subscrip- 
 tions from the highest society, but as a matter of 
 fact the millionaire, Prince Demidov San Donato 
 (nephew and heir of the husband of the Princess 
 Mathilde Buonaparte), paid the greater part of the 
 expenses out of his own pocket. The Grand Duke 
 Vladimir and Count Vorontsov-Dashkov obtained 
 the Emperor's approval of the statute of the new 
 secret society, and its operations began in the summer 
 of 1881. First of all a number of paid agents' 
 were obtained to do the " dirty work," and then the 
 attempt was made to come to terms with the police 
 of those foreign states which called for special con- 
 sideration as neighbours of Russia or on account of 
 their harbouring political refugees. 
 
 The Berlin officials had hitherto had too many un- 
 pleasant experiences of the unreliable character of 
 Russian secret agents to receive the new species with 
 open arms. In London and Geneva, on the other 
 hand, things went better, and a certain rapprochement 
 was brought about with influential police officials. 
 In Paris, however, two " famous " veterans of the 
 ' See Appendix, Note 15. 
 
SECRET POLICE. 69 
 
 former Napoleonic secret police were actually en- 
 listed in the good cause — in consideration of hand- 
 some rewards ! Immediately afterwards branches 
 were formed in the interior of the Empire, and young 
 nobles were invited to join the league. The fashion- 
 able and aristocratic appearance of the scheme, the 
 travelling and other expenses that could be made 
 out of it, and the prospect of alliance with the 
 highest society, exercised so irresistible an attraction, 
 that men of the most different ranks and ages en- 
 listed i n immense numbers in the new service, and 
 even " sons of good houses " declared themselves 
 ready to accept subordinate but well-paid positions. 
 To be able to go on a secret mission and at another's 
 expense to Odessa and Kiev, or even to Paris or 
 Geneva, appeared as interesting as it was amusing, 
 and all the more amusing as these patriotic services 
 voluntarily rendered to the fatherland were paid for. 
 The times in which the cultivation of Liberal ideas 
 and expressions had been considered as comme il faut 
 were gone for ever, and nothing more was to be heard 
 of the Russification of Poland and Lithuania.^ Was 
 it more derogatory to spend one's leisure hours in 
 acting in the capacity of a secret policeman than as 
 was formerly the case in fulfilling the duties of a 
 tribune of the people or a political missionary? 
 
 ' A field for the exploits of adventurers who wished to get 
 a good salary for "patriotic work" in the second part of 
 Alexander II.'s reign. — Ed. 
 
70 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 The official State police naturally looked upon the 
 new system with anything but friendly eyes. Since 
 the abolition of the celebrated " third division " 
 (August, 1880), the high police functionaries were 
 placed under the Ministry of the Interior, and en- 
 trusted to the guardianship of the chief of a division. 
 The occupant of this office was at that time a man 
 of great ambition, General Cherevin. For the sake 
 of the Grand Duke Vladimir he acted not only as 
 the champion of the " holy band," but expressed his 
 readiness to undertake the superintendence of the 
 hopeful new society. Plehve, the technical leader of 
 the police department, an earnest official with a full 
 sense of the responsibility of his position, thought 
 otherwise. At the first glance he recognised that he 
 had to do with a set of pretentious idlers, who were 
 dangerous to the unity and organisation of his ad- 
 ministration. But on account of the reputation 
 which they enjoyed, nothing was left for him but to 
 bide his time. 
 
 The beginning seemed to be promising. The 
 " holy band " boasted that they had made important 
 discoveries, which "somehow or other always es- 
 caped the official spies." Much was made of the 
 great services of one of the Parisian ex-policemen 
 who was sent to Baden-Baden, a gentleman who 
 had been trained under M. Pietri, and pretended he 
 had found out half a dozen nests of dangerous nihi- 
 lists. The impression which the news of these 
 
SECRET POLICE. 71 
 
 successes produced in the salons of St. Petersburg 
 was so 'great that the " holy band " began to be 
 looked upon as the salvation of Russia, and its 
 members as having given the death-blow to the 
 revolutionary dragon. General Cherevin thought the 
 time had come to carry out his ambitious plans. 
 In a memorial addressed to the Grand Duke 
 Vladimir he explained that recent experience showed 
 that it was absolutely necessary to form a special 
 ministry of police, and that the new department 
 should be brought into " organic connection " with 
 the " holy band." A series of most disagreeable 
 revelations followed close upon the great success 
 of the aristocratic voluntary police. As persons 
 accused of criminal offences could neither be 
 imprisoned nor surrendered without the previous 
 approval of Plehve or his subordinates, Plehve took 
 good care that a searching examination should be 
 made into all cases that were brought before him. 
 As a result of this examination it was found that 
 there had been mystifications of the grossest kind in 
 numerous cases, and that the suspects were for the 
 most part harmless travellers against whom nothing 
 could be urged. In other cases the collection of 
 incriminating documents was so completely neg- 
 lected that well-founded charges could not be made ; 
 and lastly, the arrest of two innocent men caused 
 very painful complications, and compromised the 
 officials who were concerned in it. 
 
72 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 On account of these occurrences Plehve presented 
 a complaint to the Emperor, and warned him of the 
 dangerous consequences that resulted from the well- 
 meant but injurious action of the Holy Band. He 
 also pointed to the confusion which threatened to 
 dislocate the newly organised dual administration. 
 About the same time two old respected functionaries 
 condemned the proceedings of the Holy Band as 
 being contrary to the honourable traditions of the 
 past : the members of this informers' league, they 
 said, looked upon their vocation either as a by-play 
 or as a means of enriching themselves, or as an 
 opportunity for indulging in adventures which 
 brought neither advantage nor honour to the 
 country. If Paul Demidov wanted to spend his 
 money for patriotic ends he might find a more suit- 
 able channel, &c. 
 
 These reasons had the more weight with the 
 Emperor, inasmuch as violent collisions had fre- 
 quently taken place between Vladimir, the patron of 
 the Holy Band, and the Minister of the Interior. 
 It frequently happened that the agents of the Holy 
 Band and their myrmidons arrested whole sections 
 of the State secret police : at other times the reverse 
 happened. These grotesque scenes were the talk of 
 the town. The number of the opponents of the new 
 system increased in proportion as the enthusiasm for 
 it decreased. Alexander III. came to the conclusion 
 that it was politic quietly to dispense with the ser- 
 
SECRET POLICE. 73 
 
 vices of the Holy Band, and to content himself with 
 the protection which Plehve afforded him. Plehve 
 was subsequently appointed Secretary of State, but 
 Cherevin was removed from his position. Chere- 
 vin's proposal to create a special ministry of police, 
 which had been unfavourably received by the public 
 as well as the bureaucracy, but which was publicly 
 announced in December, i88r, was abandoned at 
 the eleventh hour. Count Ignatiev, the Minister of 
 the Interior, had once more beaten the Grand Duke 
 Vladimir, the patron of Cherevin, and the Holy 
 Band. 
 
IX. 
 
 THE NECESSITY OF KNOWING RUSSIA. 
 
 The following words are taken from a journal which 
 professes to speak with authority: "We should be 
 most pleased with ' Holy Russia ' if we could keep 
 ourselves from knowing anything about hei\" Life, 
 it is true, would be more pleasant on our planet 
 if we "had not to know" of all the troubles that 
 disturb our repose, if we "had not to know" of 
 cholera and foot-and-mouth disease, of phylloxera, 
 social democracy, and anarchism, if we were not 
 obliged to think of ways and means to check the 
 ravages of epidemics, if we had not to study their 
 nature, and if such study did not make it apparent 
 that disaster in the main proceeds from ignorance 
 of its causes, and is the consequence of a careless 
 indifference which neglected to make the necessary 
 sacrifice at the proper moment. Truly it would be 
 an inestimable boon if we " could keep ourselves 
 from knowing" all this. 
 
 The above sentence would be a mere commonplace 
 if it did not mean that all disturbing reports about 
 
THE NECESSITY OF KNOWING RUSSIA. 75 
 
 Russia could be ignored with advantage. It is taken 
 for granted that the nearness or remoteness of the 
 storm which is apparently brewing in the East is a 
 fit subject for discussion, and that it is necessary to 
 take a cursory glance at the signs of the weather ; 
 but when it is proposed to establish a scientific 
 meteorology of the East in order to indicate the 
 precise nature and extent of the dangers that 
 threaten from that quarter, and thus to take 
 measures to ward them off, the objection is raised 
 that this is not a subject of vital importance or of 
 public interest ; Europe is indifferent or apathetic — in 
 fact "the most convenient thing is to 'keep oneself 
 from knowing' about it." 
 
 It is apparent that we have to deal here with mis- 
 understandings which arise from a too great eager- 
 ness to do good, from a " blind officious zeal " which 
 does harm where it would confer a benefit; in a word, 
 we have to deal with a false conception of the prin- 
 ciple which underlies the European policy of peace. 
 
 Every year of peace establishes the solidarity of 
 Europe and strengthens its power of defence ; every 
 year of peace completes Russia's isolation and accele- 
 rates her internal dissolution ; every year of peace 
 makes Russia less dangerous. The longer the out- 
 break of a war can be put off, the more confidently 
 can Europe accept it. The longer peace continues, 
 the longer its continuance seems assured. The 
 maintenance of peace, although it has to be paid for 
 
6 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 it a high price, ought therefore to be the end and 
 dm of all public action. 
 
 The wisdom of this principle which lies at the 
 ■oot of the European policy of peace will be of little 
 ivail if blind zeal, acting ostensibly in the interests 
 )f peace, diverts public attention from the condition 
 )f Russia, under the impression that the public 
 ' want to know nothing about it ; " it is even 
 seriously maintained that a knowledge of Russia 
 night lead to a depreciation of its strength, and to 
 1 readiness to accept the challenge thrown down by 
 t ; or, on the other hand, that Russia might look 
 jpon the exposure of her faults as a provocation that 
 ivould rouse a warlike spirit within her. All these 
 ipprehensions are both erroneous and injurious. 
 
 It is not necessary to show that those in authority 
 liave a knowledge of Russian affairs. This know- 
 ledge forms the hypothesis, the point of departure, 
 ind the firm foundation of the European policy of 
 peace. But this policy can never be firmly main- 
 tained and supported by public opinion so long as 
 :he knowledge of the state of Russia is wanting. 
 Without this knowledge the desire for peace on the 
 part of the public has no sure foundation, and the 
 /arious governments are deprived of a reliable sup- 
 port. At the critical moment questions of minor 
 ;onsideration might press for a solution, as the expe- 
 ience of the past and of the present clearly shows. 
 
 Are we satisfied that the Imperial Sanitary Autho- 
 
THE NECESSITY OF KNOWING RUSSIA. 77 
 
 rity should find out the nature of epidemics and 
 study the means to prevent them ? Do we not 
 rather feel it incumbent upon us to teach the masses 
 on these points, so that in case of necessity the 
 instructions of the sanitary authorities may be the 
 more easily carried out, and that the burdensome 
 restrictions imposed upon them may not encounter 
 opposition ? Similarly the direction of the European 
 policy of peace ought to act in concert with the 
 knowledge of the people ; it ought to be sure not 
 only of their confidence, but also of their full know- 
 ledge of the nature and of the greatness of the 
 danger that has to be guarded against. For if it is 
 not so it always remains doubtful whether the neces- 
 sary sacrifice will be forthcoming, and whether it 
 will be sufficiently lasting ; whether at the critical 
 moment other less weighty considerations may not 
 preponderate, and interfere with the unity of action. 
 It will be remembered how political passion was led 
 astray with regard to the dangers of war which later 
 {e.g., the Boulanger revelations) had to be avowed 
 even by those who had formerly denied them. Think 
 of the Italian parties who attempt to weaken the 
 triple alliance. Think of the national efforts of the 
 Austrian Slavs, who in their foolish blindness gravi- 
 tate towards Russia; recall the time when France 
 was deaf to the remonstrances of Barthelemy St. 
 Hilaire that it would be a disgrace to aid Russia in 
 her retrograde policy, and behold her even now 
 
78 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 coquetting with Russia ! When all this is con- 
 sidered the conclusion must be drawn that the 
 knowledge of Russia and of the dangers which are 
 advancing from the East has not for a long time 
 been sufficiently general, and that the nations are not 
 even yet disposed to lay sufficient stress on matters 
 of momentous importance. 
 
 And it would be a foolish mistake to suppose that 
 clear insight into the decay of Russia and its dismal 
 condition could lead to a dangerous depreciation of 
 the enemy or even to a thoughtless acceptance of its 
 challenge. On the contrary, it is the sight of Rus- 
 sian misery that first reveals in all their significance 
 the dangers of a Russian war and the necessity for 
 its prevention. 
 
 A knowledge of the state of Russia shows how 
 much more difficult it would be to carry on a war 
 against that country than against a European Power, 
 and how much more difficult it would be to carry it 
 through to a satisfactory issue ; how much greater 
 and longer continued sacrifices it would involve even 
 in the case of success, and with how comparatively 
 small means Russia's countless inhabitants could 
 begin a war and continue it in their boundless soli- 
 tudes. Without a knowledge of its condition no 
 conception could be formed of the technical diffi- 
 culties of war waged against Russia or of the great- 
 ness of the sacrifice which would have to be made. 
 A depreciation of the dangers of war would in no 
 
THE NECESSITY OF KNOWING RUSSIA. 79 
 
 case be caused by a knowledge of Russia and its 
 people : quite the contrary. 
 
 In comparing the condition and efforts of Russia 
 with those of the West of Europe the mind naturally 
 reverts to the attacks and incursions which Western 
 civilisation, both in antiquity and the Middle Ages, 
 had, in spite of all its resources, to suffer from the 
 rude and needy but hardy barbarians of the East and 
 North. And the recollection of the past brings with 
 it the apprehension that once again the countless 
 barbarians of the East may possibly triumph pre- 
 cisely by virtue of their uncivilised condition and 
 the smallness of their needs. If the knowledge of 
 the state of Russia calls up such a gruesome picture 
 of a possible future, there will be no tendency to 
 depreciate the enemy, but rather a desire due to this 
 spread of information to form a coalition of all the 
 countries of the West for the purposes of resisting 
 the advance of a barbarous Power. 
 
 No apprehension need be felt that the war- 
 spirit of the Russians would be awakened and 
 aroused by an exposure of their faults and mis- 
 deeds. For it is only gross ignorance that can 
 suppose that the irritability of the Russian war- 
 spirit is capable of being intensified, and that it 
 can be repressed or silenced except by overmaster- 
 ing force. Who are they whose susceptibilities 
 an. excessive diffidence is so anxious to spare? Is 
 it the ranks of the people? Is it the Russian 
 
8o RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 press ? Is it even the Tsar ? On none of these 
 factors of Russian public life can the European 
 publicist exercise the slightest determinative in- 
 fluence. 
 
 The masses in Russia are in themselves emi- 
 nently peaceable ; they will never take the initiative 
 in any foreign war. The criticisms passed by the 
 European press on Russia can never irritate them, 
 for they are mostly unable to read. It is only 
 among the higher classes that war is advocated, 
 war is their constant cry. Some of them are 
 possessed with a fanatical passion for aggrandise- 
 ment ; they believe they are called to be the 
 masters of the world by means of the Slavs. This 
 war-spirit, like blind fury, is neither capable of being 
 intensified, nor is it allayed by tender considerations; 
 only overpowering force can keep it down. Others 
 hope that a war will shatter to pieces the present 
 arbitrary form of government and establish a better 
 in its stead — a federal union or a communistic re- 
 public. Even those parties, who would go to war 
 under any circumstances, and who long for nothing 
 more than a defeat of Russian arms, are entirely 
 indifferent as to whether Russia's faults are exposed 
 or not. In the case of parties so decidedly and 
 deliberately warlike in their tendencies it is useless 
 to talk of provocation or the reverse. Only very 
 few educated Russians recognise clearly that it is 
 not war, but internal and especially ecclesiastical 
 
THE NECESSITY OF KNOWING RUSSIA. 8i 
 
 reforms that will bring about the regeneration of 
 Russia. These few enlightened men have been the 
 first to expose and condemn the internal state of the 
 countr_v ; they would be the last to resent descrip- 
 tions of Russia. On the contrary, they rejoice that 
 the public opinion of Europe has been united, 
 strengthened, and reinforced through becoming 
 acquainted with the danger of Russia, and that it 
 has felt itself called upon to resist the Russian 
 desire for war. 
 
 It would therefore rest on a misunderstanding 
 of the nature of the case if European publicists 
 allowed themselves to be led astray by an over- 
 scrupulousness with regard to the susceptibilities of 
 the Russian people in the fulfilment of their duty. 
 An attitude of apprehension would be still more 
 futile, as the opinions of the foreign press very 
 rarely reach Russia in an unmutilated condition ; 
 only a few editors and a few special individuals 
 enjoy the advantage of reading foreign papers in 
 their original form. The Tsar, whose reading is 
 submitted to a rigid scrutiny, does not belong to 
 this special class. For the Russian public the 
 Russian press is alone available. It would be a 
 mistake to suppose that this press erred on the side 
 of excessive sensitiveness. 
 
 The Russian press is quite unlike the press of the 
 West. It does not reflect the tendencies of other 
 countries or the state of their affairs ; it even ignores 
 
 7 
 
82 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the drift of opinion at home. It cannot influence 
 the people and the people's representatives, ^ and 
 thus make its weight felt in the course of events, 
 as is the case in Western Europe. The Russian 
 press is only the mouthpiece of the ruling coterie, 
 which has suppressed all other organs advocating 
 different views. It does not allow freedom of dis- 
 cussion, and alone enjoys the cheap and cowardly 
 satisfaction of displaying itself publicly, but with- 
 out exercising any special influence in important 
 decisions. This imperial press serves up to its 
 readers nothing but what is whispered to it daily 
 by the powers that be, and by them in turn to the 
 Emperor. Russia is calumniated by Europe and 
 threatened with attacks ; facts are found and false 
 documents produced by way of proof Under such 
 circumstances it is clearly quite irrelevant and 
 without influence on Russia's peaceful or warlike 
 position if information with respect to the condition 
 of Russia is spread in Europe for its protection, and 
 especially irrelevant if the evidence of Russians 
 themselves is used. In its reproduction there is 
 nothing else to be found than what conspicuous and 
 patriotic Russians have themselves said of their 
 country's condition. 
 
 Lastly, it would be a mistake, and a depreciation 
 of Alexander III.'s disposition and character, to 
 suppose that the European press has anxiously to 
 ' As there are none. — Ed. 
 
THE NECESSITY OF KNOWING RUSSIA. 83 
 
 consider the moods of a Tsar whose nod would be 
 sufficient to kindle the torch of war. If Alexander 
 III. were not naturally one of the most peaceable 
 and sober-minded men in his Empire, national 
 Chauvinism and desperate nationahsm would have 
 had many opportunities of rousing in him an irre- 
 sponsible desire for war. It is not to be attributed 
 to the character of Alexander III., but to the horrible 
 circumstances of his accession, that the pernicious 
 elements maintained an overmastering influence 
 over him, that they were prejudicial to the weal of 
 his Empire, endangered the peace of Europe, and 
 could not fail to compromise the respect due to the 
 ruler who was held fast in the meshes of their 
 deceptions. As a matter of fact there has never 
 been a ruler naturally less prone to approve of 
 wrong, or to promote persons of doubtful character 
 to an influential position, or even to tolerate them 
 in his presence. Nevertheless it has been under- 
 stood as lending authority to the opinion that the 
 Tsar does not want to know the truth, as if it might 
 be said of him, vult dmpi. What a desirable end 
 would be attained if he could once know to what 
 extent his people deceive him ! How they deceive 
 him as regards the state of his Empire and the 
 tendencies of other countries ; how they impose 
 upon him, for example, in making him believe that 
 absolute religious freedom exists in Russia, and that 
 every adult subject of the Empire is at full liberty to 
 
84 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 profess and act up to his religious convictions. And 
 an inestimable service would be performed to the 
 Tsar, his kingdom, and even all Europe, if his eyes 
 could be opened to the actual condition of the 
 country and to tlie accursed action of the orthodox 
 national camarilla.^ If this were attainable a new 
 era in Russia's internal and external policy would 
 commence. This policy would be absolutely peace- 
 able externally and internall}^ it would prepare the 
 way for a blessed transformation of the national life 
 by introducing genuine religious liberty and eccle- 
 siastical reforms. Consequently accurate informa- 
 tion about the condition of Russia would be in no 
 way hazardous as far as the Tsar is concerned ; it 
 could produce no effect if it were withheld from him, 
 and its influence would be beneficial if it were brought 
 to his knowledge. 
 
 Although information with regard to the condition 
 of Russia is, as we have shown, to be regarded as 
 permissible, imperative, and useful, yet the subject 
 is attended with peculiar difficulties, and it appears 
 hardly practicable to do more than spread the 
 information which we get from Russians themselves 
 as to the state of their country, because the reports 
 of foreigners run the danger of being considered as 
 either exaggerated or untrustworthy. 
 
 The Western European who was formerly accus- 
 tomed to look upon Europe as being influenced and 
 ' See Appendix, Note i6. 
 
THE NECESSITY OF KNOWING RUSSIA. 85 
 
 almost dominated by the mighty prestige of Russia 
 felt himself compelled to institute a parallel between 
 the civilisation of the East and the West, and 
 expected that the reforms of Alexander II. would 
 succeed in bringing to a glorious development the 
 powers of a nation which had apparently all the 
 freshness and vigour of youth. The Western 
 European even now finds it difficult to believe his 
 own eyes when he is brought face to face with 
 Russian civilisation, which compels him to see that 
 this vaunted prestige was by no means a proof of 
 power and inner worth, but rather of Europe's 
 weakness, abasement, and want of cohesion, and 
 that the reforms of Alexander II. have only had 
 the effect of giving freer play to the despotically- 
 bridled and only half-tamed savagery of the Russian 
 nation. It is difficult to convince a Western 
 European that Russia is in reality an entirely 
 different and hardly intelligible world to the West. 
 It is a country which has already become effete, 
 and is either on the point of retiring from the scene 
 of history, if at the eleventh hour a salutary reversal 
 of the march of development does not set in, or 
 taking advantage of the factions and want of unity 
 and cohesion among its natural enemies, it will 
 devote itself to its historical mission of destroying 
 the culture of the West and of bringing about the 
 doom of the history of the world. 
 
X. 
 
 MISDOINGS OF THE CLERGY. 
 
 The following extract, which is derived from a 
 Russian source and is of recent date, will be suffi- 
 cient to show the radical difference between Russian 
 and Western civilisation, and to rouse feelings of 
 horror and a sense of common danger in the minds 
 of those who usually take no interest in Russian 
 affairs. The woman who fell a victim to an act of 
 orthodox fanaticism was not an obscure individual, 
 but occupied a high position, and had relations who 
 were highly respected -at Court — Princess Anna 
 Livov. The extract, which is translated from the 
 French, is entirely trustworthy, as it comes from a 
 friend of the princess. It is as follows : — 
 
 " Anna Livov had paid a visit to one of her uncles 
 in the province of Kalaga, and had spent several 
 days at his house very pleasantly and in the best 
 of spirits ; thence she went to a well-known cloister 
 in the same province to perform her devotions and to 
 ask advice with respect to the founding of a hospital 
 
MISDOINGS 01 THE CLERGY. 87 
 
 which she wished to build on the estate where she 
 had spent her life in works of charity. The prior 
 of this cloister advised her to go to the nunnery of 
 Tikhopovsk, telling her that there she would be 
 likely to get more accurate information, and could at 
 the same time visit the holy well. Indefatigable in 
 her zeal, Anna betook herself to the nunnery, but the 
 tedious journey had exhausted her strength. When 
 she arrived in the neighbourhood of the well she 
 saw that the pilgrims, men and women alike, were 
 being forcibly pushed into it by the nuns (every 
 immersion was doubtless a source of income). Anna 
 hesitated to approach the well, especially as the 
 water was very cold. The nuns set upon her and 
 upbraided her as an atheist. Anna defended herself 
 and told them her name. They cried out that she 
 lied, that she was mad, &c. They then threw her 
 into the water time after time, with the result that she 
 was seized with cramp, and concussion of the brain 
 set in. The nuns now became alarmed lest charges 
 should be brought against them; they therefore locked 
 her up in a room, where she was thrown half-naked 
 upon a bed without a covering, and her arms so tightly 
 tied that the blood began to spurt. One window 
 of the room was left wide open by the nuns, and the 
 crowd of people were urged by them to look in upon 
 one who was possessed of a devil. Anna was left in 
 this state for several days-^without food, without 
 water, without attention. It happened by chance 
 
88 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 that a woman who had arrived as a pilgrim, and 
 had desired to see the one ' possessed,' was none 
 other than a former servant in the famil}' of the 
 Livovs. This woman recognised Anna, and Anna 
 recognised her in a lucid moment, and begged her 
 to inform her brother-in-law, Olenin, of her condition. 
 The woman went away, but — whether from stupidity 
 or nervousness — she could not make up her mind to 
 speak of the matter for several days. At last she 
 summoned up courage and told Olenin everything. 
 He set out at once, taking a doctor and Anna's 
 lady's-maid with him. When they arrived they were 
 not allowed to see Anna : it was only after using 
 threats that Olenin gained admittance. Anna was 
 not recognisable, so great was the change that had 
 taken place in her appearance. In a lucid interval 
 she called out, ' Alexander, save me ! ' and then the 
 delirium again set in. She was brought to Moscow 
 and nursed with the greatest care : a slight improve- 
 ment took place, and there was again room for hope, 
 but the power of resistance was gone, and Anna 
 Livov succumbed on September 19, 1888." 
 
 The following may be added by way of supple- 
 ment. The Princess Anna was unmarried, and 
 was a distinguished and highly respected woman. 
 Although by position belonging to the highest 
 society, its frivolities and superficialities had no 
 attractions for her. The sad occurrence caused 
 great sensation in Moscow and St. Petersburg; 
 
MISDOINGS OF THE CLERGY. 89 
 
 but it has not transpired whether any decisive 
 action was tal^en to bring the criminals to justice. 
 On the contrary, all the legal proceedings which 
 the relatives of this unfortunate victim of brutal 
 fanaticism and low greed sought to take were with- 
 out success. And it is added in the extract that 
 violent immersion is as prevalent as ever.^ 
 
 Why, it may be asked, were the distinguished 
 relatives of the unfortunate Princess Livov unable 
 to obtain satisfaction for the crime which was per- 
 petrated on her ? Why were the authors of it left 
 unpunished ? Any one who puts such a question 
 has neither any conception of the system which 
 prevails in Russia, nor of the arbitrary power of its 
 present representative, Pobyedonostsev, the oberpro- 
 couror of the Holy Synod. Everything must be put 
 down by force which might by any possibility shake 
 the Caesaropopism which has been called to univer- 
 sal dominion, and which " stands on guard at two 
 divisions of the world." There is no single act of 
 the Holy Synod which it is permissible to condemn ; 
 it matters not whether it concerns the violent 
 measures taken to spread the doctrines of the 
 Greek Church, or the brutal suppression of heretics. 
 No one dares at the risk of his life to oppose this 
 arbitrary power,^ and the barbarity of this aggressive 
 system imagines that it can silence an officious zeal 
 by attempting to prevent the European press from 
 taking no notice of it. 
 
 ' See Appendix, Note 17. " See Appendix, Note 18. 
 
90 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 The " Russian atrocities " were brought to Hght 
 by the publication of diplomatic reports in the 
 English Blue Book (Russia, No. i, at the British 
 Embassy, March 5, 1877), but at that time they 
 -did not receive the attention which they deserved, 
 on account of the uncertainty which prevailed as to 
 whether a war would break out, and whether it would 
 be possible to localise it. As serious efforts are being 
 made to divert public attention from Russian affairs, 
 it appears advisable to recall those terrible events, so 
 that every one may know the consequences that 
 would follow to Europe, especially in the religious 
 domain, if Russian arms were successful. The 
 following particulars, which are entirely trustworthy, 
 are taken from these documents. 
 
 First of all attempts were made to awaken 
 Russian orthodox belief in Poland and Lithuania 
 by distributing sums of money among the people, 
 and promising them exemption from taxes and 
 military duties.^ As these inducements were unsuc- 
 cessful, more drastic measures were taken. In the 
 district of Myncievicz those who remained true to 
 the faith of their fathers were flogged by the Cos- 
 sacks : "fifty blows with the 'nagaika' (Cossack 
 whip) were given to every adult man, twenty-five 
 to every woman, and ten to every child, irrespective 
 
 ' No. 12, Lieut.-Col. Mansfield to Earl Derby Warsaw, Jan. 29, 
 1875 ; and No. 13, Mansfield to Earl Granville, Warsaw, Feb. 
 10, 1875. 
 
MISDOINGS OF THE CLERGY. 91 
 
 of age or sex ; one woman who was more vehement 
 than the others receiving as much as a hundred." 
 On account of the crowded state of the prisons and 
 dwelling-houses the religious prisoners were crammed 
 into yards and sheds in the severe weather. 
 
 " Scenes similar to that which took place at 
 Myncievicz, of January, 1874, &c./ have been re- 
 peated in many localities, varying only in the amount 
 of casualties, killed and wounded." ^ 
 
 In certain places the mission work was carried on 
 with even greater severity. " The peasants were 
 assembled and beaten by the Cossacks until the 
 military surgeon stated that more would endanger 
 life ; they were then driven through a half-frozen 
 river, up to their waists, into the parish church, 
 through files of soldiers, where their names were 
 entered in the petition, and passed out at an opposite 
 door, the peasants all the time crying out, ' You may 
 call us orthodox, but we remain in the faith of our 
 fathers.' "3 In order to escape from their persecu- 
 tors the " peasants bivouacked in the forest, where 
 the mortality among them was frightful ; and orders 
 were given to the Cossacks to hunt them down back 
 to villages." 4 Furthermore, " cruelties of the most 
 revolting nature were committed by the military 
 
 ' Mansfield to Granville, Warsaw, January 29, 1874, No. 3. 
 = Ibid., February 18, 1874, No. 4. 
 
 3 Mansfield to Derby, Warsaw, January 29, 1875, No. 12. 
 * Ibid., January i, 1875, No. 9. 
 
92 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 authorities — cruelties which can only be compared 
 with those resorted to in the darkest ages of the 
 Inquisition." ^ As these violent measures were of no 
 avail, the signatures of so-called converted peasants 
 were forged, and " the peasants declared that in 
 signing the addresses they did not know what they 
 were doing ; in others, that they had given no authority 
 to the delegates ; in others, the older peasants said 
 that they had only given a personal adhesion, and 
 under compulsion." ^ "In one village a peasant 
 suffocated himself and his family with charcoal 
 rather than have his child baptized by the Govern- 
 ment pope," i.e., the parish priest. 3 Not a few 
 being driven to misery and despair have taken refuge 
 in suicide.4 In spite of all this it was impossible to 
 make the peasants give up their religion. "The 
 UniatsS who were 'converted ' in the previous year 
 are far from subscribing to their conversion : they 
 neither attend the churches nor take the sacrament ; 
 the ' popes ' are neither allowed to baptize their 
 children nor to bury their dead ; and they never 
 
 ' Lord Augustus Loftus to Earl Derby, St. Petersburg, 
 February i6, 1875, No. 4. 
 
 == Lieutenant-Colonel Mansfield to Earl Granville, Warsaw, 
 February 10, 1875, No. 13. 
 
 ' Lieutenant-Colonel Mansfield to Earl Derby, Warsaw, 
 January i, 1875, No 9. 
 
 "■ Lord Augustus Loftus to Earl Derby, St. Petersburg, 
 January, 28, 1875. 
 
 5 See Appendix, Note 19. 
 
MISDOINGS OF THE CLERGY. 93 
 
 submit to the ' popes ' marrying them." ^ Measures 
 of a different kind were taken against the most 
 obstinately recalcitrant : " In some parishes the 
 most obstinate have been sent to the interior of 
 the Empire or Siberia." ^ Of these latter, three 
 hundred small landowners were compelled to give 
 up their parcels of land, they were torn ruthlessly 
 from their wives and children, and sent as exiles 
 to the province of Kherson. Three hundred others 
 were exiled to the province of Ekaterinoslav. One 
 man was apportioned to each village, the elder of the 
 village being responsible for the Uniat, who was for- 
 bidden to have any communications with his family 
 or friends, or to receive his letters or money. They 
 received eight copecks, or twopence halfpenny, 
 per day ; but, in consequence of their stubbornness, 
 this allowance was cut off. They looked upon them- 
 selves as martyrs, and would rather die than give up 
 their belief. About 20,000 Uniats were deported to 
 Saratov and other provinces, and Russian priests 
 ("popes") were sent by the Russian Government to 
 proselytise them, but the Uniats drove them away. 
 The Uniats who were left behind were imprisoned 
 and tortured, and Cossacks were billeted upon them 
 whose excesses knew no bounds. 3 
 
 ' Lieutenant-Colonel Mansfield to Earl Derby, Warsaw, 
 February 14, 1876. 
 
 ' Ibid., January 29, 1875. 
 
 3 Consul-General Stanley to Earl Derby, Odessa, June 29, 
 1876, No. 21. 
 
94 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 And after all this the procurer of the Holy Synod 
 can hold up his head and boast before the whole of 
 Europe that Russia is the land of religious tolera- 
 tion ! And in the summer of 1888 he celebrated the 
 twenty-fifth year of jubilee of the conversion of the 
 Uniats with all the pomp of Church and State ! 
 Russia, he announced, was marked out by Providence 
 as the " guardian of two divisions of the world," and 
 from this dominating position was entrusted with the 
 mission of regenerating the world with its " pure 
 Christianity." 
 
XI. 
 
 FINLAND. 
 
 The area of the grand duchy of Finland is equal 
 to seven-tenths of the surface of the German Empire: 
 the country is therefore about one-tenth larger than 
 Prussia, and two and a half times as large as the 
 kingdoms of Bavaria, Wiirtemberg, Saxony, the 
 grand duchies of Baden and Hesse, and the Imperial 
 State of Alsace-L/orraine put together. On the other 
 hand, Finland contains little more than one-seventh 
 of the total population of these countries, and 
 numbers as compared with their average of 92 only six 
 inhabitants to the square kilometre (16 in the south 
 and most populated, Nyland-lan, and only one in the 
 most northern, Uleaborg-lan). The rapidly increasing 
 population amounted at the end of 1886 to 2,232,378 
 inhabitants, 92 per cent, of whom were peasants, 
 engaged in agriculture and the rearing of cattle, and 
 not quite 8 per cent, were living in towns ; 98 per 
 cent, are Lutherans ; 85 per cent, speak Finnish, and 
 
96 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 not quite 14.5 per cent. Swedish. The latter consti- 
 tute the country population only in the south- 
 western coast and island districts ; the remainder 
 belong to the nobihty, clergy, and civil service, as well 
 as to the commercial and industrial classes. 
 
 With regard to the configuration of the country, 
 Finland was covered during the glacial period, as 
 Greenland is still, by a huge unbroken mass of ice, 
 so that the land appears as a system of glacier beds, 
 running from north to south, and resting on a founda- 
 tion of granite. At one extremity of these glaciers 
 are found thousands of lakes, often very extensive, and 
 containing numerous bays ; at the other, interminable 
 moors, in addition to small tracts of carefully culti- 
 vated land, which are separated from one another by 
 chains of low hills, covered for the most part with 
 pine forests, but amongst which are found numerous 
 bare and totally unproductive granite ridges. The 
 extent of the whole forest area was some time ago 
 estimated at 63 per cent, of the total surface of the 
 country, whereas the returns of the districts then 
 surveyed (about 70 per cent, in the south) showed 
 8'65 per cent, of cultivated land, i.e., tilled fields and 
 meadows, 26 per cent, of moorland, and ii'6 per cent, 
 of water surface. 
 
 The general impression produced on a visitor when 
 he first sees the country is a very peculiar one ; no- 
 where else does he find such subdued melancholy 
 loveliness. The view of the innumerable lakes in 
 
FINLAND. 97 
 
 the distance is interrupted by the prettily undulating 
 lines of wooded heights ; the rural scenery is ren- 
 dered striking by the delightful and delicately gradu- 
 ated variations of the atmosphere ; but it is, so to 
 speak, a picture of still life. This is not due to the 
 scarcity of human dwellings. However scattered the 
 farms of the Schwarzwald (in Germany) are, the 
 sounds of merry laughter, expressive of comfort and 
 contentment, penetrate from its valleys to the loneli- 
 ness of the forest above ; whereas in Finland the 
 general poverty of nature lends the picture its funda- 
 mental tone. An air of silence and melancholy in the 
 scenery harmonises with the gray walls and brown 
 shingle-roofs of the unpretentious wooden structures 
 which isolated farms and scattered groups of houses 
 present to the eye. 
 
 Totally different, however, from this general im- 
 pression is that produced by every scene of human 
 activity. The smallest parcel of ground as well as 
 the more extensive cultivated field is tended with all 
 a horticulturist's care. The houses in both town and 
 country are extremely well built. The peasant's 
 home is kept spotlessly clean ; the high windows 
 with their neat curtains and bright flowers give it an 
 air of cheerfulness. Well cared-for cattle of pure 
 breed testify to the solicitude of the farmer. Every- 
 where, both in town and country, the people are well 
 dressed and evidently well fed. The roads from one 
 end of the country to the other are well kept, and the 
 
98 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 rapidity with which travellers are convej-ed, and the 
 excellent and cheap accommodation to be obtained at 
 the numerous clean posting-stages, or at the rustic 
 inns, are in themselves. sufficient evidence of the per-- 
 feet arrangement of things in Finland. 
 
 As to the capital of the country, the poverty of 
 which was at one time almost proverbial, and which 
 in its own national song calls itself poor,i a traveller 
 wi'ote twenty years ago : "On entering the Finnisli 
 capital one can form at once an idea of the 'poverty' 
 of the country. If the statistics of European capitals 
 were to be compiled from the architectural value of 
 their public buildings, and if, in so doing, the extent 
 of the period during which they were erected were 
 taken into consideration, and if the wealth of the city 
 were estimated by the sums expended yearly on its 
 structures (so much for each inhabitant), then Hel- 
 singfors would undoubtedly appear as one of the 
 wealthiest cities of Europe. The greatness of Riga, 
 for instance, dates many centuries back ; the pros- 
 perity of Helsingfors only began a few decades ago. 
 Riga has been for centuries the emporium of an ex- 
 tensive inland country ; the value of the Helsingfors 
 trade scarcely amounts (1870) to a seventh of that 
 of Riga. The larger buildings of Riga are almost 
 exclusively the property of individual corporations, 
 whereas those of Helsingfors are national institu- 
 tions. Apart from its splendidly picturesque situa- 
 
 ' See Appendix, Note 30. 
 
FINLAND. 99 
 
 tion, Helsingfors must strike every stranger as being 
 the capital of a promising country." 
 
 * * * * ^ 
 
 The conversion to Christianity of the lands to the 
 east and south-east of the Baltic, and their subjec- 
 tion to German culture, has been accomplished 
 everywhere within almost exactly the same historical 
 period, but under circumstances which differed ac- 
 cording as the colonisation emanated from Germany 
 or from Sweden. These differences should be glanced 
 at, because one of the principal Finnish character- 
 istics cannot otherwise be properly understood. 
 
 The work of conversion, which was set on foot at 
 the end of the tenth century, was unsuccessfully 
 begun among the Slavonic Prussians by Bohemian 
 and Siiesian missionaries, and was continued by the 
 Poles, but with only temporary success. It was not 
 till after the settlement of German Cistercians in 
 the latter part of the twelfth century, and the sup- 
 port granted by the Teutonic Order, that German cul- 
 ture began to develop in Prussia, and not even then, 
 as is well known, without uninterrupted, bitter, and 
 often unsuccessful struggles with the natives, and 
 strong opposition from the Poles. German culture, 
 unless it had been assisted by the mother-country, 
 would have been doomed to destruction if, after the 
 secularisation of the Teutonic Order at the Reforma- 
 tion, a series of powerful princes had not succeeded 
 in recovering and maintaining the ascendancy of the 
 German element in Prussia. 
 
loo RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 In Livonia likewise until the twelfth century 
 Slavonic (or more correctly Russian) influence tried 
 to make itself felt, but without any lasting success, 
 and without leaving behind the slightest traces of civi- 
 lisation. It is well known that about the middle of the 
 twelfth century some Bremen merchants first landed 
 on the coast of Livonia, that the country immediately 
 became the permanent home of a German mission, 
 and that in a very short time, after some compara- 
 tively brief but energetically conducted struggles with 
 the Finnish tribes of the Livonians and Esthonians, 
 a well-ordered federal state in connection with the 
 German Empire was established in the territory of the 
 present Livonia, Esthonia, and Courland by the 
 spiritual princes of the country, the military order, 
 and the autonomous towns. This state enjoyed 
 brilliant prosperity for several centuries ; but after 
 the repeated attacks of its powerful Eastern neigh- 
 bour, and after enduring terrible sufferings in war and 
 frightful devastations — the German Empire not lend- 
 ing the least assistance — it lost its unity and inde- 
 pendence (1561), though not without stipulating for 
 the preservation of German customs. 
 
 Unlike Prussia and Livonia, Finland was first 
 visited by the Swedes, not for missionary purposes, 
 but in the course of a war undertaken in order to 
 put an end to the plundering of the Swedish coasts 
 by Finnish pirates. Among the expeditions which 
 gradually extended the Swedish borders, and finally 
 
FINLAND. loi 
 
 led to the permanent acquisition of Finland by 
 Sweden, the most noteworthy are those undertaken 
 in the years 1157, 1249, and 1293. It is to be 
 noticed that the annexation was accomplished under 
 obviously favourable conditions, and particularly that 
 " little resistance was offered to the spread of the 
 Swedish administration; at least no complaint 
 against the violent imposition of foreign laws has 
 been handed down to posterity, as has been the case 
 in so many other countries." ' 
 
 To these striking circumstances must be added 
 another of paramount significance. In both Prussia 
 and Livonia the right of feudal investiture was not 
 only asserted to the fullest degree, but in many 
 cases led to excesses notorious under the name of 
 feudal rights, and especially to the diminution of the 
 rights of the free peasantry, and finally to its re- 
 duction to the level of serfdom. Sweden, however, 
 and more especially Finland, in spite of its national 
 difference, totally escaped this degradation. This 
 circumstance, which distinguishes the Scandinavian 
 world from almost the whole of Europe, is not only 
 accounted for by the necessity too often imposed on 
 the Swedish kings of relying on the help of the 
 peasantry in order to resist the encroachments of 
 an arrogant aristocracy, but also by a peculiarity 
 of the Scandinavian character which pervades all 
 classes of society. As early as the second half of 
 ■ See Appendix, Note 21. 
 
102 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the thirteenth century, under King Magnus, the 
 commoners were protected by law against the 
 arbitrary power of the nobles. About two genera- 
 tions after the final conquest of Finland it was set 
 down in the Finnish Charter obtained by the lay- 
 man, Niels Thuresson Bjelke, and Bishop Hemming 
 (1362), that in addition to the Finnish laymen and 
 clergy, twelve Finnish peasants should take part in 
 the election of the king. Since then, for nearly five 
 and a half centuries, the Finnish peasantry have 
 uninterruptedly enjoyed political and social equality, 
 and have had a voice in all decisions respecting 
 questions of legislation and taxation. 
 
 If we compare the mutual relations existing at 
 the present day among the peoples of the countries 
 just contrasted, we shall necessarily, to a great 
 extent, have to trace the differences resulting from 
 this comparison to the historical events that have 
 meanwhile occurred in them. Nevertheless it 
 cannot be denied that the beginnings of civilisation 
 in these countries have exercised a lasting influence 
 on their future development. The colonisation of 
 Prussia was attended with extreme harshness. 
 There was a time when the thought was seriously 
 entertained of rooting out the recalcitrant natives, 
 and replacing them by German immigrants, and 
 even at the present time there is no district on the 
 Baltic which has remained so far behind in intel- 
 lectual culture as East Prussia. There the peasant 
 
FINLAND. 103 
 
 is far below the level of the Esthonian or Lett, and 
 his relations with the German are by no means of 
 the most friendly. 
 
 Although in Livonia the lot of the subject popula- 
 tion has been from the very first somewhat less hard 
 (under Swedish rule much was done to lighten it), 
 although the emancipation of the serfs and the 
 suppression of forced labour among the Esthonians 
 and Letts took place much earlier than in many 
 parts of Germany, and although the country popu- 
 lation — thanks to the initiative of German fellow- 
 citizens — enjoys a free and independent communal 
 administration of justice and autonomy probably 
 unparalleled, yet the effects of past memories are 
 plainly recognisable. But for these the Muscovite 
 would never have been able to bring about a 
 revulsion— transitory, it is true, but at times very 
 serious — against German institutions. 
 
 Certainly the acts of violence indiscriminately 
 perpetrated against the country during the last few 
 years have had the effect of drawing Letts, Estho- 
 nians, and Germans more closely together than they 
 have been for the last seven hundred years. Had 
 the beginning of Livonian civilisation been milder, 
 perhaps its present existence would be less 
 threatened. In the whole history of Finland, but 
 especially in the dangers of the present time, it is 
 obvious of what auspicious importance it has been 
 for the country never to have known real feudal ser- 
 
I04 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 vitude, and only to have been inhabited by free men, 
 poUtically equal. The promise that the good deeds 
 of the fathers should bring a blessing upon thousands 
 has proved itself true here if anywhere. For in spite 
 of ethnological differences in the population, the 
 people of Finland has, from the commencement, 
 possessed the consciousness of its continuity without 
 interruption through whatever disturbances. 
 
 In vain has the Muscovite policy expanded all its 
 skill to exasperate Swedes and Finns against one 
 another, and to blow into the flame of a political 
 and hostile opposition the harmless and purely 
 literary movement of the Finnish patriots. 
 
 Upon the first appearance of a menace to the laws 
 of the country Swedes and Finns stood shoulder to 
 shoulder for the purpose of defence, with the same 
 resolution, the same patriotism, and without allow- 
 ing any separation to come between them. 
 
 There is not the least doubt that all that unanimity 
 in passive opposition can do has been done with the 
 greatest, stedfastness and in inviolable co-operation 
 by the brave little nation against the gigantic 
 oppressor. The last centuries during which 
 Finland was under the rule of Sweden — that is, 
 since the time when Sweden became an important 
 factor in the politics of the North — were for the 
 already scantily-provided country nothing but an 
 unbroken series of sufferings of all kinds. And yet 
 throughout this period the history of Finland is as 
 
FINLAND. 105 
 
 rich in memories, which the patriot may recall with 
 pride, as any other country. This, owing to the 
 limited space at our command, cannot be even 
 cursorily dealt with. Onlyone very special and charac- 
 teristic moment in the peculiar history of Finland 
 must be noticed, as it probably nowhere else stands 
 out so prominently. It reflects the highest honour 
 on the people of Finland, and is well calculated to 
 secure for them the sympathetic recognition of the 
 whole civilised world. 
 
 From the earliest times Finland's position in her 
 union with Sweden was that of equal rights. 
 Scarcely had one generation passed, after the final 
 annexation of the country by the peace of Note- 
 borg (1323), and Finland had already a voice in 
 the election of the king like the other provinces 
 of Sweden. It appears, from many decisions of 
 the General Legislation of 1442, that Finland was 
 then enjoying the same rights as the other pro- 
 vinces, but at the same time that it was some- 
 thing more than a mere territory administered by 
 Sweden — that is, it possessed an individuality of 
 its own. This is clearly shown in the legislation 
 which repeatedly names Finland side by side with 
 Sweden. Certain rights were acknowledged in the 
 case of the nobility " of Finland and of Sweden " ; 
 the regiment kept up under the standards of the 
 nobles was not to be employed outside " Finland 
 and Sweden"; the "Swedish as well as the Fin- 
 
io6 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 nish" peasantry were guaranteed certain privi- 
 leges. ^ This distinction is all the more striking 
 when contrasted with the transmarine possessions 
 acquired at a later period — i.e., the Baltic provinces 
 and the German territories, where Swedish rule 
 never fully asserted itself. Finland appears equal 
 to Sweden proper, both as regards its representation 
 in the diet of the realm, and in all other judicial and 
 political respects. The Swedish law was not foreign 
 to Finland, but was based on the native customs, 
 coupled with rights developed by the representatives 
 of the country, and rooted in the purely Finnish 
 population. 
 
 The distinction from the beginning of the period 
 mentioned acquires a most regrettable significance, 
 if not in political yet in, so to speak, practical 
 respects, because Finland is gradually relegated to 
 the undeserved position of a neglected and injured 
 step-brother — undeserved in two respects : first, 
 because of its importance as a frontier land, and 
 second, on account of the exceptionally loyal conduct 
 of the people. 
 
 It was by no means ignored by Sweden that, from 
 a military point of view, it was of the utmost im- 
 portance to maintain the Finnish frontier in the 
 best possible defensive condition against its aggres- 
 sive Eastern neighbour. Resolutions and measures 
 were repeatedly taken to ensure this object, but 
 ■ Mechelin,pp. 245, 246, znA^passim. 
 
FINLAND. 107 
 
 each time ostensibly more important tasks diverted 
 attention from Finland and its effective defence. 
 At the eleventh hour, when the power of Sweden 
 was broken and the loss of Finland was only a 
 question of time, an attempt was made to fortify 
 the southern coast, which was more immediately 
 threatened by Russia ; but, as on former occasions, 
 the land was almost entirely denuded of defensive 
 troops, and had to rely on the improvised armies of 
 the local population. 
 
 But, apart from its importance as an advanced 
 frontier post, the value of Finland was by no means 
 overlooked, but was repeatedly acknowledged and 
 emphatically insisted on. The great Swedish kings, 
 Charles IX. and Gustavus Adolphus, proved their 
 superior capacity for ruling by the care which they 
 devoted, during prolonged visits to the country, to 
 the restoration of order in its shamefully neglected 
 affairs. Axel Oxenstjerna, who distinguished him- 
 self in the same manner, remarked emphatically 
 that a well-administered Finland might almost equal 
 Sweden, only, as a matter of fact, it was the 
 weaker portion. And Peter Brahe the younger, 
 after travelling as governor-general through all 
 parts of Finland and studying them thoroughly 
 (1638), acknowledges, in his first report, that 
 Finland was by no means an insignificant kingdom. 
 As early as 1581 John III. recognised the brilliant 
 achievements of the Finns in repelling Ivan the 
 
io8 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 Cruel, by raising Finland to the rank of a grand 
 duchy. At the coronation of Charles IX. (1607) the 
 heir to the crown, Gustavus Adolphus, bore the 
 standard of Finland as " Grand Duke of Finland," 
 &c. 
 
 In estimating the value of Finland, the most 
 important factor surely was not what is noticed 
 in the second place by Peter Brahe — the great 
 abundance, considering the number of inhabitants, 
 of fish, furred animals, forests, and minerals, and its 
 extent — for imperishable treasures of another kind 
 have at all times formed the inexhaustible and 
 greatest wealth of the country. Inexhaustible indeed, 
 for, with but a few rare exceptions, the govern- 
 ment of the Swedish kings and nobility has almost 
 systematically, one might say, endeavoured to repel 
 Finland, and estrange it from Sweden. Neverthe- 
 less, Finland at all times, and uninterruptedly, dis- 
 tinguished itself more than any other province of 
 Sweden, by its steadfast loyalty and cheerful wiUing- 
 ness to make sacrifices, as long as it was not 
 actually given up and definitely handed over. 
 
 That Finland was left without aid and protection 
 from Sweden in the direst necessities of war has 
 already been adverted to. A few striking examples 
 will supply the proofs. 
 
 In spite of constant menaces of war, the troops 
 of Ivan IV., who invaded the country in 1573, did 
 not meet with any serious resistance in either 
 
FINLAND. 109 
 
 Finland or Esthonia. In the year 1577, after 
 repeated devastations by the Russians, only the 
 town and castle of Reval remained of the two coast 
 territories in the possession of Sweden. But, under 
 the leadership of the Finns, Tott and Fleming (later 
 also Delagardie and Tawwast), with only the troops 
 stationed in Finland, aided by bands of Finnish 
 peasant volunteers, the Russians were not only 
 totally driven out from the two coast territories and 
 Ingria, but even Carelia (which afterwards rem.ained 
 with Finland), together with its capital, Kexholm, 
 which had the reputation of being impregnable, was 
 taken (1580 and 1581). It is true that for these 
 achievements Finland received the honourable title 
 of a " grand duchy," but otherwise it was very badly 
 rewarded. Not only had the country, during a war 
 which lasted nearly nine years, been harassed by 
 levies, bad harvests, devastations, and plagues, but 
 after the conclusion of the truce it actually became 
 the booty of undisciplined unpaid soldiers, and what 
 was most vexatious, as being a constant and per- 
 manent oppression, it fell a prey to unprincipled 
 Swedish officials — -the "law-readers" — ^who de- 
 lighted in extortion, &c. Repeated Finnish depu- 
 tations entreating the king to do away with these 
 abuses remained unnoticed by him. 
 
 Under circumstances essentially similar though 
 of shorter duration, the sufferings were revived eight 
 years after, when Finland, left undefended, was 
 
no RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 inundated by the devastating bands of Boris Godu- 
 nov. The honourable peace of Teusina (1585) did 
 not end the misery, as a deplorable civil confusion 
 broke out in Sweden — namely, the struggle between 
 the lawful king, Sigismund, then absent in Poland, 
 and Duke Charles, who abrogated to himself all the 
 royal power as regent of the realm. It is worthy of 
 notice that Finland then, in spite of all the vexations 
 it had been subjected to, placed itself on the side 
 of legality and of the rightful sovereign, whose re- 
 presentative in Finland (Fleming, the viceroy) 
 had, by exercising an arbitrary and illegal pressure, 
 driven the people in self-defence to civil war (the 
 "War of Clubs," 1592-1600), which was only ended 
 after the deposition of Sigismund had been legally 
 accomplished. In the Swedish religious differences 
 which were then raging, Finland, threatened on 
 two sides, preserved a doubly honourable position, 
 making a stand against Swedish puritanism and 
 Lutheran intolerance, as well as against the Jesuitic 
 counter-reformation, and holding aloft the banner 
 of religious liberty. 
 
 The successes connected with the powerful posi- 
 tion of Sweden under Charles IX., extending to 
 the peace of Stolbowa (1617), viz., the "rescue" of 
 Moscow in 1610, the second capture of Kexholm, the 
 storming and occupation of Great Novgorod, the call 
 of Gustavus Adolphus, i.e., of his brother Charles 
 Philip to the throne of the Tsars, &c., were due to 
 
FINLAND. Ill 
 
 Finnish men — Klaus Boije, Arevid Wildeman, Ewert 
 Horn, Jacob Delagardie (the last named, though 
 born at Reval, was brought up in Finland) — all of 
 them leaders of Finnish troops. Thus was Sweden 
 actually in a very special way advanced by Finland. 
 
 Finland, however, proved of the greatest value to 
 Sweden in the great "German War" (Thirty Years' 
 War). While only expected to supply one-fourth of 
 the total military armament of Sweden, the Finnish 
 contingent in this war amounted to fully two-fifths 
 {ix., of thirty regiments twelve were Finnish), 
 amongst which the Finnish cavalry formed the best 
 part of the Swedish picked troops. Their war-cry, 
 " Hakka paale," ^ produced a regular panic. 
 
 These great services and sacrifices were accom- 
 plished by Finland, although it had been nearly 
 annihilated by the almost incessant frontier wars, 
 for which it had had to depend entirely on its own 
 resources, as well as by the extortions of Swedish 
 officials (its population scarcely numbered more than 
 250,000 to 300,000 people, and, according to the testi- 
 mony of Oxenstjerna, whole districts were totally 
 uncultivated and only contained wild animals), and 
 although the benevolent rule of Charles IX. and 
 Gustavus Adolphus had scarcely had time to 
 produce favourable results. But if Finland was 
 indebted to the intelligent administration of Oxen- 
 
 ' This cry cannot unfortunately be accurately translated. It 
 combines the meaning of " At them " and " seize them ! " 
 
112 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 stjerna and Peter Brahe the younger for many 
 benefits that could never be forgotten, such as the 
 reform of sundry abuses, the foundation of the Abo 
 University, improved means of communication, &c., 
 yet it was only then that the real period of suffering 
 commenced for the not only neglected, but actually 
 misused and maltreated, step-brother. 
 
 During the minority of Christina the wasteful 
 throwing away of the land, which yielded the chief 
 revenue of the realm, began ; under her frivolous 
 government disorder reached its highest point. 
 Christina alone created eighteen counts, forty-two 
 marquises, and four hundred nobles, and endowed 
 them all with hereditary landed possessions. Finland 
 was the specially favoured country for such investi- 
 tures ; in Finland alone (where hitherto there had 
 only existed one county and two baronetcies) no 
 fewer than eight counties and twenty-one baronet- 
 cies were instituted by Christina. On her abdication 
 Finland was a bundle of little principalities : two- 
 thirds of the country and one-third of the revenue 
 had been given away to noblemen living in Sweden, 
 who were for the most part foreigners. Finland had 
 become the plunder-ground of the Swedish aristoc- 
 racy, who were, moreover, granted oppressive 
 privileges — church patronage, judicial and political 
 powers, &c. The abuses and sufferings which 
 resulted to Finland need not be pointed out in 
 detail. 
 
FINLAND. ti3 
 
 Matters were destined to become still worse in 
 consequence of the ambitious plans of Charles X. ; 
 his defeats as well as his successes proved alike 
 injurious to Finland. To provide for the expedition 
 undertaken against Poland, Finland was entirely 
 denuded of all its military strength (1656), so that, 
 while 20,000 Finns were quartered in Poland, Fin- 
 land was quite defenceless, when it was invaded by 
 the Russians, who took the part of the dethroned 
 king of Poland, John Casimir. A hastily summoned 
 Finnish reserve sprang as it were from the ground ; 
 instead of every tenth man, the peasants gave every 
 eighth ; and local diets voted war contributions to 
 an extent never heard of before. In 1657 Kexholm 
 was relieved and all danger from the Russians 
 removed ; Finland gave up half of its newly-raised 
 military power for continuing the war in Livonia, 
 and received from Poland in return — the plague. 
 This war, conducted at the cost of so many sacri- 
 fices, but otherwise abortive, was ended in 1658 by 
 a truce, and was followed in 1661 by the peace of 
 Kardis. Time gradually heals the wounds of war, but 
 the successes of Charles X., as has been remai'ked, 
 were far more fatal to Finland than his defeats, e.g., 
 the acquisition of the Southern provinces by the 
 peace concluded with Denmark in 1658 at Roeskilde. 
 Hitherto, in consequence of the achievements of 
 the Finns, the brotherly relations between Finland 
 and Sweden had at least theoretically and academi- 
 
 9 
 
114 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 cally become increasingly sympathetic; the loyalty 
 of the Finns had become proverbial ; it was acknow- 
 ledged that the Finns were justified when they 
 boasted of being bound to Sweden not as slaves, 
 but as partners ; in Sweden the Finns were 
 recognised as '■' brothers and comrades," and the 
 relations existing between Sweden and Finland was 
 termed an " alliance." From the time, however, 
 that Sweden extended its frontiers to the south, 
 its interest in Finland began to cool. It became 
 more and more evident that the fidelity of Finland 
 to tlie State was one-sided and not reciprocated. 
 
 Under the last governments, whose efforts were 
 principally directed abroad, a serious neglect, nay, 
 even an oppression, of Finland had set in. The 
 improvements effected by Gustavus Adolphus, Oxen- 
 stjerna, and Brahe, had disappeared ; Finland was 
 again exploited by greedy and corruptible Swedish 
 judges and officials; trade and industry were 
 paralysed by the monopolies granted to certain 
 privileged companies and to Swedish markets. 
 Money and talent no longer found an opening, and 
 therefore migrated to Sweden. Finland began to 
 lose its culture. All these evils were intensified 
 under the aristocratic regency which followed, for, 
 instead of improving the finances by effecting the 
 "reduction" which had been decided on, i.e., re- 
 covering lands and endowments which had been 
 thrown away or obtained by cunning devices, new 
 
FINLAND. 1 1 5 
 
 grants were made, and, although the treasury was 
 almost empt}', the persons in power allowed them- 
 selves to be persuaded by France to join her in 
 frivolous military adventures, &c. This mismanage- 
 ment weighed more heavily on Finland than on the 
 provinces, yet Finland, nevertheless, repeatedly dis- 
 tinguished itself by its loyalty to the Crown, and 
 voted at the diet of Abo abundant supplies for 
 conducting the " useless " war, with the proviso, 
 it is true, that these supplies should be chiefly spent 
 in placing the countr}' in a proper state of defence 
 against Russia, which was then arming in order to 
 make up for the peace of Stolbowa. 
 
 Under the ensuing absolute rule of Charles XI. 
 Sweden enjoyed twenty years' peace ; order was 
 restored to its finances, its resources were re-estab- 
 lished through strictly carried out " reduction," and 
 an orderly administration, together with civic free- 
 dom and security, was obtained. Although the 
 king never visited Finland, and bestowed no special 
 care upon it, even in many respects treating it like 
 a step-father (in 1689, for instance, the Finns were 
 excluded from the rank of officers), it nevertheless 
 derived some indirect benefit from the general 
 improvement, and all its subsequent administrative 
 institutions may be said to date from this epoch. 
 
 It is noteworthy that a distinction, though merely 
 theoretical, between Finnish and Swedish, is then 
 met with for the first time. While, on the one 
 
ii6 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 hand, a total suppression of the Finnish language 
 was aimed at, on the other the first beginnings of 
 Finnish ethnography and philology were made — a 
 fact which at any rate points to an invigoration of 
 the native intellectual vitality. In economical 
 respects, however, this period was one of the most 
 lamentable ever experienced by Finland. Besides a 
 persistent artificial paralysing of trade and industry, 
 Finland was visited by a long series of bad crops, 
 famines, and terrible conflagrations. At the begin- 
 ning of the reign of Charles XII. it would have 
 required years to heal the wounds from which the 
 country was suffering; instead of this necessary 
 period of peace, there were constant miseries of 
 war, such as had never before been experienced, 
 which were obviously intensified by the total neglect 
 and abandonment of Finland by Sweden. 
 
 It is too well known to need amplification that, 
 during the twenty years' Northern war, the Baltic 
 provinces bordering on Russia and Poland were 
 entirely abandoned by Charles XII. for the sake of 
 his plans, which were directed towards the South. 
 We need only mention Finland's share in the 
 sufferings thereby incurred. After the great victory 
 of Narva, which was more than half due to the 
 Finns, Finland was entirely denuded of troops, and 
 was called upon to supply a second army. During 
 the first year of the war (1700), scantily populated 
 as it was, it had supplied no less than 20,000 
 
FINLAND. 117 
 
 soldiers, not even a third of whom were allowed to 
 be used in defence of their own countr)-. The want 
 of men was at that time so great that even fathers 
 of families and holders of farms had often to be 
 called out, and even this was not the last demand 
 for men! Nevertheless, the unflinching fidelity of 
 the Finns to the State and the king constantly 
 rendered it possible to send out peasant volunteers 
 to serve in other than the, so to speak, official war 
 operations ! Nothing was done by Sweden for the 
 defence of Finland ; authorities and archives were 
 shipped off, and the country was entirely abandoned 
 to itself. Although in 1707 a new army had to be 
 got together, it was able in 1710 to arm another 
 8,000 men, who, however, were powerless to save 
 their country. Half the troops, whom Charles XII. 
 in 1713 led from Bender to the fertile districts of 
 Riigen, would have sufficed to deliver Finland. 
 Instead of this help being given, the very last 
 soldier was withdrawn from Finland to protect the 
 Swedish coast, and the land, thoroughly exhausted 
 by the distress produced by a fourteen years' war, 
 became for the third time the prey of the Russians, 
 who for seven years (1714-1721) committed un- 
 bounded excesses. 
 
 Under such provocation it would not have been 
 surprising if the loyalty of Finland had relaxed, and 
 if the diplomatic schemes to marry Charles Frederick 
 of Holstein, the nephew of Charles XII., with the 
 
iiS RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 daughter of the Tsar, and to make him the ruler of 
 an autonomous Finland, had been gladly welcomed. 
 Instead of this, Finland's fidelity remained unshaken, 
 and, even under Russian sway, the Finnish partisan 
 war was carried on obstinately and without interrup- 
 tion ! 
 
 After the peace of Nystadt in 172 1 — by which, in 
 order to retain Livonia, Esthonia, and Ingria, the 
 greater part of Finland (except Viborg, &c.) was 
 given back to Sweden — the government of the 
 Swedish nobles, which had just begun, was at first 
 very attentive to the restoration of the country's 
 welfare. But Finland was soon again neglected. 
 Only one of its harbours obtained the right of 
 trading with foreign countries. This was Abo, 
 which, not having any important inland country at 
 its back, could in no way compete with Stockholm, 
 Gefle, &c. Even the representatives of Finland at 
 the diet were reduced in number. Stockholm alone 
 had as many representatives as all the Finnish 
 towns put together, &c. But the exceedingly thought- 
 less and wild rule of the nobility, disgraced by the 
 constant party hatred of the " Hats " and " Caps," 
 contributed more than any oppressions, slights, or 
 neglect, towards estranging the hearts of the Finns 
 from the State and detaching Finland from it. 
 Finland was treated, over the heads of the Finns 
 themselves, as goods for barter by the leaders of the 
 Swedish policy. On the one hand, the " Caps " 
 
FINLAND. 119 
 
 in 1741 carried on negotiations, with a view to con- 
 stitute Finland an autonomous neutral state " under 
 Russian protection." On the other hand, the 
 " Hats " expressly declared, among their reasons 
 for declaring war against Russia (1741), that the 
 war was not dangerous, because it would at most 
 bring about the devastation and loss of Finland. 
 Indeed, the whole of Finland was occupied for the 
 fourth time by the Russians, and administered by 
 them for two years (1742-1743) — this time, however, 
 in rather an indulgent manner. The Empress Eliza- 
 beth, who by a manifesto of 1742 had raised hopes 
 as to the autonomy of Finland, afterwards preferred 
 its incorporation with the Russian Empire, and com- 
 pelled the Finns to do homage. In the treaty of 
 peace of Abo (1742) the cession of Finland was offered 
 by Sweden as the price of Elizabeth's consent to the 
 choice of an heir to the throne agreeable to the 
 " Hats" ; in short, Finland was heartlessly treated 
 as something to be bought and sold. The treaty, 
 it is true, allowed the greater part of Finland to 
 remain under Sweden, but the Finns were wounded 
 in their tenderest feelings, not only in that their 
 national territory was rent asunder, but also because 
 the new frontier regulations deprived the southern 
 harbours of their inland connections, and the inland 
 country of its harbours ! 
 
 During the ten years of the wildest party struggles 
 between the " Hats " and the " Caps " that followed. 
 
I20 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 Finland had to pay the greater part of the reckoning. 
 It was brought to light by the deputations to the 
 diet how much Finland was injured, and neglected 
 in favour of Sweden ; how all payments out of the 
 " manufacturing fund " were withdrawn ; how only 
 three Finnish seaports, as against twenty -one 
 Swedish, obtained the right of trading abroad, &c. 
 Instead of allaying the increased discontent in 
 Finland by refraining from acts of injustice, the 
 Swedish nobility preferred to introduce a regular 
 reign of terror, by making use of a severe press-gang 
 system, and by keeping a strict watch over all mal- 
 contents, who were speedily brought to trial and 
 executed. Native Finnish officials were dismissed 
 and replaced by Swedes. It was even proposed to 
 replace all the Finnish military by Swedish forces, 
 after the plan of placing Finland in a general state 
 of defence had been given up, because of the fear 
 that the Finnish country population might prove 
 unreliable ! Such was the gratitude for the sacri- 
 fices cheerfully made for centuries by the loyal 
 Finns. 
 
 What truth there was in the pretended unre- 
 liability of the Finns was first shown at the diet of 
 1765, when, chiefly by the aid of the numerous 
 Finnish representatives, the restoration of the royal 
 authority, which had been degraded by the ex- 
 cesses of the nobility in power, was effected ; the 
 freedom of trade, which had been lost for 150 
 
FINLAND. 121 
 
 years, was regained ; the liberty of speech and 
 of the press was inscribed in the fundamental law 
 of the land, &c. And soon after Gustavus III.'s 
 coronation, it was in Finland that the decisive steps 
 were taken to restore the royal power, and to place 
 it on a satisfactory basis. ^ All the attempts of the 
 Swedish nobles, who for the sake of their own plans 
 had always been ready to give up Finland, failed 
 on account of the fidelity of the Finns to their 
 king! 
 
 With the accession of Gustavus III., the golden 
 age of Finland appeared to dawn. He had already 
 issued a special manifesto from Versailles (1784), 
 the " Letter to the Finnish nation," and his en- 
 deavours to raise the state of defence of Finland to 
 the same level as that of Sweden, and to support 
 the Finnish nobility, which had been neglected by 
 the Swedish Estates, soon became evident. He 
 visited Poland, accompanied by the Crown Prince 
 Gustavus Adolphus. The gratitude of the "Finnish 
 nation " for all the benefits he had conferred was 
 expressed to him in a solemn form. It appeared 
 for a moment as if the intimate understanding 
 between Finland and its king was to be disturbed, 
 when a personal quarrel occurred between the king 
 and the younger gifted Sprengporten, whose discon- 
 tent was made use of on two sides— by the Free- 
 masons, who aimed at the autonomy of Finland, 
 ' See Appendix, Note 23. 
 
122 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 and also by the Queen-mother, whose dearest wish 
 it was some day to see her favourite son, Duke 
 Charles, raised to the position of an independent 
 Grand Duke of Finland. To reaHse these plans, 
 Sprengporten entered the service of Russia, against 
 whom Gustavus III. had illegally, without consult- 
 ing the Estates, declared war, whilst Russia was 
 occupied in Turkey, hoping thus to take advantage 
 of the opportunity offered to recover Viborg, &c., 
 and, in addition, he sought to foment a conspiracy 
 in Finland, with the object of severing the country 
 from Sweden. Although the latter plan ended in 
 complete failure, yet the so-called Aujala league, 
 formed by the malcontent Finnish military officers, 
 which, though faithful to the State, called on the 
 people to resist the king — i.e., to arrest the war, 
 consolidate the national rights, and at the same 
 time also defend the country to the last — affords 
 the only example in history of an attempt made 
 in Finland to rebel against the king. The Aujala 
 league, however, met with no support from public 
 opinion in Finland, which declared itself decidedly 
 in favour of the king, and thus once again gave a 
 striking proof of its fidelity. 
 
 Gustavus IV. likewise left behind him a grateful 
 remembrance of his regency in Finland, because 
 of many beneficial economic arrangements — the 
 foundation and endowment of the Economical 
 Society (" P'inska Hallningssiillskapet "), &c. He 
 
FINLAND. 123 
 
 liked and favoured Finland because it showed itself 
 decidedly averse to the prevailing revolutionary 
 ideas. The final fate of Finland, however, its sever- 
 ance from Sweden, was brought about by the king's 
 mortal antipathy to Napoleon, "the scarlet beast of 
 the Book of Revelation," whom he, a second Charles 
 XII., intended to overthrow by a bold onslaught. 
 Of course it did not come to this, but, repeating the 
 grievous wrong inflicted by Charles XII. on Finland, 
 he almost entirely denuded the country of troops, at 
 a time when it was threatened with war by the 
 East. Far from complying with the categorical 
 demand of Russia, Napoleon's ally, to exclude the 
 English from the Baltic, he even undertook, with 
 the assistance of England, to conquer Norway, and 
 abandoned Finland to its fate. 
 
 In an obstinate and desperate struggle Finland 
 gave the last proofs of its fidelity to king and realm, 
 but unfortunately in vain, since, in spite of brilliant 
 military achievements and martial ardour, the 
 Finnish troops, under the bad leadership of Klirg- 
 spor, had to relinquish one favourable position after 
 another, and lastly they were obliged to retreat into 
 Swedish territory. While the whole country was 
 occupied by the Russian troops the peasants took 
 up arms wherever an opportunity presented itself. 
 Before the eyes of the Russian garrison, Mathias 
 Colonius, then an old man of seventy, interpreted 
 the feelings of every Finn when he said in his 
 
124 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 rectorial address, " Although the fortune of war has 
 placed our bodies in the power of our enemies, and 
 compelled us to resign ourselves to the fortune of 
 arms, yet our souls cling with incorruptible loyalty 
 and unutterable obedience to our native king ; for as 
 long as the issue of war is still uncertain, and until 
 a peace shall have been concluded by which our 
 ruler himself resigns his rights, it is not permissible 
 for a subject to abandon his duties, if he does not 
 wish to be branded as a traitor." And when Von 
 Dobeln announced to the Finnish soldiers the 
 purport of the treaty of peace, he pronounced words 
 which conclude the Swedish period of the history of 
 Finland in a dignified and truthful manner :— 
 "Through the loss of the noble Finnish people 
 Sweden has forfeited its most reliable support, and 
 the Swedish army its most solid and most efficient 
 element." 
 
 ***** 
 
 Alexander I., who by the favour of Napoleon 
 made himself master of Finland, recognised the 
 value of the acquisition. The intellectual and 
 moral gain were appreciated more by him than the 
 territory which had been annexed. Finland was to 
 serve as a lasting model of culture to the old un- 
 developed Russian Empire. Just as a century before 
 Peter I. had not wished to possess Livonia and 
 Esthonia by virtue of the brutal right of war, but by 
 the bonds of mutual confidence, so Alexander I., 
 
FINLAND. 125 
 
 after Finland was given up by its former ruler, united 
 it to his Empire by the solemn pledge of the letter of 
 security of the 15th (27th) of March, 1809, "to pre- 
 serve entire and unchanged the religion and funda- 
 mental laws of the country, as well as the privileges 
 and rights which every estate, and all the inhabitants 
 in general, have enjoyed in virtue of their constitu- 
 tion." 
 
 When the diet assembled on the 17th (agth) of 
 March, 1809, at Borga, to do homage to the new 
 ruler, he and the constitutionally elected representa- 
 tives of the national estates took a solemn oath to 
 be faithful to one another and to the law of the 
 land. This sacred vow has since been solemnly 
 renewed on every change of government, and also 
 by Alexander III., on his accession to the throne. 
 
 Soon after the erection of the grand duchy of 
 Finland into an autonomous state, personally united 
 with Russia, its national territory was again restored 
 through the incorporation of the " government of 
 Viborg" with Finland. This province under Russian 
 rule had remained behind in its delevopment, and 
 had become in a relatively short time so degraded 
 in respect of culture that the traces of this degrada- 
 tion even now, eighty years after, have not totally 
 vanished. 
 
 The oath of fidelity mutually taken at Borga has 
 always been observed by Finland to the letter. The 
 same cannot unfortunately be said with regard to 
 
126 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the other contracting party. For half a century the 
 assembly of the diet of the Estates, prescribed by the 
 constitution for the levying of taxes and making of 
 laws, has not taken place. The realisation of true 
 constitutional administration was not agreeable to 
 the reactionary and gloomy policy of the last period 
 of Alexander I., to say nothing of the autocratic 
 spirit of Nicholas I. At that time, at any rate, the 
 country, through the intermediary of its senate, was 
 ruled in accordance with its old institutions, and in 
 complete harmony with the Russian Empire, so 
 beneficially that at no period of its existence did 
 Finland enjoy such undisturbed and thorough 
 development.^ 
 
 No doubt in many departments of civic life the 
 antiquated legislation, the want of development of 
 the financial system, &c., were keenly felt, but as the 
 country from the earliest times had been used to a 
 capable self-government, it was possible to take cir- 
 cumstances into account, and to find contentment 
 and satisfaction even within the narrow limits as- 
 signed. 
 
 All possible steps were taken during the liberal 
 period of the beginning of Alexander 11. 's reign to 
 renovate and vivify the political condition of Finland. 
 Under the auspices of the enlightened Governor- 
 General Berg, who was well acquainted with the cir- 
 cumstances and requirements of the country, an 
 ' See Appendix, Note 23. 
 
FINLAND. 127 
 
 assembly of Finnish notables and persons acquainted 
 with its affairs prepared a programme for a second 
 diet, which was opened by Alexander II. in person 
 on the 15th of September, 1863, and to the general 
 satisfaction of all, sat during his presence at Hel- 
 singfors until the 15th of April, 1864. The limited 
 space at our command does not permit us to give 
 even a brief account of the legislative measures 
 which were voted by the Estates then as well as at 
 the third diet (26th of January to May 31, 1867) for 
 the real regeneration, completion, and consolidation 
 of the Finnish administration, and were afterwards 
 sanctioned by the Grand Duke. All these agree- 
 ments between the Finnish people and their ruler 
 may be briefly described as a late but ail the more 
 felicitous realisation of what Alexander I. had pro- 
 mised the Finnish people on the day when the diet 
 did homage to him, viz., that he would raise them to 
 the rank of a nation (that it would be place, desormais 
 au rang des nations). Indeed the Finnish people 
 has attained a highly honourable position in the 
 European family of nations, and it is easy to un- 
 derstand why it faithfully clings with an inborn and 
 long-tried tenacity to the advantages obtained after 
 long sufferings. 
 
 The sincere fidelity of the Finnish people is shown 
 by observing the feelings with which the Finn at no 
 distant date looked back from an untroubled and 
 prosperous present to the painful recollections of 
 
128 RUSSIA UNDUR ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the Swedish past. In his " History of Finland " ^ 
 the national Finn, Koskinen, writes as follows : — 
 " The people of Finland, although they were subju- 
 gated, obtained the same political rights as their 
 masters the Swedes enjoyed. Both peoples after- 
 wards marched side by side through good and ill 
 fortune, and although the lion's share of honour 
 always fell to the Swedes, and the burden of suffer- 
 ing to the Finns, yet the people of Finland gained 
 advantages from the political union which, left to 
 themselves, they would never have been able to 
 obtain in the same degree and in the same time. . . . 
 The old bond of union, though snapped as if by a 
 decree of fate, left behind recollections which will 
 always remain dear and sacred to the Finnish 
 people " (pp. 562 and 563). 
 
 Even those who did not come to the same con- 
 clusion by themselves, may gather from the above 
 that the quite recent truly happy relations between 
 the Finns and their Grand Duke produced on their 
 part exceptionally faithful and warm feelings of 
 gratitude and esteem towards that potentate. And 
 these they were quite prepared to pay to him. Yet 
 what fate arranged so happily and pleasantly is now 
 to be destroyed by one blow of a rough hand. 
 
 The Grand Duke in his most recent manifesto 
 may tell the Finns that they need have no apprehen- 
 
 " From the earliest times to the present day. (German 
 edition, Leipsig, 1874.) 
 
FINLAND. 129 
 
 sions, that it is not proposed to interfere with the 
 rights of the faithful Finnish people, and that the 
 only desire of the Russians is to form a closer union 
 with the grand duchy ; but it is a contradiction in 
 terms. For Finland has no other union with Russia 
 than that which is conditioned by the personal union 
 of the crowns and by the community of the leader- 
 ship of the army and the diplomatic representation. 
 All other " union," if it is not voted by the states of 
 the grand duchy, is a manifest act of violence and 
 an undeniable wrong. 
 
 The people of Finland remember only too well 
 the barbarity which was practised in the " pro- 
 vince of Viborg" shortly after its "union" with 
 Russia. And have they not before their eyes the 
 example of the German colonies on the Volga, in 
 Southern Russia, and Bessarabia, colonies which 
 enjoyed an enviable prosperity, until a pretext was 
 found to deprive them of their efficient self-govern- 
 ment, and, by inoculating them with Russian bureau- 
 cracy, " to make them members of the great Russian 
 family " ? And as a result the colonists were driven 
 to such despair that they preferred to leave the 
 country and wander into foreign lands. 
 
 The Finns are not ignorant of the fact that in 
 Livonia, Esthonia, and Courland the people were de- 
 prived of their rights, and that Russification of the 
 worst kind was introduced by a similar manifesto. 
 The Grand Duke Vladimir, while on his tour through 
 
 10 
 
I30 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the Baltic provinces, had no sooner declared in the 
 name of the Emperor how much he Ipved and 
 cherished his dear Baltic subjects, how he would in 
 no wise interfere with their position, but would 
 rather "make them members of the great Russian 
 family," than all at once a blight fell on all depart- 
 ments of public life : order, security of rights, and 
 means of education were destroyed, and the country 
 was overrun with Muscovite officials. 
 
 Alexander III. may have acted in all good faith 
 in signing the manifesto to the Finns which deals 
 only with the future. But had not the immediate 
 past and the present already given sufficient grounds 
 for uneasiness ? Were not the pernicious beginnings 
 of violence and of the destruction of all security of 
 rights already visible ? 
 
 Was it a trifle that the well-ordered financial rela- 
 tions of Finland and its stable monetary system 
 were destroyed with a single stroke of the pen, while 
 the Russian paper rouble was forced into circulation 
 at a value to be determined by the Russian Minister 
 of Finance ? Add to this the ruination of trade and 
 manufactures in Finland through the introduction of 
 arbitrary Russian custom-house measures ! 
 
 And was it nothing to hand over the well-organised 
 postal system of Finland to the disorderly manage- 
 ment of Russian officials ? What a terrible misuse 
 has been made of the power of intercepting letters ! 
 At the present day confidential communications can 
 
FINLAND. 131 
 
 only safely be sent in Finland, as in " Holy Russia," 
 through the intermediary of personal friends. And 
 the Russiiication of the railways is only a question 
 of time. And an army of Chinovniks thrown upon 
 the land ! No European can have any notion of 
 the resemblance between all this and an infectious 
 epidemic. 
 
 Was it not a gross infraction of the rights of the 
 land when the members of the Finnish senate were 
 compelled to resign in consequence of an official 
 note from the governor-general, in which, by a 
 flagrant violation of the constitution of the grand 
 duchy, the Emperor's will was declared to be 
 supreme, and the senate was requested to subor- 
 dinate itself to the orders of the Russian Govern- 
 ment ? It amounts to this : the substitution of 
 Russian caprice for orderly Finnish administration, 
 and the destruction of all rights of person and 
 property. That is what is meant by " unification " 
 and " admission as members of the great Russian 
 family." It is nothing but the fanatical degradation 
 of culture to the lowest depths of barbarism. 
 
 Truly it is not without cause and for no slight 
 object that the minds of the Finns are agitated. 
 Their whole culture, which has been painfully ac- 
 quired after hundreds of years, is at stake. An im- 
 pressive spectacle is presented to the eyes of Europe — 
 the spectacle of a small courageous people united as 
 one man to resist the encroachments of their giant 
 
132 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 oppressor by means of passive resistance. What 
 may be the result no one can tell. But this sorely 
 tried people have one consolation. Some unforeseen 
 calamity may overtake their giant oppressor at any 
 moment, for his body is corrupt and covered with 
 sores ; while the healthy and vigorous may hope, 
 Antseus-like, to derive fresh powers from their past 
 culture, and with resigned and steadfast love of 
 their "poor" home, they may say in the words of 
 the national song : — 
 
 " Men detta laudet alska vi ; 
 For OSS, med moar, fjall och skar, 
 Ett gultland dock det ar. 
 
 Din blomning, sluten an i knopp, 
 
 Skall mogna ur sitt tvang : 
 
 Se, ur var Karlek skall ga upp 
 
 Ditt Ijus, din glans, din frojd, ditt hopp : 
 
 Och hogra klinga skall en gang 
 
 Var fosterlandska sang." ' 
 
 See Appendix, Note 24. 
 
XII. 
 
 THE AKSAKOV FAMILY. 
 
 At the end of 1888 a book was published at Moscow 
 under the title of " Ivan Sergyevich Aksakov in his 
 Letters" (two vols., 1839 to 1848, and 1848 to 1851), 
 which is one of the most remarkable in recent Russian 
 literature. It is, in a double sense, of more im- 
 portance to literary history than any work published 
 in the Russian language during the last twenty 
 years. 
 
 The recent political history of Russia is so inti- 
 mately connected with the literary movement in that 
 country, that the one cannot be understood apart 
 from the other. The dominant idea in Russia under 
 Alexander III. is that of a national separateness and 
 exclusiveness, an idea adopted by the Government 
 of St. Petersburg from a literary party, that of the 
 so-called Slavophils. The history of the Slavophil 
 party, again, is indissolubly connected with the for- 
 
134 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 tunes of the Aksakov family. Not that either Aksakov 
 the father, or one of his sons, was the founder of the 
 school ; that position is recognised as belonging to 
 the poet Khomyakov, whom the Aksakovs always 
 regarded as their master. But the scholars far 
 outstripped their master, who died young, in in- 
 fluence and in active propagandism. They com- 
 pleted the details of his system, and deduced from 
 it political consequences foreign to the purpose of 
 the originator; they introduced Khomyakov's ideas 
 to wider circles, and prepared the way for their 
 realisation, and for their distortion and exaggeration, 
 perhaps even more effectively than they themselves 
 knew or desired. For more than a generation the 
 house of Aksakov formed the centre, the Vatican, so 
 to speak, of the doctrine of the only saving power of 
 the Russo-Slavonic nationality. The father, who died 
 in 1859, and his eldest son, Constantine, who died a 
 year later, did not live to see the abolition of serfdom, 
 and the new era opened in the history of the Russian 
 people and State by that event; but the surviving 
 younger son, Ivan (born 1823), followed the traditions 
 of his ancestors with a talent and energy which have 
 secured him an important place, unique of its kind, 
 in the annals of his country. He certainly produced 
 no tangible political results comparable to those pro- 
 duced by Katkov ; but his moral and literary influence 
 was far greater than that of the famous editor of the 
 Moscow Gazette. 
 
THE A KSA KOV FAMILY. 135 
 
 But there is another sense in which the history of 
 the Aksakov family was important to Russia. Its 
 earlier chapters have been narrated in a book which 
 is unequalled in Russian literature. The history of 
 his ancestors, his parents, and his own early years, 
 written by Sergy (Sergius) Aksakov, the father of 
 Constantine and Ivan, under the title of " Family 
 Chronicles," is one of the most delightful, instructive, 
 and artistic memoirs ever written, a masterpiece both 
 in form and contents. The author sketches, in short, 
 nervous strokes, a picture of Russian country life, 
 and of the patriarchal housekeeping of the eighteenth 
 century, which, although or because it is limited to 
 the chronicles of one family, gives at the same time 
 a lively history of Russian manners and culture in 
 the days of Elizabeth and Catherine II. The nar- 
 rative is fascinating in its poetic warmth and feeling. 
 The author's grandfather appears as the representa- 
 tive of the old Russian patriarchal life, and as a 
 pioneer of the colonising activity by which the half 
 Tartar countries of the Lower Volga have been sub- 
 jected to Russian and Christian civilisation. ^ He 
 seems, in spite of his rough ways and autocratic 
 temper, to have been an estimable old man. His 
 son, the father of the author, is half modernised, 
 weak, and insignificant ; yet he is capable of a deep 
 and ideal attachment to a young girl, intellectually 
 
 ' A German translation of the "Family Chronicles," by 
 Racynski, has been published by W. Engelmann, of Leipsic. 
 
136 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 greatly his superior, the clever and beautiful Sophie 
 of the novel, whose real name was Marie. She be- 
 came the mother of the narrator. She was born in 
 Kasan, and was the daughter of an official in a high 
 position, who had given her an unusually complete 
 education, procuring for her German and French 
 teachers. Yet the admired beauty decided to give 
 her hand to the timid and insignificant squire, whose 
 passion for her knew no bounds, and to follow him to 
 the modest house of his uncultivated and still half- 
 barbarian father. The "Family Chronicles" de- 
 scribe with the utmost tenderness the relations that 
 grew up between these two apparently widely sepa- 
 rated and yet allied natures. The young wife learns 
 to understand the strength and nobility of the despotic 
 old man, and he the aptitude and moral superiority 
 of his daughter-in-law.^ Accustomed all his life to 
 abuse, and occasionally to kick, the women of the 
 neighbourhood, he becomes the friend and protector 
 of the representative of a higher civilisation and 
 humanity. 
 
 The grandson, born in 1791, received his first im- 
 pressions of life among the romantic wilds of his 
 grandfather's estate of New Aksakovo (called in the 
 story New Bagrovo). Here he learnt to know and 
 love his mother-earth, its products, and its inhabi- 
 tants, to recognise trees by their shadow and birds 
 by the sound of their flight, and to observe each 
 ' See Appendix, Note 25. 
 
THE AKSAKO V FA MIL V. 1 37 
 
 detail of the life of the trout in the brook and the 
 animals he hunted in the forest. Here he acquired 
 a feeling for nature, which an innate disposition to 
 poetry and a refining education developed into artistic 
 perfection. He who reads only the last chapter of 
 " Bagrov's Childhood," which is the continuation of 
 the " Family Chronicles," will gain an idea of its 
 nobility. The old man describes the mysterious 
 fascination of the spring night which he, then seven 
 years old, spent in prayer before the coffin of his 
 grandfather. The next volume gives an account of 
 the early years of study which the author passed 
 in Kasan, and affords remarkable glimpses of so- 
 called education in Eastern Russia eighty years 
 ago. It stops at the young man's entry upon the 
 customary official career. 
 
 The son's account begins where the father's breaks 
 off. The first volume of " Ivan Aksakov in his 
 Letters " is preceded by a clearly-written sketch of 
 the later history of the family, begun by the writer 
 of the letters, and completed by the anonymous 
 editor. From this sketch we take what follows. 
 
 His official position in St. Petersburg was so little 
 to the taste of Sergy Aksakov, the chronicler and 
 the father of Ivan, that he gave it up as early as 
 1812, married four years later, and returned to the 
 house of his parents^ where he lived for a long time 
 as a landlord and an enthusiastic huntsman. The 
 romance of the home of his youth had meanwhile 
 
138 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 given place to an uninspiring prose. Tlie accom- 
 plished and amiable mother had become an ailing 
 and imperious old woman, who felt herself burdened 
 by her ascendency over her nonentity of a husband, 
 but who none the less treated her children with a 
 want of consideration which led them to remove to 
 a neighbouring estate of the family, and later (1826) 
 to settle in Moscow. There Sergy Timofeevich 
 lived, at first as an official of the censorship, after- 
 wards in private life, until his death in 1859. 
 
 The son gives a detailed sketch of both his 
 parents, and dwells on the iniiuence they exerted 
 upon the development of their children. It is in 
 every particular the opposite of the well-known — 
 
 " Vom Vater hab' ich die Statur, 
 Des Lebens ernstes Fiihren ; 
 Vom Miitterchen die Froh natur."' 
 
 Sergy Aksakov enjoyed life and its pleasures. He 
 was essentially an artist. A passionate friend of the 
 theatre, a passionate hunter, a passionate gambler, 
 he was an artist in the chase and at the card-table ; 
 he could forget everything in the occupation of the 
 moment. The tender husband and father "could 
 spend the entire day in hunting, entire nights in 
 card-playing ; yet he recognised his weakness, and 
 
 I " My height is like my father's height, 
 Lilce his, my life is earnest ; 
 My mother's is my nature bright." {Goethe.) 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL Y. 1 39 
 
 was therefore free from self-conceit, and was a 
 lenient judge of others. . . . When age and sick- 
 ness had curbed his activity and dulled his passions, 
 his mind rose to that peaceful, objective observation 
 of life which arouses such pleasant emotions in the 
 reader of his works. . . . He was a complete stranger 
 to the interests of the politician and the citizen. 
 His delight in nature and his part in literature 
 occupied his thoughts so completely, that, though 
 he was enlisted in the militia, even the year 1812 
 passed over him without leaving a permanent im- 
 pression. Although Russian in the full meaning of 
 the word, he was never a ' patriot ' in the current 
 acceptation of the word in his time. Political 
 schemes were so far from him that he laid claim 
 to no kind of heroism, and used in jest to call him- 
 self a coward, in spite of his decided personal 
 courage. -. . . Although his education was limited, 
 he was recognised as an authority in the circle of 
 his friends, for the most part scholars and highly- 
 educated men. He had a thorough knowledge of 
 life, and of all the emotions and weaknesses of the 
 human heart." 
 
 The above criticism corroborates in a striking 
 manner the incidentally stated opinion of Ivan 
 Turgenev, that Aksakov the father belonged in no 
 sense to the Slavophil party, and that it could con- 
 sequently be truly said that not one important poetic 
 talent, and not a single work of art, had been pro- 
 
I40 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 duced by that school. The author of the " Family 
 Chronicles " did indeed, for the love he bore his son, 
 wear the Russian national costume, and take part in 
 other national extravagances, when already an old 
 man ; but he did so because he was politically in- 
 different and had no definite connection with the 
 public affairs of his country. The disposition and 
 development of the brothers Constantine and Ivan, 
 sons of the narrator, were principally determined, 
 both in politics and in other matters, by their 
 mother, Olga Semenovna, nee Saplatin. This re- 
 markable woman was the daughter of a general 
 who had become prominent in the Turkish cam- 
 paigns, and of a Turkish woman, made prisoner at 
 the siege of Bender. Until her marriage she was 
 the companion of her father, who had early been 
 left a widower. For years she supplied the place 
 of secretary and reader to the veteran, who devoted 
 the evening of an eventful life to the diligent study 
 of the historians and poets of his time and country. 
 She possessed, according to her son, a high spirit, 
 inclined to stoicism and to an idealistic view of life, 
 and she considered the mother of the Gracchi as the 
 highest pattern of womanhood. She was severe in 
 her judgment of herself and others, and averse to all 
 luxury and artificiality. She was frank and truthful 
 to a degree, considering it a sin to deny herself to 
 unwelcome guests. In questions of conscience she 
 was inaccessible to the influence even of the husband 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL V. 141 
 
 whom she loved and honoured. Like all strong 
 characters, she had little inclination or capacity for 
 entering into the nature of people of a different 
 mould. Her influence upon her sons was far- 
 reaching. Daughter of a general of the time of 
 Catherine and Suvarov, she was an ardent patriot, 
 and much more Russian than her husband, who in 
 earlier years had devoted much of his time to the 
 literature and the drama of France. " She lived 
 entirely in the Russian manner, held fast by Russian 
 customs, Russian ritual, and Russian cookery ; she 
 took a full and warm delight in the scenery of her 
 country ; she exercised the Russian hospitality and 
 sociability, and far from seeking to limit these 
 qualities in her husband, she lent a special charm 
 to the gatherings at his house." 
 
 For our purpose we must look more particularly 
 at the nursery, in which the two leaders of the 
 Slavophil party received their first impressions of 
 life. Constantine Aksakov was six years older than 
 Ivan, who was born in 1823, ^^^d, in spite of the 
 profound difference in their characters, he was the 
 favourite, and afterwards the most confidential friend, 
 of the father he adoringly loved. While the other 
 sons were sent in their childhood to schools in St. 
 Petersburg, Sergy Timofeevich could never part 
 from his eldest-born. For forty-two years, until the 
 death of his father, Constantine lived under his roof, 
 and left it only once for the short period of four 
 
142 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 months ; and it is not surprising that, though in the 
 prime of his life and of herculean proportions, he 
 utterly broke down at his father's death, and followed 
 him to the grave nineteen months afterwards. He 
 succumbed in i860 to a lung-disease, of which until 
 1859 no trace had ever existed. 
 
 With so close a tie binding him to his poetic 
 father and his father's interests, growing up at the 
 knees of the literary celebrities of Moscow, who 
 taught him in his father's house, and systematically 
 trained to patriotism as he was by his mother, Con- 
 stantine Serg3'evich showed, even as a boy, the 
 fantastic sympathies by which he became remark- 
 able as a man. At an age when others are learning 
 to read he knew by heart a large portion of the 
 older Russian poets. His pride in his nationality, 
 awakened by his mother, and further developed in 
 his father's ardent manner, became so soon a 
 mania with the boy, that he rejected the usual 
 Russian word for father {pdpenka, or papdsha) as half 
 foreign, and substituted one of his own invention, 
 a diminutive from otets, father. The plays and 
 puppet-shows arranged by him, and acted in the 
 nursery, always dealt with events of national history 
 or legend, and treated by preference of Russian deeds 
 of heroism against Germans and other "heathens." 
 At the age of twelve he worked the tragic end 
 of a Slav prince, Vachko, who fell in a battle 
 against the Germans, by whom he was besieged in 
 
THE AKSAKOV FAMIL Y. i43 
 
 Cuxhaven (szc)/ into an epic, which he rehearsed with 
 his brothers, dressed up in fantastic costumes. He 
 declared that he had ascertained that the birthday of 
 the Slav hero, who had been so meanly forgotten, 
 fell upon the third of November (the Russian St. 
 Andrew's Day) ; and he chose that day for a solemn 
 performance for the benefit of the family. A certain 
 dangerous impatience and arrogance appear soon to 
 have followed on these manifestations of childish 
 patriotism. When letters in the French language 
 to his mother from her friends fell into the hands of 
 the young purist he used to summon his brothers to 
 form a tribunal, which commenced proceedings by 
 solemnly piercing the criminal foreign document, 
 and ended them in an auto-da-fe, accompanied by 
 poetic execrations. These scenes were finally for- 
 bidden by the good sense of the father, but they 
 prepared the way for the time when the son of the 
 cosmopolitan friend of literature and the translator 
 of Moliere forbade the employment of French, 
 not only to himself, but to the entire household, 
 and succeeded in enforcing his commands. The 
 child was father to the man who built up an entire 
 history of Russia to correspond to his theoretical 
 suppositions, on which ground he rejected every- 
 thing but the Muscovite old-Russian Slav nationality, 
 and was finally led to declare a war against Little 
 
 ' In reality that Prince is supposed to have been besieged in 
 Uriev (now Dorpat).— Ed. 
 
144 /RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 Russia and White Russia, similar to that with 
 which he sought to threaten the " heathens " of the 
 West. 
 
 II. 
 In spite of the influence exerted upon his develop- 
 ment by his elder brother, Ivan, the junior by six 
 years, showed at an early date that he was of a 
 completely different disposition. While the prin- 
 ciples inherited from his mother worked chiefly 
 upon the fancy of Constantine, who in this re- 
 sembled his father, the sober, practical, and yet 
 fanatical nature of Olga Semenovna appeared in 
 the younger brother. He, too, in boyhood, in youth, 
 and in adult life, made many attempts in the 
 sonorous exercise of rhyme and musical rhythm. 
 But he was always essentially a politician, far more 
 disposed to a practical carrying out of his convictions 
 and principles than to their artistic representation. 
 His brother was unwilling to look beyond the walls 
 of Old Moscow, and had to force himself to do so. 
 Ivan Sergyevich, on the contrary, was a diligent 
 reader of the newspapers, followed the fortunes of 
 non-Russian Europe as attentively as those of his 
 own country, and betrayed a desire to be instructed 
 about the world as it was, and about its component 
 parts. It was not without a considerable influence 
 on his character that he quitted Moscow and his 
 father's house at the age of fifteen, and went to St. 
 Petersburg, where for four years (1838-1842) he 
 
THE AKSAKOV FAMILY. 145 
 
 studied at the school of law, and prepared himself 
 for the higher branches of the Government service 
 in that institution of aristocratic repute. In spite of 
 his aversion to bureaucracy and imperialism, Sergy 
 Timofeevich was sufficiently in harmony with his 
 time and his position to lay more weight upon the 
 " career " of his children than he cared to ac- 
 knowledge. Two of his sons had to study law, and 
 the third to enter the corps of pages, a preparatory 
 school for officers of the guard, which enjoyed an 
 unenviable reputation as a nursery of aristocratic 
 libertinism. Ivan was an industrious student, who 
 employed all the means of education at his disposal 
 in St. Petersburg, and kept aloof from the follies of 
 his frivolous environment. Yet he made himself so 
 thoroughly respected by his comrades that they 
 allowed him to continue in the way he had chosen. 
 The student of law in the hated town of Peter the 
 Great was for some time considered half a renegade 
 by his more fanciful brother and his brother's friends. 
 He acknowledged the value, from many points of 
 view, of a foreign education ; he observed the pre- 
 cepts of the " Orthodox " Church only under certain 
 limitations ; he went by preference to the French 
 theatre, and declared openly that it was more enter- 
 taining than the Russian, with its indifferent actors 
 and its repertoire of translations. But at bottom 
 the young man had already become the exclusive 
 Russian, hostile to all foreign elements, that his 
 
 II 
 
146 RU6SIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 whole life proved him to be. The difference was 
 only that he took things more soberly, and examined 
 them more thoroughly, than the hastier Moscow 
 Slavophils, who were prone to judge by exteriors. He 
 wished to study Europe, in order reasonably to judge 
 and condemn it. He wished to obtain a clear idea 
 of the Russian State mechanism, that he might be 
 able to mark out in detail the boundaries drawn by 
 his friends between the State and the people. He 
 considered it necessary to observe the "people" 
 (from whom the deliverance was to come) in their 
 various employments and daily intercourse with one 
 another, and to separate the national wheat from the 
 chaff. His pride and his common sense forbade him 
 to adopt, like Constantine, the Russian peasant's 
 dress, to discard foreign languages and foreign edu- 
 cational systems, and to make a profession of lauding 
 the national mode of life. Occasional jests on the 
 subject of the French tailors, who supplied the 
 Aksakov family with sleeveless jackets and parti- 
 coloured trunk-hose, occur pretty frequently in 
 Ivan's confidential letters. But it is evident, from 
 the decisive severity with which he met the sar- 
 casms on the subject in others, that they were not 
 meant in earnest, and that he accorded his relations 
 the same liberty which he claimed for himself. 
 Though he had a considerable share of the extrava- 
 gance characteristic of the Aksakovs, he was of a 
 different type from his brother and his brother's 
 
THE A KSA KOV FA ;\IIL Y. 147 
 
 more intimate friends. He was as fanatical as they, 
 but he was a fanatic by reflection, and was therefore 
 able to distinguish between what was attainable and 
 what was desirable, and was ready, if need were, to 
 compromise with the existing, and for the time being 
 unalterable, disposition of Russian affairs. He pos- 
 sessed, besides, a decided talent for dealing with 
 practical and administrative problems, and the 
 ability, inseparable from it, to get on with men 
 of a different stamp. 
 
 The two volumes of letters which we are now 
 considering belong exclusively to the bureaucratic 
 period of Ivan Sergyevich's eventful life. They give 
 an equally clear idea of the then condition of the 
 Russian official world, and of the character of the 
 young man who, at the age of twenty, had to deal 
 with problems such as in civilised countries fall to the 
 lot only of mature and experienced men, exceptionally 
 qualified for the task. He was employed chiefly upon 
 ministerial commissions of revision and examination, 
 i.e., exceptional institutions, which embody the 
 governmental mistrust of its officials, and attest to 
 Old and New Russia the questionable integrity of 
 the administrative mechanism. He was occupied for 
 eighteen months as secretary to the second division 
 of the sixth department of the Senate, which was 
 domiciled in Moscow. He was then, at the age of 
 twenty, and with the style of "Titular Counsellor," 
 attached to Senator Prince P. P. Cagarin, afterwards 
 
148 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 president of the imperial council, who was charged 
 with the "revision" of the province of Astrakhan. 
 His eleven months' residence in the half-Asiatic town 
 on the Volga gave the young official the opportunity 
 of becoming acquainted with the most different 
 branches of the administration, opened out to him a 
 sphere of activity much above his age and his position, 
 and formed an important period of his life. From 
 that time he cherished the wish of being henceforth 
 employed exclusively in similar duties, i.e., in excep- 
 tional missions ; but his wishes were at first not ful- 
 filled. On his return from Astrakhan (November, 
 1844), Aksakov had for some time to retire into his 
 position of senatorial secretaryship. In the autumn 
 of the following year he was appointed assistant to 
 the president of the Kaluga criminal court, and re- 
 mained for two and a half years in that office. 
 
 The letters he wrote from Kaluga are extremely 
 valuable contributions to the history of the rule of 
 Nicholas and the state of the provinces of Russia at 
 that time. They form in substance the sharpest 
 possible condemnation of the "old system." An 
 enthusiastic champion of his nationality, an enemy of 
 everything foreign, and especially of everything Ger- 
 man, as he was, the patriot looks in vain for evidence 
 of a healthy development of Russian life in state and 
 society. The higher classes fill him with contempt, 
 because of their profound neglect of morality and 
 their pitiful semi-culture. The people, on the other 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL V. 1 49 
 
 hand, he maintains, vegetate in a dull sloth and 
 hopeless subjection. The corruption of the nobility 
 begins to affect the middle classes of the city popu- 
 lation, for whom the imitation of misunderstood 
 German and French manners and fashions forms the 
 climax of modern civilisation. He tells his brother 
 again and again that the original nature and strength 
 of the true Russian, of which he had dreamed, are 
 nowhere to be found, and that the traditions of the 
 " good old times," which yet remain among the rural 
 population, threaten to be strangled by the pressure 
 of servitude and the corrupting influence of officialism. 
 And yet, in spite of his keen observation and sober 
 judgment of details, he clings to his theme, repre- 
 senting the rejuvenating power of the "pure" 
 nationality, the poisonous influence of Western cul- 
 ture, and the universal damage done by the reforms 
 of Peter the Great. 
 
 A short residence in St. Petersburg, in the autumn 
 of 1848, followed the time spent in Kaluga. It gave 
 rise to a most unfavourable judgment of the town, 
 which had become unendurable to his Muscovite 
 sympathies, but which yet helped him, when wearied 
 of the judicial service, to a mission to Bessarabia. 
 There he devoted himself, for fourteen months, to 
 improving the condition of the followers of the old 
 faith, and never wearied, in spite of the persecutions 
 heaped upon them, in his praise of the glory and the 
 blessings of the Orthodox Church, undeserving as its 
 
ISO RUSSJA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 servants for the most part were. He spent the winter 
 of 1848-1849 once more in St. Petersburg. There 
 the wild reaction caused by the fear of revolution in 
 governmental circles had in the meantime reached its 
 highest point, and a system of espionage, extended 
 to all classes of society, suppressed every trace of 
 independent action. Even Aksakov, the son of a 
 patriotic house, which detested, foreign customs as it 
 did revolution, was finally entangled in the meshes of 
 this system. Accustomed to inform his father of 
 every detail of his outer and inner life, he had not 
 concealed the painful impression made upon him by 
 St. Petersburg. In spite of the advice of his ex- 
 perienced father, he had imprudently committed his 
 Moscow letters to the post, which was at that time 
 one of the most active branches of the famous " third 
 section of the imperial chanccllerie," i.e., the secret 
 police. 
 
 We shall leave Aksakov's book to speak for itself 
 upon what followed, with the remark that we have 
 been able to give only selections from the curious 
 document we extract from it, on account of its great 
 length. 
 
 Ivan Aksakov was arrested on the evening of the 
 18th of March, 1849, and consigned by Lieutenant- 
 Colonel Lowenthal to the staff of the corps of gen- 
 darmes. He was lodged in a room belonging to the 
 residence of Count Orlov, chief of the third section. 
 The reasons given for his imprisonment were his 
 
THE A KSAKO V FA MIL V. 151 
 
 near relations to Juri Samarin (an agitator arrested 
 shortly before for having written his " Letters from 
 Riga "), and the boldness of certain expressions in 
 family letters which had fallen into the hands of the 
 secret police. 
 
 A number of written questions was put before him, 
 which he answered with characteristic frankness and 
 outspokenness. These answers form, from many 
 points of view, the Slavophil confession of faith. In 
 what follows we give word for word the most impor- 
 tant questions and answers, with the notes made 
 upon them by the hand of the Emperor Nicholas. 
 Aksakov was libei"ated on the 22nd of March, after a 
 detention of scarcely four days. 
 
 Question Sheet of the Third Section of the 
 Imperial Chancellerie. 
 
 Question III. — Is there not among your papers a 
 letter from your father, in which he calls your atten- 
 tion to the biting and rather obscure style of a letter 
 of the 24th of February, and hints that you might 
 be taken for a Liberal ? Give a full account of the 
 entire contents of your above-mentioned letter, and, 
 if your memory permits, verbatim where possible, 
 especially in the expressions referred to by your 
 father. 
 
 Answer III. — Although it may injure me, I am 
 prepared to answer this question openly. My father's 
 reference is to a letter of mine, the gist of which is 
 
152 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the following. I had written to him : " The restora- 
 tion of the former state of things in Europe calls a 
 triumphant smile to the faces of our St. Petersburg 
 aristocrats. They feel themselves suddenly revi- 
 talised. Every time I walk over the Nevski Prospect 
 I become very despondent. You cannot dream how 
 my soul revolts at the sight of these 'half-Frenchmen' 
 and ' half-Germans ' — these people who are every- 
 thing but Russians, who distort their mother-tongue, 
 who wish to lord it with the luxuries of Western 
 industry and live in the most un-Russian way ! 
 ' Thank God ! ' is written on their faces, ' we can now 
 fearlessly go on, as we have done before — that is, we 
 can guzzle and carouse, and suck our peasants dry ! ' 
 Last year these gentlemen were alarmed by the dis- 
 turbances in Europe, and they sang exulting hymns 
 in praise of Russia and the Russian people. For my 
 part I could find in their hymns only this meaning: 
 'What a good, long-suffering, excellent people is ours! 
 We despise it, we drain it of its last penny, and it 
 endures it all patiently, and bears us no malice.' " 
 These are the expressions, with the obscurity of 
 which my father reproached me, when he said that it 
 might be inferred from them that I was a Liberal, 
 while (he added) you are, on the contrary, an opponent 
 of the Liberalism of Western Europe. He is perfectly 
 right. I take this opportunity to express my unspoken 
 ideas and to represent them clearly. 
 
 In my opinion the former disposition of European 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL Y. 153 
 
 politics was as false as the present. (Marginal note 
 by the Emperor Nicholas : " Perfectly true ! ") And 
 precisely because it was bound logically to lead to the 
 present revolutionary condition. The inner false- 
 hood of the principles of historical life in Western 
 Europe must be crowned by unbelief, anarchy, pro- 
 letairism, egotistic concentration of every idea upon 
 the material possessions of life — by a proud and 
 insane trust in human power, and in the possibility 
 of replacing God's watchful care by human legisla- 
 tion. (Marginal note by the Emperor : " This is the 
 gospel truth ! ") Western Europe was brought to 
 this pass by the authority of Catholicism, by Protes- 
 tant rationalism, and by the one-sided vindication of 
 personality, so opposed to the humble spirit of 
 Christianity. (Marginal note by the Emperor : 
 " Thank Heaven ! ") It was not so in Russia. The 
 orthodox faith saved our country, and brought into 
 its life quite other essential conditions, which the 
 people regarded as holy. The people look to the 
 Tsar as the autocratic head of the entire orthodox 
 community of Russia, who for the public weal takes 
 upon himself the whole burden of care and labour. 
 The people have complete confidence in him, and are 
 firmly convinced that to require guarantees would but 
 disturb the intimacy of the mutual relationship, and 
 lay useless restrictions upon freedom of action. And 
 finally, they are convinced that only that restriction 
 (sc, of the governing power) is justified which the 
 
154 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 spirit of the Christian doctrine enjoins on every one 
 in connection with his fellow-men. This relation of 
 the Russian people to its ruling house has found ex- 
 pression in the official commentary on the well-known 
 manifesto of February or March of last year, in the 
 words : " Every form of government, however perfect, 
 has its faults," &c. (Note by the Emperor: "All this 
 is true ! ") Yet let no one think that I desire to flat- 
 ter; Heaven forbid! This is my conviction : — Under 
 Peter the Great the upper circles of society became 
 alienated from the people. They surrendered them- 
 selves to the seductions of the West, they were cor- 
 rupted by the brilliancy of its civilisation, and they 
 despised the original and essential principles of the 
 Russian nationality. It was not only that works of 
 art and of industry were imported into Russia from 
 without. No ! Russian tailors were actually banished 
 for making Russian costumes (cf. the complete collec- 
 tion of the Russian laws), and the Russian language 
 was disfigured by foreign words ; the administration, 
 with its German arrangements and nomenclature, 
 strangled all life by its formality ; the officials, with 
 their German divisions of rank, occupied a dishonest 
 and false position in relation to the peasantry, who 
 not only understood them with difficulty, but could 
 scarcely pronounce their names. The nobility 
 separated itself completely from the people. It 
 deduced from its pitiful civilisation the right to dis- 
 believe what they believed ; to neglect the ordinances 
 
THE A KSAKO V FAMIL Y. i J 5 
 
 of the Church, with which they lived in accordance ; 
 to be ignorant of its mother-tongue ; to forget its his- 
 tory and traditions, and to regard the people only as 
 material from which to extract revenues. (Note by 
 the Emperor: "Much of this is true, but thank 
 Heaven not universally so!") The following genera- 
 tions allowed themselves to be driven forward along 
 the same lines, without looking round them, and with- 
 out taking thought. This society has to answer for 
 it to the Government, that it turned the sympathies 
 of the population away from it, — society has pre- 
 vented the government from seeing Russia in the 
 true light. . . . 
 
 While " educated " society lived this semblance of 
 a life, and aped the West, the people fortunately 
 remained unchanged or nearly so. I say nearly so, 
 for the example of corrupted manners, which we give, 
 begins already to work evil in the country. The 
 lower classes were at first repelled from the great 
 towns, when they saw, as, for example, at Lent in 
 Moscow, that, while they rigidly observed the fast, 
 as they went to early mass or returned from confession, 
 " good " society delighted itself with nocturnal drives 
 over the ice-fields, accompanied by torches, singers, 
 fortune-tellers, and gipsies. Afterwards the people 
 became accustomed to such sights, and adopted 
 similar bad habits. (Note by the Emperor : 
 " Naturally — if this be true, it is scandalous, and 
 should not be permitted by the authorities in the 
 
156 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III 
 
 towns in question.") I admit that under the present 
 Government the consciences of many have been 
 awakened. Are we not answerable, they ask, for the 
 Russian people? and is it not our duty to help Russia 
 to a new life ? 
 
 This regeneration of the Russian nationality was 
 effected in science and in literature. The pioneers of 
 the movement are men who serve Russia with all 
 their strength and with all their hearts, who have 
 patiently sought the treasures of the intellectual 
 riches of the people, who have regarded as holy the 
 national origin of their being, and have steadfastly 
 adhered to orthodoxy. These men, — why Heaven 
 only knows ! — are called Slavophils, although their 
 relations to the Western Slavs are limited to a cordial 
 sympathy with the position of their kinsmen by blood 
 and by faith. I count myself among these people, and 
 I believe that it is consequently our duty — that is, 
 the duty of educated society — to do penance, to cleanse 
 our ways, and to become genuine Russians. (Note 
 by the Emperor: "Because behind the sympathy 
 with the alleged oppression of the Slav peoples the 
 criminal idea is hidden of a rising against the legal 
 governments of neighbouring and in part of allied 
 kingdoms, — the idea of a general union of the Slavs, 
 which they anticipate, not from God's decree, but 
 from a revolution which would bring ruin upon 
 Russia. . . . This I regret, because it means a con- 
 fusion of criminal and sacred things.") 
 
THE AKSA KO V FA MIL Y. 1 57 
 
 The events which took place at the beginning of 
 last year^ led us to hope that educated society had 
 found its senses and was about to reform. But it 
 was quite otherwise. Society, especially that of St. 
 Petersburg, was at first alarmed — a new proof that 
 it does not know the Russian people, for every revolt, 
 every path that leads to violence and revolution is 
 odious to them, and is opposed to the principles of a 
 populace saturated with the spirit of the faith. (Note 
 by the Emperor : "Charming! now we shall see what 
 the Russian according to Aksakov really is ! ") But 
 society was soon tranquillised, because it did not see 
 that it bore in its own heart the germs of the mischief 
 which had broken out in the West. It continued in 
 its false direction, and believed, as has been well said, 
 that it could create in Russia its own West, and 
 intoxicate itself with impunity upon the sweetness 
 of all those sins which prepared the downfall of 
 Western Europe. (Note by the Emperor : "Natural 
 enough ! ") Therefore, I say it openly, it has always 
 been repulsive to me to see before me an empty- 
 headed libertine, the lord of thousands of peasants, 
 who work patiently and zealously to defray by the 
 sweat of their brow the senseless extravagance 
 of their masteis. (Note by the Emperor: "Such 
 people exist, but they expose themselves to the con- 
 tempt and condemnation of all better thinking men, 
 who are still numerous enough, and, thank God, 
 ■ 1848.— Ed. 
 
iS8 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 daily increase in number.") Such a man stupidlj' 
 despises the " clownish ignorance of the peasantry," 
 when he himself cannot even write his name correctly, 
 and believes himself delivered from the duty of even 
 an external respect for the Church and her commands. 
 Instead of learning wisdom and patience from the 
 people, their master, when he has perhaps entered 
 the service of the State, is prepared at once to instruct 
 them in his own way, and to load them with all 
 possible theories but those which are Russian. There 
 are many such. One meets them in St. Petersburg 
 at every step. My father expressed the fear that my 
 indignation upon this point might be taken for 
 Western Liberalism. (Note by the Emperor: " But 
 one should not give occasion to such a misunder- 
 standing by one's manner of speaking, exaggeration, 
 and dogmatism. These things are due to arrogance 
 and inexperience, and distort the true intention.") 
 If that should be so, all who believe it are in error. 
 I have already pointed out that all violence is 
 abhorrent to the Russian people, and in consequence 
 to those who, like me, claim to be Russian in thought 
 and feeling. I am convinced that violence only 
 begets violence, destroys the moral purity of every 
 cause, and never leads to good; and I can never 
 believe that the end justifies the means. Rather I 
 believe what our Lord said to the disciple who would 
 have defended Him by force, " All they that take the 
 sword shall perish with the sword." And for this 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL V. 159 
 
 reason I desired that we ourselves should notify each 
 other of our errors, and so strive to find the right 
 way. We must use all our powers to establish the 
 existence of our nationality, to the salvation of 
 Russia and her people. And we must do it with 
 the co-operation of the Government, which has the 
 best intentions, but cannot always accomplish them, 
 although they are a hundred times better than those 
 of our own society. It is only from the Government 
 that the regeneration of the Russian nationality 
 and the independent development of a Russian life 
 can come. 
 
 My answer to this question has been somewhat 
 long. I considered it necessary to expound my 
 views at length, in order to avoid the possibility of 
 a misunderstanding. I have written everything 
 unreservedly. (Note by the Emperor : " I believe 
 it, but people can make mistakes with the best 
 intentions. C'est le ton qtii fait la musique.") 
 
 Question VII. — Your brother Gregory, in a letter 
 from Simbirsk, in which he mentions Jellaczicz, the 
 Ban (of Croatia), with special praise, and calls the 
 assembly of Frankfort stupid, expresses the hope 
 that Austria may be converted from a German into 
 a Slavonic monarchy. Do you and your relations 
 profess Slavophil ideas, and in what do they consist ? 
 
 Answer VII. — My brother Gregory, in one of his 
 letters, calls the parliamentary assembly of Frank- 
 fort stupid. ... I fancy that not even those who 
 
i6o RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 question me can have any doubt of that. He is loud 
 in his praise of Jellaczicz. . . . Was he then un- 
 worthy of the praise ? His imperial master had the 
 same opinion of him, for he rewarded him with an 
 order. With regard to my brother's opinion that 
 Austria will be converted from a German into 
 a Slavonic monarchy, it is mine also ; the German 
 element of that state has become corrupt, and 
 Austria would have long since fallen to pieces, had 
 the Slavs not supported it. One may therefore 
 conclude that Austria will execute a volte-face, and 
 become converted into a Slavonic kingdom. I should 
 much regret the change, for a strong Slavonic mon- 
 archy, springing up beside independent Russia, 
 would draw to itself the Southern Slav races which 
 we are alienating, and Russia would thereby be 
 defeated in its mission as the chosen defender upon 
 earth of orthodoxy and Slavonic principles. But 
 perhaps Austria may continue her existence with 
 her present constitution. As to my Slavophil ideas, 
 I and my relatives are by no means Slavophils in 
 the sense implied in the question. We do not 
 believe in Panslavism — nay, we consider it im- 
 possible : firstly, because it would require the 
 adoption of a single faith by all the Slav races, 
 and the Catholicism of Bohemia and Poland would 
 bring a hostile foreign element into our community, 
 which could not be amalgamated with the orthodox 
 faith of the other Slavs ; secondly, because the indi- 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL V. 1 6 1 
 
 vidual elements of the Slavonic nations must 
 previously be dissolved and fused into a differently 
 characterised, more powerful, more united, and 
 mighty nationality — namely, the Russians ; thirdly, 
 because a large part of the Slavonic races is already 
 infected by the influence of barren Western Liberal- 
 ism, which conflicts with the spirit of Russian ortho- 
 doxy. Russia is far more to me than all the Slavs, 
 and my brother Constantine is reproached with 
 absolute indifference to all Slavs outside the 
 Russian kingdom, nay, outside Greater Russia. 
 (Note by the Emperor : " And he is right, for every- 
 thing else is madness. God alone can determine 
 what is to happen in the far future. Even if every 
 circumstance should combine to lead up to this 
 union, its accomplishment would be the ruin of 
 Russia.") 
 
 III. 
 
 The Aksakovs had lived for a long time in 
 Moscow, as a letter of the now dead author, Panaev, 
 informs us, and occupied a large and roomy house 
 in the Smolenski market-place, which had the 
 appearance of a country seat transplanted into the 
 town. The exterior corresponded to the internal 
 arrangements, the prodigal hospitality of which was 
 characteristic of Moscow, and was of a quite patri- 
 archal nature. The large wooden building, in which 
 the family lived, was surrounded by stables, out- 
 
 12 
 
1 62 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. ' 
 
 houses for the servants, a wide court, and a taste- 
 fully laid-out garden, in which not even the old- 
 fashioned bathing-house was wanting. Guests came 
 and went at every hour of the day. They were 
 always certain of a cordial welcome, usually felt 
 themselves at home after a short time, and seemed 
 as if they belonged to the family. Even on days 
 when there was no reception there was generally 
 a crowd of men and women, who amused themselves 
 with play, dancing, and innocent conversation, and 
 often remained until daybreak. 
 
 The head of the family, Sergy Timofeevich 
 Aksakov, at that time about fifty years of age, was 
 the type of the easy, pleasant country nobleman of 
 the old school. Of herculean build, powerful ap- 
 pearance, and harmonious voice, the amiable father 
 concealed behind the unpretentious heartiness of his 
 manner a wide range of culture and a delicate 
 feeling for art. No one divined in him the man 
 who was in the evening of his life to take the first 
 rank in literature, and by his " Family Chronicles " 
 far to outstrip the poetic talent of his famous sons. 
 It was known that Sergy Timofeevich had read 
 more than others, had translated a few of Moliere's 
 comedies, and had written here and there a theatrical 
 criticism in his enthusiasm for the stage, that he 
 was fond of declamation, in which he was a pro- 
 ficient, and that he took an eager part in the philo- 
 sophical studies of his sons and their friends. But 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL Y. 163 
 
 these appeared to be the only differences between 
 him and other people of a similar disposition. 
 
 The Slavophil party, the history of which was to 
 be indissolubly connected with the name of Aksakov, 
 was at that time still in its infancy. The eldest son 
 of the house, then two-and-twenty, belonged to 
 a circle of philosophising students, who had grouped 
 themselves round the young Stankevich, a landed 
 proprietor, who was an ardent disciple of the newly 
 imported systems of Schelling and Hegel. His 
 companions were Bakunin, Alexander Herzen, and 
 Byelinsky (the subsequent founders of the young 
 Russian Radical school), from whom he differed 
 chiefly in his enthusiasm for Moscow. The whole 
 family was devoted to the worship of the old- 
 Russian capital. The father, an unwearying pedes- 
 trian, was for ever discovering fresh points of view 
 from which to admire the beauties of the " white- 
 stoned " town he loved ; the son was firmly con- 
 vinced that Moscow was not only the heart of 
 Russia, the centre where were gathered together 
 all the advantages of Russian life, but at the same 
 time the first town of the world. He never spoke of 
 St. Petersburg without a certain dislike. He was 
 never weary of showing and extolling to strangers 
 the magnificence of his adopted town, and he con- 
 sidered that the title of " a genuine Muscovite " was 
 the highest conceivable praise. 
 
 Constantine was naturally not behind his father 
 
i64 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 in his love for Moscow. He once took young 
 Panaev, the afterwards well-known Radical writer, 
 then a guest at the house, for a walk, with the 
 intention of showing him the most picturesque views 
 of Moscow. The two friends, favoured by delightful 
 summer weather, lay down on the grass at a high 
 part of the bank of the Moskva, opposite the 
 Dramilov bridge. There they rested after their 
 walk, and admired the picturesque town spread 
 out before them in the splendour of the setting sun. 
 They had taken off their coats and given themselves 
 up to the enjoyment of the moment, which the en- 
 thusiastic young Aksakov appreciated from the 
 bottom of his heart. 
 
 " Is there anywhere in the world," he said to his 
 companion, "another town where one could be so 
 free and unconstrained as here ? We are but a little 
 way from its centre, and yet we could imagine our- 
 selves in the country. Look how effectively the 
 small houses on the hill stand out from the green 
 of the grass ! There are many such spots in 
 Moscow, all equally picturesque, and many of them 
 only a few steps from the centre of the town. How 
 delightful this life is — and how can you endure 
 existence in the cold, wire-drawn, granite St. Peters- 
 burg ? Stay with us ! Your heart is Russian ; but 
 only here, in the midst of historical remains which 
 call up pleasant emotions at every step, can a 
 Russian heart beat happily. It is impossible not 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL V. 165 
 
 to love Moscow, for she has made so many sacrifices 
 for Russia." 
 
 Aksakov spoke for a long time, and more and 
 more passionately. With gleaming eyes, clenched 
 fist, and a voice choking with excitement, he ex- 
 claimed at last, "It is high time that we should 
 think of our nationality, but here only is it possible. 
 The time draws near when we must become one 
 with our people, and discard these unbecoming 
 German swallow-tails that make a distinction 
 between us." With these words he contemptuously 
 flung away the fashionable overcoat lying beside 
 him ; then he continued more excitedly, " Peter 
 the Great made us cut off our beards, to alienate 
 us from the people ; we must grow them again too. 
 But you, dear Ivan Ivanovich," he went on, laying 
 his powerful hand on Panaev's shoulder, " you 
 must cast off St. Petersburg and come over to 
 us. . , . Think it over thoroughly." 
 
 " Five years later," thus ends Panaev's account 
 of this characteristic scene, " Constantine Aksakov 
 amazed the whole of Moscow by appearing in 
 public in high boots, a red shirt, and the national 
 sleveless coat (the so-called mourmolka). At the 
 same time (about 1840) he had a scene with 
 Mademoiselle K., the most fashionable beauty of 
 Moscow, which gave rise to much talk. " Made- 
 moiselle," he said to her at an aristocratic ball, 
 " give up that foreign dress, and set a good example 
 
i66 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 to our ladies by wearing the national sarafan. It 
 would admirably become your charming face ! " As 
 the fiery apostle of the people urged her with in- 
 creasing vehemence, the aged Prince Shcherbatov, 
 at that time military governor of Moscow, who had 
 grown up in the traditions of the eighteenth century, 
 came up to them. The lady repeated Aksakov's 
 words, and the prince ironically observed : " Then 
 we shall all have to wear a caftan like M. 
 Aksakov's." " True," said his interlocutor, highly 
 excited, "the time will soon come when we shall 
 all wear the caftan." The horrified prince hastily 
 beat a retreat ; and Chadaev,i who had been an 
 onlooker, jestingly related how Constantine Sergye- 
 vich had tried to induce the military governor 
 to wear the sarafan. 
 
 IV. 
 
 The Aksakovs and their friends were suspiciously 
 watched in certain quarters, and the all-powerful 
 Count Zakrevsky (formerly Minister of the Interior, 
 appointed Governor-General of Moscow in 1848) 
 regarded them as members of the "red" party. 
 Alexander Koshelev, who at that time held daily 
 intercourse with the Aksakovs and Khomyakov, 
 and often saw them at his house, tells in his 
 memoirs of the close watch kept by the police on 
 all the doors through which real or suspected 
 ' See Appendix, Note 36. 
 
THE AKSAKOV FAMIL Y. 167 
 
 Slavophils went out and in. Lists of suspected 
 persons had to be periodically handed to the Count, 
 who was highly astonished that the old Prince 
 Sergy Ivanovich Sagarin (a highly respected 
 " member of the imperial council," who could not 
 well be accused of revolutionary ideas) should asso- 
 ciate with Koshelev and Aksakov. " This circum- 
 stance," says Koshelev, "may have kept Zakrevsky 
 from employing the arbitrary measures which he 
 had planned against me. ... In St. Petersbui"g 
 they dreaded us like fire. . . . When Constantine 
 Aksakov paid a visit to A. S. Norov, the Minister 
 of Education, at the time of his residence in Moscow, 
 that benevolent and harmless man exclaimed in 
 astonishment, ' I made the acquaintance of Constan- 
 tine Aksakov ; I expected to find in him a tiger or 
 a bear, and I found a polite and, as it seems, a very 
 good-natured young man.' " 
 
 V. 
 
 Only for a short time did Sergy Timofeevich 
 enjoy the fame to which he attained in his latter 
 years. He died in May, 1859, six days after the 
 death, at the age of ninety, of Alexander von 
 Humboldt. The news of both deaths was an- 
 nounced in St. Petersburg at about the same time, 
 and it was debated for several days which was the 
 greater loss. This circumstance is characteristic of 
 the rapidity with which purely national views had 
 
i68 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 taken root in St. Petersburg, formerly so cosmo- 
 politan. Admiration of Aksakov had, by the middle 
 of the 'fifties, become so extravagant in Moscow, 
 that moderate men like Granovsky, the historian, 
 entered a protest against it, and held themselves 
 obliged to remind people that the fashionable com- 
 parison of the " Family Chronicles " with the 
 Odyssey was entirely attributable to the imper- 
 fection of Russian education, and to the Slavonic 
 tendency to senseless exaggerations. It was only 
 a few years since Constantine Aksakov had called 
 Gogol the Russian Homer, and declared his " Dead 
 Souls" to be an unique work in the literature of the 
 world. The audacity of this opinion had been com- 
 bated in an exhaustive criticism by Byelinsky, an old 
 friend of its eccentric advocate, in which he re- 
 minded Aksakov of the proverb, " Sunt certi denique 
 fines." The same Byelinsky was one of Gogol's 
 earliest and most enthusiastic admirers, and had 
 done justice to the deeper meaning latent in the 
 works of that genius of humour, at a time when 
 none had suspected its existence. 
 
 Constantine Aksakov survived his beloved father 
 by only a few months ; he died in December, i860, at 
 Zante, whither he had retired on account of a lung 
 disease. At his death he was barely thirty-seven 
 years old. Panaev, who had an honest personal 
 affection for him, judges him as follows : — " To the 
 end of his days Constantine Aksakov remained 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL Y. 169 
 
 a child in his relations to real life. He grew up 
 to manhood under his father's roof, to which he 
 clung like a snail to its shell, and he was unable 
 to exist without the support of family life. The 
 death of his father, and the change it produced in 
 the household, was the last blow to his already 
 broken health. He could not survive the loss, and 
 died soon afterwards, a virgin bachelor." 
 
 Panaev adds some account of the almost comic 
 part which the naturally talented young man played 
 whenever he had to move outside the circle in which 
 he had grown up, and which had become the in- 
 dispensable foundation for his romantic opinions of 
 the world and of life. During the only journey he 
 made in his father's lifetime (to Germany, via St. 
 Petersburg, in 1840) he was practically lost. " The 
 day after his arrival in St. Petersburg," writes 
 Panaev, " he paid me a visit. After we had 
 warmly embraced each other I ventured to hope 
 that he would stay some time with us. " Oh no," 
 he answered; "what should I do in this odious 
 town ? I am going to foreign countries. This town 
 oppresses me. Your Petersburg seems to me like 
 a huge endless barrack ; your masses of granite, 
 your chain bridges, your eternal drum-beatings 
 irritate me. I cannot see a genuine Russian face 
 in the whole town ; the environs are nothing but 
 marsh and fen. God forbid that I should have to 
 stay long here ! " 
 
I70 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 We went out, and Aksakov looked upon men 
 and houses with equal disfavour. The noise of the 
 carts and the hurry of the streets seemed to distract 
 him. As if he wished to escape from his dis- 
 agreeable surroundings, he looked up at the sky, 
 which was bright and clear but for the passage of 
 a fleecy cloud. He caught my hand, stopped, and 
 began enthusiastically to declaim : 
 
 " The clouds sweep by ! Once more the sun is beaming, 
 And down to earth the blue of heaven is streaming." 
 
 He recited the long poem so loudly and excitedly, 
 that people began to stare and to crowd round us. 
 I pointed this out to Aksakov, and he shook his head 
 sadly: "I see I have forgotten myself; I thought 
 I was in Moscow, where nobody is surprised if 
 a poem is recited in the street. It is probably not 
 the custom here, so these people crowd about us. 
 In Moscow they know what freedom means, and 
 there is room for a free soul to beat its wings. . . . 
 But here ! forgive me if I have compromised 
 you." 
 
 It was Aksakov's intention to spend a year in 
 foreign countries ; but after four months in Germany 
 he could no longer master his passionate longing for 
 Moscow, and returned to the family hearth, away 
 from which he could not live. Europe did not im- 
 press him favourably ; after his return he was 
 a more one-sided Muscovite than before, and he 
 
THE AKSAKO V FA MIL Y. 1 7 1 
 
 became a declared hater of the West, and a fana- 
 tical Slavophil. 
 
 Dislike to St. Petersburg and inability to find 
 one's bearings in the world of Western culture 
 were certainly not specific peculiarities of the 
 Slavophils. They were tolerably well marked in 
 the majority of the thoroughgoing Muscovites of 
 the time. Turgenev says of Byelinsky, the valiant 
 champion of Western culture and civilisation, that 
 during his residence in Germany and France he felt 
 like a fish out of water, and showed neither desire 
 nor capability of entering into the real spirit of the 
 Western world. Another advocate of Western 
 culture and vituperator of the limitations of 
 Moscow, Ketcher, the translator of Shakespeare, 
 and the close friend of Herzen and Ogarev, was 
 almost beside himself after exchanging the old- 
 Russian capital for the imperial residence on the 
 Neva. He bewailed again and again the narrowness 
 of the arrangements of St. Petersburg, which did 
 not suit the " broad nature " of the genuine Russian, 
 and allowed no freedom of movement. " Here," he 
 said, " there are no comfortable little houses in 
 which a man can live independently, no little 
 gardens where he can plant his own cabbages and 
 occupy his leisure in gardening. Crammed into the 
 same house with hundreds of strangers, chiefly poor, 
 forced to be content with a small parlour and with 
 dirty stairs, cut off from courtyard and garden, from 
 
172 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 free air and exercise — such an existence is physically 
 and morally impossible for the Muscovite, who is 
 accustomed to better things." 
 
 The above - mentioned memoirs furnish many 
 statements concerning the moral condition of the 
 then society of Moscow, so renowned for its 
 "genuineness" and its unadulterated nationalism, 
 and of its intellectual leaders, which really means 
 the shallowness of the materialistic and pleasure- 
 seeking life in which that society wasted its time. 
 The high-minded men who thought themselves 
 called to renovate the state and the society of their 
 country, and differed one from the other solely as 
 to the means of doing so, floundered, in their 
 relations to everyday life and practical morality, in 
 the same morass which their much-despised neigh- 
 bours were accustomed, " with little wit and much 
 comfort," to wade through. The one and the other 
 class could live only in an artificial world ; they 
 therefore never attained to an unobstructed view 
 of life, or to an energetic concentration of the 
 strength and capacity they possessed in so large 
 a measure. In truth, it hardly mattered whether 
 the flight from this little encouraging reality was 
 cloaked by old-Muscovite or by European-Radical 
 illusions; pretended activity, self-deception, and 
 back-stair gossiping were the result in both cases. 
 Freedom and unconventionality were certainly more 
 frequent in Moscow than in St. Petersburg ; but 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL Y. 173 
 
 they were not put to a profitable use, and were in 
 many aspects dangerous to the community. " This 
 lazy, apathetic Moscow," said Professor Korsh of 
 that town to Panaev, " seems to me like an old 
 woman who boasts of her aristocratic family and 
 the conquests of her youth, lives upon her former 
 reputation for intellect, and brags of an indepen- 
 dence which in reality is most doubtful. Like other 
 provincial towns, Moscow depends upon the favour 
 and the whims of its high officials. . . . To be a 
 dependant is always disagreeable, but I had rather 
 be a dependant of the master himself than of the 
 servants who lick the dust before him. Moscow is 
 a capital place for people who live from one day to 
 another, and for those who are stationary or have 
 become tired out ; but there is no field there for 
 vigorous men, desirous of action and enterprise." 
 
 VI. 
 
 At the time we speak of, besides the house of 
 Sergy Timofeevich, the salons of a certain Mme. 
 Elagin formed a social centre for intellectual 
 and philosophical circles. This lady had first 
 married a M. Kiryeevsky, and by him became the 
 mother of Ivan and Peter Kiryeevsky, both of them 
 close friends of Khomyakov. Her reception rooms 
 were open both to the friends of her sons and to 
 Herzen, Ogarev, Granovsky, and the other leaders 
 of the " Western " party. Herzen and Khomyakov 
 
174 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 were usually the foremost champions in the 
 tournaments fought in the salons of Mme. Elagin. 
 They excelled all their companions in their brilliant 
 oratory, their surprising readiness, and their un- 
 wearying eagerness for disputation, and they con- 
 ducted their arguments with the courtesy of knights 
 at the joust, which gave them in the salon an 
 inestimable advantage over the others. According 
 to the thoroughly reliable evidence of a contem- 
 porary adherent of the Western party, P. V. 
 Annenkov (a literary man, and an intimate friend 
 of Herzen and Turgenev), Khomyakov was so 
 deeply read and so skilled a tactician in debate, that 
 he was able successfully to support the boldest 
 opinions, and caused his talented and witty opponent 
 many a bad quarter of an hour. To be a match for 
 his rival, and to be able to control his citations 
 of the fathers and of the decisions of councils, 
 Herzen had to study the voluminous ecclesiastical 
 histories of August Neander and of Gfrorer, and 
 even the acts of oecumenical councils. Khomyakov, 
 again, made himself acquainted with the more 
 recent achievements of Western art, science, and 
 technics, while his scholars, distorting the teaching 
 of their master, declared such knowledge unneces- 
 sary. Whether it was the new and much-talked-of 
 novels of George Sand, or the writings of social 
 reformers such as Comte and Proudhon, the 
 authorities cited by the Western party were counted 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL Y. 1 7 5 
 
 by Khomyakov's scholars (not by the master himself) 
 worthy of no consideration. They said that Europe 
 could achieve something in the spheres of natural 
 science, finance, technology, means of intercourse, 
 and so on, and that she could bring forth comfort, 
 riches, and luxury. But they denied her the 
 capacity to create healthy works of art to satisfy 
 the religious and metaphysical wants of humanity, 
 and they declared that she possessed no means to 
 realise the ideas of right, justice, and fraternity. 
 Those who listened to these remarkable discussions 
 are unanimously of opinion that Khomyakov's 
 criticism of the intellectual and social condition 
 of Europe was moderate and elegant in form, yet 
 of quite overpowering acuteness and discrimination. 
 It undoubtedly had a certain influence even upon 
 his opponent Herzen. The detailed essays which 
 he published many years later upon the failure and 
 the untenable position of Western Europe show 
 traces of Khomyakov's influence, of which it is 
 possible that Herzen himself was never aware. ^ 
 
 An end was put to the good-fellowship between the 
 friendly rivals in an unexpected and peculiar manner. 
 It was due to Byelinsky, who in 1839 had been one 
 of Aksakov's warmest friends, like him an ardent 
 admirer of Hegel, and had remorselessly condemned 
 Herzen's political radicalism as a departure from 
 
 ' Cf. the essay addressed to Georg Herwegh, and published 
 in Herzen's " From the Other Shore." 
 
176 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 true Hegelian principles. It was he who gave the 
 first signal for an open rupture between the Slavo- 
 phils and the Western party, and after 1840 cease- 
 lessly attacked the doctrines of his former friend as 
 obstacles to the civilisation of Russia, and to its 
 conversion to European principles. 
 
 The period of the literary and social life of 
 Moscow from 1830 to 1850, which we are now con- 
 sidering, was affected by Byelinsky's literary activity 
 only in so far as it influenced the relations between 
 the two sections of Stankevich's circle. At the 
 time of the first publications of Byelinsky's later 
 period, a peculiar combination of circumstances 
 excluded those elements which had formerly been 
 means of accommodation. Soon after his return 
 from foreign travel Stankevich died of consump- 
 tion, to which he had long been predisposed. 
 Bakunin, whose pre-eminence in debate was uni- 
 versally recognised, had left Moscow for Berlin. 
 The mantle of these men seemed to have fallen 
 upon Granovsky, the historian, a high-minded, 
 moderate young scholar anxious to act as mediator, 
 and connected with both Herzen and Aksakov. 
 
 But it was only a seeming inheritance. In the 
 much-admired lectures on mediaeval history which 
 Granovsky delivered at the Moscow University he 
 did not once mention the Orthodox Greek Church 
 and its pretended vocation in the history of the 
 world, and he professed conceptions which shut out 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL Y. 1 77 
 
 the theory of the renovation of Europe by the 
 orthodox Slavonic races. His mediation between 
 Slavophils and Westerns was consequently at 
 an end. But it was the first article written by 
 Byelinsky after his change of opinion which did away 
 with all hope of accommodation. The champion 
 of Western ideas made a most violent onslaught 
 upon the Moskvitanin, a journal published by the 
 old-Russian reactionaries, Pogodin and Shefirev. 
 Khomyakov, in spite of the numerous differences 
 between his views and theirs, was connected with 
 this journal. 
 
 Constantine Aksakov's gentle disposition caused 
 him to make a long struggle against a rupture with 
 his friendly opponents, for whom, as men and as his 
 comrades of many years' standing, he had a high 
 regard. The close of Granovsky's course of lectures, 
 which had met with an unexampled success, was 
 celebrated by a banquet given by his colleagues and 
 auditors. Aksakov persuaded the more important 
 members of his party to take part in this banquet, 
 hoping that the opportunity might bring about a 
 reconciliation. Khomyakov and Petr Kiryeevsky 
 were willing to agree to the proposal, and Shefirev, 
 in spite of his dislike to Granovsky, had, as his 
 colleague, to take part in the celebration. Thus the 
 co-operation of the Slavophils was actually brought 
 about. Panaev, who was by chance in Moscow, 
 gives the following account of the celebration : — 
 
 13 
 
178 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 " After the conclusion of Granovsky's last lecture, 
 amid applause and cheers, the majority of the 
 audience accompanied him to the house where the 
 banquet awaited the guests. Herzen and Constan- 
 tine Aksakov were masters of the ceremonies, the 
 former as representative of the Westerns, the latter 
 of the Slavophils. Granovsky took the place of 
 honour, with Shefirev beside him. We were no 
 less than three hours at table. 
 
 " The first toast, that of Granovsky's health, was 
 received with unanimous applause. He answered 
 by drinking to the health of Shefirev, and then the 
 prosperity of the University was pledged. 
 
 " At last Constantine Aksakov rose. His eyes 
 gleamed, and he struck his fist upon the table, 
 crying out in a voice of thunder, ' Gentlemen, I 
 propose the toast of Moscow ! ' 
 
 " The cheers for the old-Russian capital had not 
 yet died away, when suddenly the vesper-bells began 
 to peal from all the numerous towers of the town. 
 ' The bells of Moscow reply to the toast ! ' cried 
 Shefirev, raising his voice. 
 
 " The transparent intention of these words caused 
 some to smile, and delighted others to the highest 
 degree. Much moved, Constantine Aksakov walked 
 up to and embraced the speaker. He then, with 
 evident emotion, recited his well-known poem, 
 
 " ' Old capital, so oft belauded.' 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL V. 179 
 
 " Shefirev then walked up to Aksakov and sank 
 into his arms. After the enthusiasm of the Slavo- 
 phils who were present had found fitting expression, 
 one of the Westerns began to speak. ' I propose,' 
 said he, ' a toast in honour of all Russia, not 
 excluding St. Petersburg.' 
 
 " Shefirev changed colour, rose from his seat, 
 and asked leave to speak. ' Allow me to remark,' 
 he began, ' that the toast which has just been 
 proposed is unnecessary, for the whole of Russia 
 was comprehended in the toast of Moscow, which 
 we all drank with enthusiasm. Moscow is the 
 heart and the representative of Russia, and com- 
 prises in her muster-roll, as M. Constantine Aksakov 
 has aptly said in an admirable essay in the Moscow 
 Gazette, all other Russian towns.' 
 
 " Panaev then rose and said, ' Petersburg is not 
 included in the muster-roll of Moscow, because it 
 did not exist when that roll was drawn up. Why 
 will you exclude Petersburg from the general 
 toast ? ' 
 
 " Shefirev answered, evasively, ' I am very 
 willing to drink your health, dear Panaev.' And 
 while a number of Granovsky's younger adherents 
 noisily drank to the prosperity of St. Petersburg, 
 Panaev and Shefirev clinked glasses together." 
 
 The end of this historical banquet was the usual 
 one in such cases. Those who at the beginning of 
 it had refrained from an open quarrel only out of 
 
i8o RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 regard for their honoured guest, fell into each other's 
 arms when the wine began to take effect. But next 
 day all was forgotten. The differences which had 
 once existed reasserted themselves, and very little 
 was sufficient to convert the former allies into open 
 and decided enemies. 
 
 It must be admitted that the banquet itself gave 
 rise to a touching scene. Byelinsky had aroused 
 Aksakov's displeasure by an attack upon the Mosh- 
 vitdnin. Khomyakov's brother-in-law, the dissolute 
 poet Yazuikov, had, in his poem, " Our Non-Allies," 
 called the catholicising Chadaev an apostate, Gra- 
 novsky a corrupter of the young, and Herzen "a 
 - lackey in a Western livery," and he had insinuated 
 that these men were traitors to their country. 
 After these occurrences Constantine Aksakov ap- 
 peared, at a late hour of the night, by Granovsky's 
 bedside, wakened his unwitting friend, wept upon 
 his neck, and told him in a broken voice that they 
 were for ever separated from each other by the 
 events that had taken place. The tender-hearted 
 man took an equally emphatic leave of Alexander 
 Herzen, the real originator and spokesman of the 
 new young - Russian school. But the personal 
 sympathies which formerly existed between the 
 more important members of the circle of Stanke- 
 vich were never entirely extinguished. Although 
 there was no longer any personal intercourse 
 between them, Byelinsky and Granovsky preserved a 
 
THE AKSAKO V FAMIL Y. i8l 
 
 cordial feeling for the high-minded Constantine 
 Aksakov ; and Herzen spoke of him in his memoirs 
 of " Nos amis, les ennemis " (an expression first used 
 in a song of Beranger's), which appeared many 
 years later, with unmistakable regard. Neither he 
 nor his friends were ever willing to count Pogodin, 
 Shefirev, and the other panegyrists of vulgar 
 realities and old-Russian despotism among the true 
 Slavophils. Byelinsky once wrote as follows, in 
 grateful recollection of the years of his develop- 
 ment : " Outside our circle I have known excellent - 
 men, men of greater merit than we were ; but I 
 have never anywhere met men with so insatiable a 
 thirst of life, so great demands from life, and so far- 
 reaching capabilities of sacrifice in the cause of an 
 idea." 
 
XIII. 
 
 M. N. KATKOV. 
 
 The name of the most influential Russian publicist 
 of his time is only occasionally encountered in the 
 fairly compi'ehensive body of memoirs which appeared 
 between 1830 and 1850. The remarkable memoirs 
 of Koshelev, the Polish Director of Finance, make 
 but an incidental mention of the famous publisher of 
 the Moscow Gazette. Turgenev's " Reminiscences of 
 Life and Literature " pass over in complete silence 
 the contemporary and fellow-student of their author. 
 Panaev's memoirs, and the letters of Granovsky the 
 historian, restrict their information on the subject to 
 relatively modest proportions. The reasons for this 
 are not difficult to divine : in spite of his indubitable 
 and recognised importance in the intellectual world 
 the comrades of his youth considered Katkov in- 
 tolerable ; and the witnesses of his great successes 
 held him to be a self-seeking and dangerous man, 
 whom it was better to avoid. Turgenev's posthu- 
 mous letters attest that the all-powerful publicist 
 
 was absolutely hated by all who knew him intimately, 
 
 182 
 
M. N. KATKOV. 183 
 
 and was considered so utterly regardless of others, 
 that people entered even into business relations 
 with him only when, they were unavoidable. The 
 Liberals of the old school, whom he had actively 
 and continuously persecuted, considered him a rene- 
 gade, whose desertion to the reactionary camp was 
 caused principally by motives of vanity and ambi- 
 tion. Leontiev, on the other hand, the closest friend 
 of Katkov and the companion of his labours, was 
 always regarded, even by his enemies, as an honest 
 man, and from a moral point of view far superior to 
 his comrade in arms. 
 
 Born at Moscow in 1820, Mikhail Nikoforovich 
 Katkov was the son of a noble family possessed of 
 no property. He lost his father early. He studied 
 at the University of Moscow at the time when a 
 large number of its young alumini were becoming 
 prominent. We find him about 1840 in the circle of 
 assiduous votaries of German philosophy, which had 
 formed round Stankevich the Hegelian, and which 
 was composed of Alexander Herzen, N. Ogarev, 
 Bakunin, Granovsky, and the critic Byelinsky. It is 
 well known that these founders of the young-Russian 
 democratic party belonged for the most part to 
 honourable and noble families. It is equally well 
 known that they were intimate with their future 
 opponents, the Slavophils (Khomyakov, the two 
 Kiryeevskys, and Constantine and Ivan Aksakov), 
 and that their discussions with them were solely on 
 
1 84 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the practical deductions to be drawn from the systems 
 of Hegel and Schelling. Katkov, industrious philo- 
 logist as he was, played but a secondary part beside 
 Herzen, the advocate of French socialistic ideas, and 
 the then conservative Bakunin. He was considered 
 capricious, unreliable, and vain. He associated, 
 Panaev tells us, principally with Bakunin and 
 Ketcher, the translator of Shakespeare, because he 
 sympathised much more with their advocacy of 
 European culture than with the opinions of the 
 Slavophils, whose national exclusiveness appeared 
 to him narrow-minded. He was besides a devoted 
 admirer of the Gerrnan romanticists, especially of 
 Th. A. Hoffmann, and in imitation of his favourite 
 Heine he posed as a sacrifice to the fashionable 
 " Weltschmerz." While his companions chattered 
 merrily over their champagne, in nightly exchange 
 of jest and argument, he used to put on a sombre 
 air, now folding his arms across his chest like a 
 second Napoleon, now lifting his small and insignifi- 
 cant eyes rapturously to Heaven, a la Lord Byron. 
 These airs and graces afforded his friend Ketcher, 
 who was fond of a joke, an opportunity for endless 
 sarcasms. At other times Katkov was in a frolic- 
 some humour, which his friends laughed at as 
 childishness. His whole manner was that of a poet 
 in process of development, who cared nothing about 
 the actualities of life. Among his favourite occupa- 
 tions was the translation of Heine's poems, which 
 
M. N. KATKOV. 185 
 
 he afterwards listlessly read to his friends ; but for 
 his living he wrote criticisms, and worked at a trans- 
 lation of " Romeo and Juliet," the money got for 
 which was to be spent on a journey to Berlin. 
 
 In April, 1840, Katkov paid a visit to St. Peters- 
 burg to prepare himself for the journey to Berlin. 
 There he was for many weeks the guest of Panaev, 
 who gives the following account of his visit : " When 
 I think of Katkov I can scarcely imagine him but 
 with his eyes fixed on the sky and his arms crossed 
 on his breast. In that position he would declaim 
 unceasingly the poems of Freiligrath ; I can still 
 hear his languid voice reciting ' Capitano, capitano.' 
 He was very young, and had the most extraordinary 
 crotchets. One day, for example, it suddenly struck 
 him that Theodore A. Hoffmann, to whose works we 
 were both devoted, used to spend his evenings in a 
 Berlin wine-cellar. He at once proposed to me to 
 go to such a cellar, and when I answered that there 
 were no cellars of the kind in St. Petersburg, but 
 that I would willingly send for wine, Mikhail 
 Nikoforovich flew into a regular fury, and told me 
 I wanted to play the aristocrat and toady to aristo- 
 cratic prejudices. He would sweep away these pre- 
 judices, he would go to a cellar, and would bring in 
 the custom of going to them ; and so on. I had a 
 great deal of trouble in calming him." Another 
 ludicrous whim seized him while he was at an oyster 
 breakfast with PanaeV, Bakunin, and the poet 
 
i86 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 Yazuikov. He suddenly became melancholy, and then 
 rushed into the street, and stood with folded arms in 
 the middle of the Semenov bridge, where his extra- 
 ordinary behaviour caused a small tumult among the 
 people. A few days later he became so childishly 
 enraged over a philosophical discussion with Bakunin 
 that he challenged him to a duel, and was with diffi- 
 culty persuaded not to fight it out in St. Petersburg, 
 but to settle the dispute by a meeting in Berlin a few 
 weeks afterwards. 
 
 Bakunin went forthwith to Berlin, but Katkov was 
 detained for several weeks, as he could not obtain the 
 money necessary to realise the darling wish of his 
 youth. The money was to come from the fees for 
 his translations of Cooper's novel, " Lake Ontario," 
 and of " Romeo and Juliet." The fee for the first 
 consisted in two hundred copies of the book, which 
 a bookseller bought from him for 350 paper roubles 
 (about ^^14). But the publisher of the translation of 
 Shakespeare delayed so long to pay his debt, that the 
 impatient traveller went off without the money, and 
 had it sent after him. 
 
 When Katkov went on board the steamer that was 
 to take him to Liibeck he had 100 paper roubles 
 (scarcely £a^) in his pocket. " And yet," says 
 Panaev, " he was in good spirits, and buoyed up by 
 the thought that he would in a few days be in 
 Western Europe, to which he was so strongly drawn. 
 The goal of his wishes was the University of Berlin, 
 
M. N. KATKOV. 187 
 
 ' the sanctuary of science,' of which he had dreamed 
 for years." 
 
 We may here remark that Katkov was by no means 
 the only Russian nationalist who at that time, when 
 the principle of nationality had not yet been dis- 
 covered, carried his respect for German literature 
 and science to the point of worship. One of his 
 older contemporaries, the already-mentioned Slavo- 
 phil, Koshelev, thus describes his emotions when he 
 first trod upon German soil : " When I stepped 
 ashore at Travemiinde, the thought that I was in 
 the fatherland of Kant, Schelling, Goethe, and 
 Schiller called up in me a dream of delight. The 
 modest dinner I ate in Travemiinde seemed especially 
 well-flavoured, the little inn I lived in a miracle of 
 cleanliness and good order. Amid the antiquities of 
 Liibeck I imagined myself in mediaeval Germany, 
 and Hamburg, with its ' Jungfemstieg ' and the 
 promenade by the Alster, produced so powerful an 
 impression upon me, that I wandered through the en- 
 tire town, large as it is, in the course of a single day." 
 
 The same patriotic traveller has only this to say of 
 Berlin, that the town reminded him at times of St. 
 Petersburg. 
 
 We know nothing more of Katkov's Berlin student 
 days except that he came in daily contact with 
 Turgenev, Granovsky, and Bakunin, that he excelled 
 his countrymen in industry and perseverance, that he 
 studied philology and philosophy with success, and 
 
i88 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 that he was personally acquainted with two famous 
 teachers of the high school, Schelling and the 
 aesthetic Werder (who had a great reputation with 
 the philosophers of Moscow). The industrious 
 student was respected but not loved by his fellow- 
 students. Katkov was never a bosom friend of any 
 of the young men mentioned. The highly-sensitive 
 Turgenev appears even then to have been repelled 
 by Katkov's overweening selfishness ; Granovsky, 
 the best-liked and most sociable Russian of his time, 
 formed substantially the same opinion. These dis- 
 ciples of German philosophy were not destined to 
 live together for any length of time in Berlin. 
 Bakunin left for Dresden in 1842, Turgenev returned 
 to St. Petersburg, Katkov to Moscow, his native 
 city, where he immediately found work as a lec- 
 turer in an academy, and after his marriage with a 
 Princess Shalikov became an influential member of 
 society. Everybody is well acquainted with Katkov's 
 future career. It is as well known in Western 
 Europe as in Russia that the first two periods of his 
 public life formed a striking contrast to the last one. 
 
 At the beginning of the 'fifties the Moscow pro- 
 fessor of philosophy resigned the office, which he had 
 filled with great credit, because he could not tolerate 
 the pressure that was brought to bear by Prince 
 Shikmatov '^ on the intellectual life and freedom of 
 the universities. 
 
 ' The then (1852) Minister of Popular Education.— Ed. 
 
M. N. KATKOV. 189 
 
 In 1856, along with his friend Leontiev, he founded 
 a monthly review (Russky Vestnik — " The Russian 
 Messenger") in the learned and liberal pages of which 
 a constant attack was kept up against the radical 
 extravagances of the St. Petersburg journalism, and 
 the fantastic ideas of the Moscow Slavophil press. 
 
 For six years Katkov was regarded as one of the 
 most eminent representatives of the Liberal Euro- 
 pean tendency in Russia. Boris Chicherin, Korsh, 
 Turgenev Pavlov, Bezobrasov, Filipov, and other 
 excellent men reckoned him as one of their partj' ; 
 they supported the Vestnik as collaborateurs, and 
 in all essential points held similar views to the 
 editor. 
 
 Katkov's special merits convsisted in the fact that 
 he, in contradistinction to the supporters of the 
 democratic party, was opposed to a constitution after 
 the Belgian model. He favoured the establishment 
 of self-government, as being the best means of 
 attaining the full development of Russia. The 
 follower of Gneist and Tocqueville urged decentra- 
 lisation and the organisation of sound communal 
 and provincial conditions ; the pupil of Schelling, 
 Werder, and Bockh preached the necessity of a 
 classical education, and asserted that the talk of a 
 purely national one was mere clap-trap ; the master 
 of European history and literature opposed to the 
 dreams of Panslavism the reality of a historically 
 developed Russian state. In the department of 
 
190 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 economies the Russky Vestnik advocated the doc- 
 trines of free trade ; but his preference for English 
 institutions was so well known that the comic papers 
 always represented him as wearing a Scotch bonnet, 
 and nicknamed him "The Englishman." 
 
 This continued till the spring of the dangerous 
 year 1863, the date of the Polish-Lithuanian revolt, 
 when a new phase in the development of Russia 
 and in the history of Katkov (who shortly before had 
 undertaken the editorship of the Moscow newspaper) 
 began. His conduct during this last phase of his 
 career, which embraced a period of twenty-five 
 years, justified the opinion of his youthful friends, 
 who had always maintained that Mikhail Nikofo- 
 rovich's ambition, selfishness, and capriciousness 
 would one day warp his good and estimable qualities 
 and prove that he was wanting in the highest quality 
 of all — moral character. 
 
XIV. 
 
 ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 
 
 (From 1812 to 1882.) 
 
 This work on Russia, not only on account of the 
 position of its author, but by reason of its contents, 
 ranks as one of the most important contributions 
 to recent memoir literature. A member of the 
 Slavophil party, a zealous participator in the 
 emancipation of the serfs, the champion of provincial 
 institutions, and an indefatigable writer and agitator, 
 Alexander Ivanovich Koshelev, who died in 1SS2, 
 played no unimportant part during the last thirty 
 years of Russian history. His literary remains are 
 written with a fearless candour, and bring to the 
 knowledge of the Russian public a multitude of 
 facts which were hitherto imperfectly known, if 
 known at all. Personal relations, private struggles 
 and conflicts, are not passed over in silence, but are, 
 almost without exception, summarily treated ; in 
 fact the vigorous author of these memoirs lived a 
 life of action, with just sufficient margin for the 
 
192 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 development of his inner nature as appeared neces- 
 sary to the maintenance of a certain moral balance. 
 Koshelev fills the pages of his autobiography almost 
 entirely with an immense number of his own ex- 
 periences. The reader fares all the better on this 
 account, inasmuch as the writer, for a party man 
 and an official, retained the precious quality of in- 
 dependence. The zealous Slavophil remained free 
 from the hatred of the nobility and the national 
 narrowness of the party to which he belonged : the 
 champion for the Russification of Poland became 
 eventually the most determined opponent of his con- 
 federates and of their system ; the high official of 
 former days had no hesitation in criticising the 
 government, of which he himself had at times been 
 a member, in a large number of writings printed 
 beyond the Russian frontier and forbidden by the 
 Russian censorship. 
 
 From a man of so unusual a stamp a vast amount 
 can be learned, even though disagreeing with him in 
 many points and differing from his principles. His 
 contribution to the knowledge of the newer Russian 
 conditions can hardly be overestimated, since the 
 facts brought to light are derived from first sources 
 throughout. 
 
 I. 
 
 Alexander Ivanovich Koshelev was born in 
 Moscow in 1806. His family were rich and origin- 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 193 
 
 ally Lithuanian : he was brought up with much care 
 in the house of his parents, who had received a 
 European education. His father had spent the 
 most important years of his youth in London, where 
 his uncle had been ambassador in the time of 
 Catherine II : he studied at Oxford, and then for some 
 years served as adjutant of Potenkin in the pro- 
 vinces. His first wife was Princess Menshikov : on 
 her early death he married the daughter of a French 
 emigrant, Desjardin ; he retired as lieutenant-colonel 
 and settled in the old capital of the Russian Empire. 
 The first great event in the life of the son of these 
 parents was the invasion of 1812 ; the second, the 
 early death of his excellent father, who had been 
 brought up in the traditions of the English nobility 
 of the old school. His mother had the boy so suc- 
 cessfully educated by the most celebrated teachers 
 in Moscow (among them was Christian V. Schloyer, 
 who was later professor of politics in Bonn, and son 
 of the famous historical investigator), that in his 
 fifteenth year he could read Plato, Thucydides, and 
 Xenophon in tbe original, and was in a position 
 to devote himself to independent Russo-historical 
 studies. At sixteen he attended the Moscow high 
 school as a student of philosophy. Twelve months 
 later the young man had his name struck off the list 
 of students because he would not comply with the 
 foolish order of the rector to attend the lectures of 
 eight different professors at the same time. 
 
 14 - 
 
194 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 Koshelev now devoted himself to private st 
 under the direction of Schloyer : these include 
 philosophy of Schelling, and enabled the you 
 eighteen to pass successfully his final acade 
 examination, and to enter the government servi 
 official of the Moscow Archives of the Minisi 
 Foreign Affairs. 
 
 The numerous leisure hours which this s( 
 left to him were almost exclusively devoted to 
 course with friends, who met together at i 
 unions — a literary and a philosophical circle, 
 by side with the study of Fichte, Kant, Oken 
 they devoted their attention to Liberal politics 
 a special zeal. The revolutionary ideas i 
 swayed St. Petersburg at that time, and drov 
 flower of the nobility, who were serving ii 
 guards, to the Dekabrist revolt of 1825, had s 
 to Moscow. Koshelev makes no secret of il 
 several of his most intimate acquaintances we: 
 plicated in the conspiracy, that he looked \i\ 
 throughout sympathetically, and that it was gen 
 matter for astonishment that he was not arres 
 consequence of the catastrophe of Decembe: 
 sent to the fortress of St. Peter and Paul. 
 
 The youthful members of the philosophic; 
 literary union thought it advisable to burn 
 transactions, to suspend their regular meeting 
 to observe strict silence — a silence which reigm 
 the whole Empire, and especially the Liberal 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEVS MEMOIRS. 195 
 
 cracy, for several years. Koshelev, although in 
 his old age, expresses himself with respect to this 
 period with the candour peculiar to him : " The 
 terror and exasperation which filled all {sic] on the 
 announcement of the execution of Pestel and of the 
 four chief conspirators cannot be described in words ; 
 literally, every one felt as if he had lost a brother or 
 a father. . . . For this reason the entry and corona- 
 tion of the Emperor Nicholas bore the character of 
 mere Court festivities. Very many (sc, nobles) re- 
 mained on their estates, and only those took part in 
 the festivities who were obliged to do so by reason of 
 their official position. The Emperor himself was 
 extremely gloomy and unapproachable ; gloomy also 
 was the outlook." 
 
 In September of the year 1826, nine weeks after 
 the conclusion of the coronation ceremonial, Koshe- 
 lev, who was now twenty years of age, migrated 
 to St. Petersburg in order to continue the career 
 which he had begun as official in the chancellerie 
 of Count Nesselrode, Minister of Foreign Affairs, 
 and through his family connections to be introduced 
 into society. The young Radical took his place at 
 once in the brilliant society of the capital : he was in 
 no way overburdened with his official duties, and 
 like others enjoyed his leisure. But even then his 
 youthful literary Moscow friends, Kiryeevsky and the 
 poet Venevitinov, who had settled on the Neva, ap- 
 pealed more to the serious and cultured youth than 
 
196 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the fashionable people, whose circles he frequei 
 At the death-bed of Venevitinov he became 
 quainted with Khomyakov, the retired lieutenai 
 the foot guards, who afterwards became so fan 
 as the founder of the Slavophil theories, and of 
 doctrine of the universal mission of the Greek Oi 
 dox Church. Khomyakov was a. man whose relig 
 enthusiasm made a great and lasting impres 
 upon Koshelev. It was now that he began to 
 the need of serving his country in a more practic 
 way than appeared possible in the chancellen 
 foreign affairs. As Nesselrode withheld from 
 the desired position of secretary to the embass 
 Constantinople, Koshelev, believing he had spc 
 his chances with his chef through an inconside 
 arrogant remark, offered his services to Bludov, 
 Secretary of State, at that time head of the def 
 ment of foreign confessions, resolving never agai 
 return to the diplomatic career. 
 
 This change in Koshelev's official career 
 attended with important results, because it gave 
 his first actual insight into the inner v/orking of 
 State machine. Bludov, a somewhat unexpe 
 Liberal convert to the system of the Emp 
 Nicholas, was a man of intellect and sagacity 
 excellent stylist, and so highly appreciated by 
 Emperor that he was consulted on all impor 
 matters of home politics, and participated in 
 merous vital questions — for example, the "reuni 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 197 
 
 of the Uniats with the Orthodox Church and the edit- 
 ing of the Canon Law of the Evangelical Lutheran 
 Church. Our author, in common with other critics, 
 estimates the most conspicuous of all non-military 
 assistants of the Russian Emperor from 1825 to 1855 
 as a gifted man, benevolent at heart, but vacillating 
 and "cowardly." On those days when he was 
 obliged to have an audience with the Tsar, Bludov 
 seemed distracted: he heard and understood nothing 
 that was said to him, he was extremel}' restless, 
 looked every minute at the clock, and regulated his 
 watch early in the morning by that of the royal 
 palace. If he returned from the audience without 
 receiving a reprimand he was as happy as a child ; 
 he did not walk, but ran through the rooms, and was 
 ready to fall on the neck of everybody who met him. 
 It may here be incidentally remarked that Koshelev's 
 criticisms on friendly and sympathetic persons {e.g., 
 the dreaded Count A. Orlov) are less reliable than 
 are those on his opponents, to be just to whom he 
 regarded as a duty. Harsh criticisms are clearly 
 not in accordance with his kindly nature, and where 
 he can see his way to praise and appreciate his 
 judgments are sometimes wanting in proportion. 
 
 From the information we have with respect to 
 Koshelev's official activity we learn that a proposal, 
 made under the auspices of Bludov and Dashkov to 
 ameliorate the lot of the serfs, remained a dead 
 letter, in spite of the approval of the Emperor, and 
 
198 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 the knowledge, even at that time, of the cor 
 danger and the indefensibility of the existing 
 tion. It may also be noted that Koshelev, as ( 
 the secretaries of the commission for the adr 
 tration of the law (published in 1833) with n 
 to the Evangelical Church of Russia, became : 
 of the stubbornness with which the represent; 
 of the diets of Livonia, Esthonia, and Cou 
 defended their rights and privileges. Koshele 
 now five-and-twenty, and his head and heart 
 filled with quite other matters. About the 
 time that he learnt that intercepted letters 
 marked him out in the eyes of the Emperor 
 dangerous man (" C'est un mauvais homme, 
 vous conseille d'etre sur vos gardes avec lui. 
 Majesty had said on one occasion to Count Bl 
 Koshelev was seized with a violent passion 
 beautiful fascinating ladj^ of high position, wh( 
 also a penchant for him, but with whom he nevi 
 less broke off relations, because he had no sym 
 with her inclinations and plans, which were n 
 directed towards playing a fashionable part in so 
 During the days that followed the decisive 
 the earnest lover was on the brink of madness ; 
 he was seized with a serious illness, and 
 recovery he was advised by his physician to 
 Carlsbad and try the cure for the dyspepsia ' 
 had troubled him for years. 
 
 Since the outbreak of the Polish Revolution ( 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 199 
 
 passports had been exceptionally difficult to obtain, 
 and it required the intervention of Bludov and a 
 delay of several months before the traveller could 
 proceed on his journey. This increased his im- 
 patience to the highest degree, and filled him with 
 an enthusiasm for travel which the modern reader 
 may well envy. German life, with which Koshelev 
 became familiar when, after surmounting the diffi- 
 culties of the cholera-quarantine, he left the vessel 
 Nicolai I. and stepped on land at Travemiinde, ap- 
 peared to him in glowing colours. We have already 
 quoted (p. 187) the description of the delightful im- 
 pressions made on Koshelev by Travemiinde, Liibeck, 
 and Hamburg. Berlin had little attraction for 
 Koshelev, nevertheless it seems to have interested 
 him for a time on account of the lectures of its 
 famous professors. 
 
 For an educated man— no matter whether he 
 came from London, Moscow, or Rome — to have 
 visited Germany, and not to have talked with Goethe, 
 was like going to Rome and not seeing the Pope. 
 As a matter of course, Koshelev, when he had finished 
 his "cure" at Carlsbad, went to Weimar to be intro- 
 duced by the princess (Mary Pavlovna) to the man 
 whom he regarded as " the greatest of the living." 
 The introduction of the distinguished Russian 
 traveller was carried out in the usual way. The old 
 man spoke of Weimar, of Her Royal Highness the 
 Princess, of the fortune of the country in possessing 
 
20O RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 SO excellent a ruling house, and observed, when 
 Koshelev mentioned the name of the poet Shuko- 
 lovsky, " It will bring high honour to Shukolovsky 
 to be entrusted with the honourable task of the 
 education of His Imperial Highness, the successor 
 to the Russian throne." The enthusiastic visitor 
 retired somewhat disappointed ; nothing but the eyes 
 of his interlocutor had impressed him strongly. To 
 his surprise Koshelev received in the meanwhile an 
 invitation for the last evening before his departure. 
 He met Heinrich Meyer and the Chancellor von 
 Mtiller in Goethe's house, and this time the conver- 
 sation turned neither on grand dukes, nor princes, 
 nor royal highnesses. Goethe declared that 
 " politics and realism threatened to stifle literature 
 and art, and that since these could neither revolu- 
 tionise mankind all at once, nor adapt themselves to 
 the demands of the time, nothing was left to them 
 but to take possession of the highest standpoint, and 
 to show and open up to man a new world, and thus 
 conquer him by the power of new ideas." The 
 company left at half-past ten at a sign given by the 
 chancellor. 
 
 Koshelev's stay in Germany seems to have been 
 the most enjoyable period of his first travels, and to 
 have moved him most strongly on account of the 
 freshness of the impressions received. He spent 
 the winter in Genoa. Revolutionary Paris was in 
 the meantime interdicted to Russian subjects. At 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 201 
 
 Genoa he attended the lectures of Decandolle, De 
 Larive, and Rossi, who afterwards became Count 
 and Prime Minister to Pius IX., and often visited 
 the house of Marie Naruishkin nee Princess Chet- 
 vertinska, the former mistress of Alexander I. In 
 spring he was at last able to set out for Paris. He 
 had an introduction to Pozzo di Borgo, and made 
 the acquaintance of Guizot, Thiers, Villemain, and 
 Michelet. Then he went to London, where he had 
 the good fortune to be present at the celebrated 
 sitting of the House of Lords, at which the Reform 
 Bill was passed on the 4th of June. In London 
 Koshelev made the acquaintance of Count A. F. 
 Orlov in a most peculiar manner. Orlov had been 
 sent on an extraordinary mission to the Court of 
 William IV. in connection with the Belgian question. 
 The highly imperious confidant of the Emperor 
 Nicholas had the habit of addressing those who 
 were his subordinates as " thou," and also of imita- 
 ting the humming and hawing of his master. Even 
 officials so highly placed as the counsellor to the 
 Embassy Kokochkin, who was afterwards envoy at 
 Turin, submitted to this indignity. Koshelev 
 therefore astonished everybody when at a dinner 
 party by replying to the Count with the same con- 
 temptuous " thou." Contrary to his own expecta- 
 tions this did not bring about his ruin : the Count, 
 who had the reputation of being highly irritable and 
 irreconcilable, not only called the bold young man 
 
202 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 henceforth " you," but invited him to accompany 
 him to Paris, and treated him on the journey and on 
 future occasions with special kindness. 
 
 After his return home in August, 1832, Koslielev 
 went first to Moscow, where he spent the winter at 
 his mother's house, and it was not till the following 
 spring that he went to St. Petersburg, which never 
 seems to have had much charm for him. Here, 
 however, he was not destined to remain. The then 
 Governor of Moscow, Prince D. W. Galitsin, pressed 
 him so strongly to accept the position of govern- 
 ment councillor of the Moscow administration, that 
 Koshelev felt himself obliged to do so, and to settle 
 permanently in his native city in October, 1833. 
 
 Koshelev cannot praise his chef enough, and 
 • Prince Dmitri Galitsin, as we know from other 
 sources, really deserves this praise. His own 
 officials, as well as the inhabitants of Moscow, 
 regarded the retirement of the old man who had 
 been entrusted with the administration of their town 
 for twenty years as a heavy loss. Yielding to an 
 irresistible desire he resigned his office at the end of 
 thirty years, in order to pass the remainder of his 
 days in his beloved Paris. Koshelev had abandoned 
 the service of the State before. As a characteristic of 
 Galitsin, and of the difficult relations under which 
 he administered his office, he relates the following 
 noteworthy incident : — " In the year 1834 a terrible 
 fire broke out in Moscow, which destroyed more 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEVS MEMOIRS. 203 
 
 than a thousand houses. It was generally believed 
 that it was the work of incendiaries. A special 
 commission of investigation was appointed, and, as 
 the Emperor himself had come to Moscow, an in- 
 quiry was carried on day and night. On his depar- 
 ture the Emperor advised that the documents should 
 be handed over to a military commission, which 
 would have to pronounce a judgment within three 
 days, and lay it before the governor for ratification. 
 He desired an opinion from the Moscow government. 
 As a member of the body I was dragged out of bed 
 at two o'clock in the morning. I put on my uni- 
 form, hastened to the sitting, and there found the 
 civil governor, Nebolssin, also in uniform. He put 
 the case before me and my colleagues, and explained 
 that we should have to give our opinion within 
 twelve hours on the decision which he had read to 
 us. This was impossible without previous know- 
 ledge of the contents of the documents: we refused 
 to give an opinion on the judgment which had been 
 arrived at, and asked for time in order to distribute 
 the documents among those present and sift them to 
 the bottom, promising at the same time not to leave 
 the sitting before we had finished the task imposed 
 upon us. The good Nebolssin, who had expected to 
 lay the matter before Prince Galitsin in the morning 
 and then to dispatch a courier to the Emperor, was 
 in despair, but we remained firm to the resolution 
 we had formed. At nine o'clock in the morning 
 
204 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 Nebolssin went to the governor, who allowed us 
 an extension of thirty-six hours. At last the real 
 crisis began. The council of war had sentenced 
 nine or ten of the accused to be flogged to death ; 
 but we had the independence to maintain that the 
 proofs were not conclusive, and that at most four of 
 the accused should be left under suspicion. When 
 Governor Nebolssin, who had been riveted to the 
 president's chair for thirty-six hours, heard this 
 decision, he fainted. Having been brought to, he 
 exclaimed, ' Gentlemen, you will ruin both your- 
 selves and me ; consider well what you are doing ! ' 
 We still held fast to our opinion, and our decision 
 reached the hands of the general governor without 
 the signal of the civil governor. Galitsin sent for us 
 an hour later ; he talked the matter over again, 
 thanked us for the conscientious discharge of our 
 duty, and promised to make use of the report as far 
 as possible. Rewrote to the Emperor that he could 
 not consequently take upon himself the ratification 
 of the judgment arrived at by the council of war. 
 No one was sentenced to death, four of the accused 
 received more or less severe punishment, the rest 
 were simply placed under suspicion." 
 
 Some months later saw a decisive turning-point in 
 Koshelev's life. On February 5, 1835, he married 
 Olga Petrovna Soloveva, who had won his heart by 
 reason of the serious earnestness of her character. 
 In May of the same year he purchased from the im- 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEVS MEMOIRS. 205 
 
 perial master of the horse, Prince W. W. Dolgoruky, 
 and at his special request, 35,000 acres (Prussian) 
 of arable land, and 11,666 acres of forest, including 
 the neglected estate, Pessotchua, in the district of 
 Sapochkov, for 725,000 roubles. Dolgoruky had 
 never received any income from this rich property, 
 and feared he would be completely ruined by it. 
 Koshelev, when the bargain was completed, took 
 his departure, and for the next twelve years of his 
 life was exclusively landlord, distiller, and farmer of 
 the Government monopoly on brandy for the different 
 towns and districts of Riasan. Koshelev did not 
 return to the transaction of public affairs until he 
 had become a millionaire. 
 
 If these pages were meant for Russian readers it 
 would be necessary to dwell with special care on 
 this part of Koshelev's life. 
 
 Among the causes of the economic distress in 
 which the Russian nobility and the Russian land- 
 lords were involved previous to the liberation of the 
 serfs, absenteeism, extravagance, and the repugnance 
 of the more highly educated and distinguished aristo- 
 crats to a landlord's life had for a long period been 
 the most outstanding and dangerous. "With rela- 
 tively few exceptions the usual assumption was right, 
 that the Russian noble who was exclusively occu- 
 pied with the management of his estate must have 
 taken up this calling on account of his incompetence 
 for the service of the State or military life. A claim 
 
206- RUSSIA UADER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 to social distinction could only be justified by those 
 who had served several years in the guards, at the 
 Court, or in the ministry, and who had only retired 
 to the country in later years. 
 
 Along with their inferior position the landed aris- 
 tocracy by profession were, as a rule, bad agri- 
 culturists, stupid and unmethodical, and entirely 
 devoid of technical education. We know of no other 
 Russian in recent times who can be compared with 
 Koshelev as an eminent author and politician, and an 
 effective and practical agriculturist. It appears no 
 less remarkable that this exceptional man carried on 
 for twelve years without loss the profitable but little 
 respected employment of a farmer of the Govern- 
 ment monopoly on brandy, which was abolished at 
 the commencement of Alexander II.'s reign; that, 
 side by side with the distillation of brandy, he suc- 
 cessfully devoted himself to practical agriculture, and 
 that he acquired the reputation of being at the same 
 time a landlord who was a friend to the peasantry 
 and a man who looked after his own interests. 
 This unexampled position explains precisely how the 
 influential and active leader of the Slavophil party 
 was enabled to keep himself free from a host of the 
 fatal blunders committed by his compatriots, and 
 how he came to be recognised, both during and after 
 the abolition of serfdom, as among the most compe- 
 tent and experienced critics of the state of Russia 
 with regard to the condition of the land and the 
 
ALEXANDER KUSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 207 
 
 peasantry. All his numerous writings on this im- 
 portant matter reveal the practical man, who has got 
 his knowledge at first hand, and is aware of all the 
 points of importance. 
 
 In the summer of 1847 Koshelev had got his 
 financial and agricultural affairs so well arranged 
 that he could settle for the greatest part of the year 
 in Moscow, and turn his attention to the scientific 
 and political interests which corresponded with his 
 inclinations and his intellectual interests. Two 
 subjects especially claimed his attention during the 
 following years : the distressing condition of the serf 
 population and the study of the theology of the 
 Greek Church, which had been stimulated by his 
 friend Khomyakov. Koshelev's mind was drawn 
 towards the state of the peasantry by his whole past 
 life. He had repeatedly filled the office of a repre- 
 sentative marshal in the district of Saposhkov, and 
 had been obliged while in this position to take up 
 the cause of the resident country population against 
 their stupid and despotic masters, and in this way 
 he had gained an insight into the abyss of the 
 misery of serfdom which filled him with passionate 
 hatred — a hatred which he could only slowly repress 
 —against this " root of all our evils." We will spare 
 the reader the reproduction of the reports with 
 respect to the atrocities and villainies against which 
 Koshelev had to contend. The amount of brutality, 
 folly, depravity, and viciousness would, besides, 
 
2o8 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 appear incredible. It is enough that Koshe 
 during the short period of his official dut}^, set 
 work with all the energy and superior power of 
 man of education and position, and made himsell 
 thoroughly hated by the nobles of the old sell 
 through his behaviour towards the classes, that 
 re-election was not to be thought of. He loo 
 upon it, therefore, as a patriotic duty to attack 
 subject from another side. Appealing to one of 
 many paragraphs of the ninth volume of the laws 
 the Empire, which had been designed to amelior 
 the position of the peasants, Koshelev went to 
 Minister of the Interior, Count L. A. Perovsky, 
 October, 1847, to ask the Emperor to sanction 
 proposal directed towards the voluntary limitati( 
 of the right of proprietors — a proposal which 
 intended to lay before the assembly of nobles 
 the province of Riasan. Perovsky's reply was 
 refusal. "His '^Majesty fully recognised the gc 
 intention of the petitioner, and had himself Ic 
 thought of taking measures for the reform of 1 
 agrarian situation ; but the present time was noi 
 suitable one for so important an undertaking. 
 Koshelev cherishes the wish to enter into agr 
 ments with his own people, which would ensi 
 them a certain measure of freedom, no objecti 
 would be raised„[_to his doing so." Neverthele 
 Koshelev remained without any information fri 
 the Cabinet when he submitted proposals bearing 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEVS MEMOIRS. 209 
 
 the same point in the years 1849 and 1850. The 
 events of the revolutionary year 1848 had deter- 
 mined the Emperor to abandon his views on agrarian 
 reform : his mind reverted to the subject again and 
 again, but at the critical moment political considera- 
 tions stood in the way of a solution. 
 
 Friendly intercourse within a small circle afforded 
 the only consolation for the five years between 
 1848 and 1853, years which recalled the five follow- 
 ing 1825. This was the circle of the Slavophils. .- 
 Its origin, as is well known, dated back to the 
 'thirties, when a number of young enthusiasts met 
 together, under the direction of Stankevich, to 
 study the philosophy of Schelling and Hegel. The 
 majority of these held at first the advanced Liberal 
 ideas of the West. Subsequently a difference of 
 opinion split up the friendly circle into two oppo- 
 site camps. According to the Slavophils the only 
 salvation for Russia — as for Europe — was to be 
 found in a return to the principle of nationality and 
 to the old ecclesiastical Byzantine tradition, as well 
 as the only safety from the false heathen culture 
 of the West. 
 
 The soul of this circle, as has been already 
 mentioned, the intellectual and highly cultivated 
 visionary, Khomyakov, succeeded at last in win- 
 ning over to his side the cool-headed and practical 
 Koshelev, who was now over forty. Koshelev gives 
 no particulars as to this change in his inner nature, 
 
 IS 
 
2IO RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 he contents himself by saying that Khomyakov had 
 inspired him with a desire for the study of patristic 
 literature and old Russian theology : that he had 
 found in this complete satisfaction, and that he 
 was convinced more and more of the necessity of 
 an exclusively national development. Khomyakov's 
 first acquisition in proselytism was Koshelev's inti- 
 mate friend, the friend of his youth, Ivan Kiryeevsky, 
 the earnest theological writer. Then followed Ivan 
 Kiryeevsky's brother Peter, who made the collection 
 and study of the songs and folklore of the Russian 
 people his chief occupation, and the eccentric, high- 
 spirited Constantine Aksakov, who was even then 
 inclined to such grotesque exaggerations of the new 
 doctrine, that his friends frequently found themselves 
 compelled to restrain his zeal. Constantine's younger 
 brother, Ivan Aksakov (later on a leader of the 
 party), was then, to his brother's sorrow, so exclu- 
 sively devoted to Western ideas that he was not 
 reckoned one of the number. Juri Samarin (known 
 in consequence of his odious polemical writings 
 against Poland and the Baltic provinces) was re- 
 garded as the most distinguished dialectician of the 
 school. The professors, Pogodin and Shefirev, repre- 
 sented the extreme right, while as Russians of the 
 old school they inoculated Khomyakov with leanings 
 towards Protestant Liberalism and an arbitrary con- 
 ception of history. 
 
 As party agitation in the proper sense of the word 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEVS MEMOIRS. 2H 
 
 was out of the question on account of the pressure 
 of outward circumstances, and as the new doctrine 
 was treated chiefly as an interesting subject of 
 conversation, members of the iirst Slavophil society 
 felt themselves to be an exclusive body, and friendly 
 relations and interminable discussions with the 
 representatives of European Radicalism followed as a 
 matter of course. The chief spokesman of the latter 
 was Alexander Herzen, who often came into violent 
 conflict with the other members. He left Moscow 
 in 1847, ^n<i went abroad never to return. Granov- 
 sky, the professor of history, and Pavlov, the 
 author, took Herzen's side, while Chadaev, who 
 was many years older, stood opposed in a certain 
 measure to both parties : he preferred Catholicism, 
 and contended that Russian history was barren in 
 substance and led to no results. This contention 
 was regarded as epoch-making at the time. Cha- 
 daev's opposition to both parties roused intense 
 excitement. A gradual breach, which afterwards 
 became complete, was already beginning between 
 Radicals and Slavophils. Koshelev, who had the 
 good fortune to obtain a passport to visit the first 
 London Exhibition in 1851, sent reports of the 
 exhibition to the Slavophil periodical, Moskovsky 
 Sbornik ; but as his articles had to be sent to St. 
 Petersburg to be submitted to the chief censorship 
 bureau, and' as they were never returned, he became 
 disgusted and ceased writing. 
 
212 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 This was the condition of things at Moscow — and 
 Moscow was representative of a great part of 
 Russia — when the war began in 1853, and with it a 
 new chapter in Russian history. Koshelev's com- 
 ments on this period are so characteristically frank 
 that they deserve to be quoted verbatim. "After 
 the outbreak of the war with Turkey a presenti- 
 ment that a struggle with Europe was at hand 
 pervaded all minds. The destruction of the Turkish 
 fleet at Sinope roused society from its torpor, and 
 the Government being occupied with war prepara- 
 tions and military operations, paid less and less 
 attention to internal affairs. It looked as if we 
 should at last be released from our dark and dreary 
 prison-house and brought to a point of vantage, 
 where, although we might not enjoy the free air of 
 heaven, we might at least feel a refreshing breeze. 
 The landing of the troops of the Western Powers in 
 the Crimea, the battles of Alma and Inkerman, 
 and the siege of Sebastopol caused us no great 
 grief, for we were convinced that even a defeat 
 would be more tolerable and useful to Russia than 
 the duration of the position in which the Empire had 
 found itself for years. ^ 
 
 Public opinion and even the opinion of the masses 
 
 moved in the same direction. In this connection I 
 
 must especially mention the calling out of the 
 
 militia volunteers in 1854. Although wars against 
 
 ■ See Appendix, Note 27. 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEVS MEMOIRS. 213 
 
 the Mahometans and in defence of kindred races 
 and co-religionists alwaj's called forth the national 
 sympathy of the Russians, yet the manifesto with 
 regard to the militia was received by all classes not 
 only with coldness, but with a feeling of displeasure. 
 Melancholy processions followed the soldiers as if 
 they were marching off to the other world (a thing 
 which happened at other times only in the case of 
 conscripts). There was no trace of enthusiasm 
 visible, although the defence of the country was at 
 stake. It was exactly the same when on the same 
 occasion the nobles were called out. Only those 
 nobles joined who on account of their position 
 could not do otherwise. Any one who was relieved 
 of the honour and duty of defending his country, 
 whether from considerations of age, health, or family, 
 made no secret of his joy. On the 20th of February, 
 1855, the announcement of the death of the Emperor 
 Nicholas and of the accession of Alexander II. 
 reached Moscow — an announcement which caused 
 sincere sorrow only in the hearts of a few, since the 
 three decades embraced^by Nicholas's reign, especially 
 since 1848, had been borne with difficulty. Suspicion 
 and arbitrary power knew no bounds. 
 
 Koshelev (who assures us repeatedly that as a 
 sincere nationalist he was always an advocate of 
 absolute power) had had a memorial lying in his 
 desk since the end of 1854, in which he advised the 
 summoning of an assembly of the people for the 
 
214 l^USSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 purpose of strengthening the credit of the State, 
 opening up new sources of revenue and transforming 
 the war of the State into a war of the people. This 
 memorial, originally destined for the heir to the 
 throne, was transmitted to the Emperor in May, 1855, 
 who (as the author was officially informed) handed it 
 over to the Minister of Finance, but took no further 
 notice of it. A little later Koshelev and his party 
 obtained permission to publish a quarterly journal 
 — Kusskaya Besseda ("The Russian Discourses") — 
 which immediately acquired a certain influence, as 
 being, so to say, the official organ of the Slavophil 
 party, but on account of the continuance of the 
 traditional difficulties of censorship only made head- 
 way gradually. Those of the old regime who still 
 retained office regarded the Slavophil party as a 
 variety of the dreaded revolutionists. 
 
 Prince W. A. Cherkasky, to whom frequent re- 
 ference is made, was subsequently one of the colla- 
 borators of the Besseda. In spite of this Koshelev 
 did not regard him as a genuine member of his party: 
 he did not accept the orthodox view of the Church, he 
 was an opponent of undivided common property, and 
 a satirist of the idolatrous worship of nationality. 
 
 II. 
 
 The happiest and most prosperous period in the 
 eventful reign of the Emperor Alexander II. was 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 215 
 
 during the preparation and execution of the law 
 abolishing serfdom (Feb. 19 (March 2), 1861). 
 
 " Friends are certain, fair are the promises, and 
 our beginning is full of radiant hope," might be 
 applied to the period of Russian development and 
 Russian thankfulness which brought to fulfilment 
 the wishes cherished for two generations by the 
 best of the land, and which was regarded as the 
 harbinger of a time such as the great Eastern 
 monarchy had never hitherto experienced. The 
 years 1857 to 1862 may likewise be looked upon as 
 the most successful period in the career of Koshelev, 
 who had attained the age of fifty when Alexander II. 
 came to the throne. He had given his best years to 
 the work of emancipation. This had been his first 
 love, and as an old man he could look back upon it 
 with undisguised if mingled feelings of satisfaction. 
 
 It is well known that the Emperor Alexander II. 
 was devoted to his father's memory, and that he 
 emphasised this feeling by retaining, during the first 
 years of his reign, the chief representatives of the 
 old system, although they were opposed to his 
 own. The same ministers, Orlov, Panin, Dolgoru- 
 kov, &c., who had been known in the preceding reign 
 as opponents of every Liberal movement and of every 
 idea of reform, were destined to be the chief instru- 
 ments in the work of emancipation, which the new 
 monarch wished to be treated as an inheritance 
 from .his father. Every day from 1857 to i85i, and 
 
2i6 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 especially the events connected with the commence- 
 ment of the work, showed the impracticability of 
 this arrangement. The first decisive step was taken 
 November 20, 1857, by means of a rescript, in which 
 the Emperor expressed his satisfaction to Nasimov, 
 the Governor-General of the Lithuanian provinces, 
 with respect to the emancipation proposals made by 
 the representative nobles of his district. This re- 
 script had to be circulated amongst all the governors 
 and marshals of the Empire. It encountered, how- 
 ever, the determined opposition of Count Orlov, who 
 tried to keep back the Emperor from this first step 
 to revolution, and believed, after a long conversation 
 which he had with the monarch, that he could boast 
 of success. Alexander II., however, displayed on 
 this occasion a firmness and resolution which did 
 him the highest honour. No sooner had Orlov left 
 the cabinet and given the comforting assurance to 
 his friend, the elder Adlerberg, " He is shaken, and 
 the rescript will not be sent," than Lanskoi, the 
 Minister of the Interior, received orders to have the 
 important document copied and sent without delay 
 to all the provincial towns. Here it ought to be 
 noted that the Emperor (although he made Orlov 
 first president of the so-called Chief Committee') 
 displayed the same firmness during the whole time 
 that emancipation was under discussion. At the 
 critical moment he constantly took the side of the 
 ' Dealing with the emancipation of the serfs. — Ed, 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 217 
 
 friends of reform, and he succeeded in securing the 
 adoption of the Bill, which afterwards became law in 
 spite of the opposition of no less than six ministers of 
 the Empire ; but these ministers he left undisturbed 
 in their offices. ^ 
 
 With the publication of the rescript of November 20, 
 1857, the Rubicon was crossed, and the abolition 
 of serfdom took the form of a national event in 
 which all sections of society believed they were 
 bound to participate. Even at the beginning of the 
 year 1858, proposals with respect to the principles 
 to be applied to the great reform were presented to 
 the Government from the most different quarters ; 
 reflections on the experiences of other countries 
 were submitted in great numbers, and nothing else 
 was talked of but emancipation. Koshelev thought 
 that he too must produce his plan. In conjunction 
 with his friends, Juri Samarin and Prince Cherkasky, 
 he elaborated a scheme to be submitted to the 
 Emperor, which proposed the redemption of the 
 entire ground in the possession of the peasants : 
 the operation to be brought to completion within a 
 period of twelve years, and in the case of the 
 proprietors a term of three years in consideration 
 of entering into a contract of voluntary union with 
 their peasants. The maximum price to be paid 
 was to be settled by the Government, but after 
 the expiry of the term of three years compul- 
 ' See Appendix, Note 28, 
 
2iS RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 sory sale was to be effected through the inter- 
 mediary of Government officials. This proposal was 
 put before the Chief Committee for examination, and 
 afterwards before the Formulating Commission (to 
 formulate the emancipation laws). It caused a 
 certain sensation in Moscow and St. Petersburg 
 society, on account of its Radicalism, until it was 
 forced into the background by projects of a more 
 radical nature. 
 
 At the beginning of the year 1858 all the Russian 
 provincial assemblies of nobles received orders to 
 elect deputies who should discuss in local committees 
 the great project, in conjunction with men of trust 
 named by the Government. Koshelev with Samarin 
 and Cherkasky had begun to publish a brilliant 
 journal — The Country's Weal. It advocated emancipa- 
 tion with such ardour, that neither he nor his friends 
 could think of being elected. In order not to be 
 excluded from all participation in the matter, he got 
 himself nominated as Government delegate for the 
 committee of Riasan (Cherkasky and Samarin entered 
 the committee of the Tula province in a similar 
 capacity), where he immediately took up a position 
 hostile to the majority of the committee, and carried 
 on the struggle with the greatest personal bitterness. 
 At different times attempts were made to drive him 
 from his position, and once they were very nearly 
 successful. Cherkasky had expressed himself in 
 one article in the journal referred to as being in 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 219 
 
 favour of the provisional retention of corporal 
 punishment, and in this way brought upon himself 
 and his friend violent attacks from the St. Peters- 
 burg Radicals. When Ivan Aksakov took upon him- 
 self their defence, and said that it was foolish " to 
 attack two men who as it was had to sustain hard 
 battles against selfishness and ignorance," the 
 majority of the members of the committee of Riasan 
 declared that they desired the removal of Koshelev as 
 satisfaction for the insults which he had heaped upon 
 them. Koshelev eagerly accepted the challenge ; 
 he travelled to St. Petersburg, represented the case 
 to Lanskoi, Minister of the Interior, and Count 
 Rostovsov, president of the committee of supervision, 
 and the latter issued a fulminating rescript, which 
 administered a rebuke to Koshelev's opponents and 
 declared all resolutions adopted in his absence null 
 and void. The proceedings took their course, but an 
 understanding was so little to be thought of, that at 
 the end of the session three different schemes were 
 proposed. Koshelev, who remained in the minority 
 with his Liberal proposals, hastened once more to St. 
 Petersburg, where his distinguished relations helped 
 him to an exhaustive conversation with Count 
 Rostovsov, whom he so completely converted to his 
 views that he invited him along with Samarin and 
 Cherkasky to join the Formulating Commission, 
 that is, the most important central authority for the 
 time being for the decision of questions relating to 
 
220 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 the law of emancipation. He accepted thanl^fully, 
 but to his painful surprise, though both his friends 
 were invited, he himself was left out. Count Panin, 
 the ultra-Conservative, Minister of Justice, thought 
 " that two leaders of the Slavophil party were 
 enough," and struck out the name of Koshelev, 
 which was especially obnoxious to him and his 
 colleagues. 
 
 Deeply mortified, Koshelev procured a passport 
 and went abroad for several months for the benefit 
 of his health. From Carlsbad, where he underwent 
 the usual course of treatment, he went to Prague for 
 the purpose of discussing " the future of the Slavs 
 and the Panslavist idea," with Hanka, Shaffarik, 
 Shumovsky, &c. It was here he made the dis- 
 covery that, with the exception of Hanka, there 
 were in the Bohemian Prague only such Bohemians 
 who expected to have the leading part in the hands 
 of Bohemians themselves, not of the Russians. From 
 Prague Koshelev went to Vienna, where he became 
 more intimately acquainted with the most ardent 
 Russian Panslavist agitator of recent times, M. Th. 
 Rayevsky, the well-known priest to the embassy. 
 From Vienna he went to Switzerland. In Domo 
 d'Ossola he made the acquaintance of Cavour, who 
 was there on a visit. Cavour received him very 
 graciously, and on a later occasion, as they were 
 travelling to Geneva, discussed the importance of 
 the " Mir" — that is, a Russian community living in 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 221 
 
 undivided possession of common land. Cavour 
 expressed the opinion subsequently so often quoted, 
 that he saw in the " Mir " a bulwark against the 
 social dangers of the future such as no other 
 country possessed, and for which Russia ought to be 
 thankful. Koshelev assures us that the signifi- 
 cance of the Russian commune was more thoroughly 
 understood by Cavour than by any other foreigner 
 he knew, the discoverer of this first principle of the 
 development of the Russian state and society. Von 
 Haxhausen, not excepted. After residing for some 
 time in Geneva, Paris, Brussels, and Ostend, 
 Koshelev suddenly returned to his own country. 
 He was invited along with the representatives of 
 numerous other provincial committees to come to 
 St. Petersburg as a member of the local committee of 
 Riasan, in order to discuss before the Formulating 
 Commission the proposals he had brought forward 
 with regard to emancipation, and to give his opinion 
 of the resolutions arrived at by this central com- 
 mittee. At the same time he learned that the com- 
 mission had gone far beyond the proposals made 
 by him, and intended to grant to the peasant 
 communities an extraordinarily large measure of 
 independence, and to give the utmost scope to the 
 bureaucratic tendency towards Government " regula- 
 tion." Koshelev arrived in the Russian capital so 
 opportunely that he was able to take part in the 
 discussions and controversies which had just begun. 
 
222 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 We cannot enter more fully into the position 
 which Koshelev took up with regard to the Russian 
 land question. This would necessitate a most 
 minute examination of one of the most compli- 
 cated, and for Western Europe one of the most 
 difficult, laws of modern times. The reproduction 
 of the numerous writings which our author has 
 devoted to the subject would be necessary in order 
 to make his views and the various modifications 
 which they underwent in the course of time, at all 
 intelligible.' According to his conception the 
 peasants should be placed in the position of entering 
 within the shortest possible time into the full 
 possession of a portion of land sufficient for their 
 independent existence ; but at the same time the 
 interests of the nobility should be safeguarded as 
 much as possible, and all useless sacrifice avoided. 
 At the commencement at least, a proprietorial con- 
 trol should be exercised over the administration of 
 the communes, as the peasants, in his opinion, 
 were totally devoid of all inclination and capacity 
 for the independent management of their affairs. 
 The Government organs entrusted with the regula- 
 tion of the matter greatly differed from him in 
 their opinions on that point. Immediately after 
 he reached St. Petersburg, Koshelev learned that 
 the Formulating Commission of supervision had 
 
 ' Only a portion of Koshelev's work, "A Voice from the 
 Country," published in 1869, has appeared in German. 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 223 
 
 adopted resolutions, making the present contribu- 
 tions of the peasants the standard of valuation of 
 the estates to be redeemed, and discarding all 
 special taxation with respect to these. It was 
 further resolved that on determining the extent of 
 the area belonging to the peasants, no account 
 should be taken of the circumstances of individual 
 provinces, but that general maximum and minimum 
 standards should be applied, and that in future the 
 large proprietors should have no influence in the 
 administration of the present communes.^ In order 
 to anticipate the inevitable opposition of the repre- 
 sentatives of the nobles, Count Rostovsov and 
 Milyutin, the Secretary of State, drafted an instruc- 
 tion for the~ representatives of the local committees 
 about to be elected, which excluded an actual dis- 
 cussion of the schemes elaborated on the part of the 
 separate provincial committees. As a matter of form 
 these schemes had to be presented to the so-called 
 chief committee, while the invited deputies, in 
 contradistinction to the Formulating Commission, 
 had nothing to do but give advice with regard to 
 the local administration of the resolutions already 
 taken by the chief committee. Samarin and Prince 
 Cherkasky, who belonged to the committee of 
 supervision, and were essentially in accord with its 
 views, urged Koshelev to keep quiet so as to 
 expedite the despatch of the great work, and to re- 
 ' See Appendix, Note 29. 
 
224 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 frain from all opposition to the report of the com- 
 mission ; but their entreaties were in vain, for 
 Koshelev resolutely refused to adopt this course. 
 Without hesitation he entered into consultation 
 with his opponents, the Conservative deputies, 
 Count Shumalov, Ofrosimov, &c. : his chief object 
 was to try and extend the rights which had been 
 granted to the representatives of the local com- 
 mittees ; he wanted the proposals made by these 
 committees to be substantially examined within 
 the Formulating Commission; in other words, not 
 to settle the question simply by a bureaucratic de- 
 cision, but after its full discussion by representatives 
 of those directly interested in its solution.^ This 
 undertaking failed so completely that Koshelev could 
 not even succeed in getting an audience of Rostovsov, 
 the President of the commission. Rostovsov, in 
 conjunction with the influential Secretary of State, 
 N. Milyutin, who was even then known as a deter- 
 mined opponent of the nobility, and who had 
 declared Koshelev's criticisms of the report of the 
 commission as the work of a mere pamphleteer, 
 brought it about that the Emperor personally 
 approved of the mode of discussion adopted by the 
 Formulating Commission, and, as a consequence, 
 all further opposition and all more detailed dis- 
 cussion of the opposition proposals of the pro- 
 vincial representatives became morally impossible.^ 
 ' See Appendix, Note 30. ' See Appendix, Note 31. 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 225 
 
 Koshelev returned to Moscow in November, 1859, 
 deeply discouraged. Here he wrote a brochure, 
 " The Deputies and the Formulating Commission," 
 which was printed and published at Leipzig, but 
 had no effect on public opinion. 
 
 This episode in Koshelev's life at which we have 
 just glanced is extremely significant as showing his 
 political leanings, and the opposition between his 
 views and those of the other more influential leaders 
 of the Slavophil party. It was composed of men 
 who, standing aloof from the actual life of the people, 
 were great enthusiasts for a peasantry which had 
 remained unaffected by the evils of European civili- 
 sation. As the only practical man in the party, he 
 predicted with true instinct that the hopes based 
 upon the independent administrative talent and 
 economic qualities of the Russian peasant would 
 turn out a fiasco, and that the injury done to landed 
 proprietors by the false friends of the peasants 
 would be accompanied by dangerous consequences 
 to the whole Empire. It is a moot point whether 
 these consequences could have been generally 
 avoided under the given circumstances, and whether 
 Koshelev's special proposals would have been 
 capable of arresting them. His prediction that 
 the peasants would fail to manage their own affairs 
 successfully, and that their economic condition 
 would become worse, was unfortunately more than 
 justified by subsequent events, and turned out to be 
 
 16 
 
226 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 even more correct than he himself could have ex- 
 pected. Proofs of this are to be found in such 
 abundance in Koshelev's own later writings (espe- 
 cially in the brochure, " A Voice from the Land "), 
 and in all more recent Russian literature, that 
 nothing further need be said on the subject.': 'j^jjg 
 emphasis with which he insisted on a participation 
 "of the representatives of the nobility in forming 
 resolutions with regard to the law of emancipation, 
 and the legislative measures connected with it, 
 forms a second and no less prominent trait in his 
 character. Unlike the majority of his party, 
 Koshelev, in spite of all his earnestness for Liberal 
 views, and his repugnance to antiquated gentry and 
 nobility, had a preference for class organisations 
 combined with aversion to the absolute power of the 
 bureaucracy — a type of opinions which was peculiar 
 to the strictest Russian Conservatives. Conse- 
 quently he occupied a position midway between the 
 two parties, which may be regarded as the chief 
 reason of his failure to obtain an important place 
 in the Government in spite of the unquestionable 
 personal esteem in which he was held, his popularity 
 with the leaders of the national movement, and his 
 substantial agreement with their aims. 
 
 Koshelev's love of work and readiness to fill any 
 honourable office were left unrewarded on account of 
 his experience in 1859. Hardly a year after the 
 ' See Appendix, Note 32. 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 227 
 
 defeat, which he suffered during his former resi- 
 dence in St. Petersburg/ he again returned to the 
 capital in obedience to a summons from the Minister 
 of Finance, inviting him to take part in the dis- 
 cussion with respect to a reform of the tax on 
 brandy. Koshelev, who had farmed the Govern- 
 ment monopoly on brandy in the Government of 
 Riasan for many years, and who knew the demorali- 
 sing effect of this system better than any one, had 
 presented a memorial ten years before to the minis- 
 ter Vroutshenko, in which he pointed out that the 
 farming of the monopoly was financially disadvan- 
 tageous and politically destructive, since it degraded 
 the police and administrative officials to mere assis- 
 tants and pensioners of the farmers, and made them 
 interested parties in the spread of debauchery. At 
 last he had the satisfaction of seeing his idea accom- 
 plished, and in accordance with his proposals, a duty 
 on the manufacture introduced, the amount of in- 
 come derived from which exceeded all expectations. 
 Within the commission the ardent nationalist and 
 theoretical opponent of the Germans became inti- 
 mately associated with the representative of the 
 Baltic distillers, Heinrich von Hagemeister, but in 
 the case of another German who belonged to the 
 commission, and who was afterwards minister of 
 finance. Von Reuter, he speaks in the most scornful 
 and angry terms, and regards it as a grievous error 
 ' See Appendix, Note 33. 
 
228 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 to have reposed any confidence in him. This is the 
 more remarkable as coming from a critic who is 
 otherwise lenient in his judgments. The labours of 
 the commission continued about six months, and 
 brought Koshelev his first distinction from the 
 State — the Vladimir order of the third class. His 
 acceptance of the order caused a certain sensation, 
 for a little before, his colleague, the stubborn and re- 
 fractory Juri Samarin, refused the same order with 
 the declaration that he could not accept a Govern- 
 ment reward for a service rendered to the general 
 community (the participation in the committee of 
 supervision, which elaborated the law of emancipa- 
 tion). 
 
 The proclamation of the celebrated ukase with 
 respect to the abolition of serfdom, February 19 
 (March 2), 1861, coincided with the time of the labours 
 of the commission relating to the reform of the tax 
 on brandy. Koshelev, whose Liberalism was always 
 apparent, left St. Petersburg with the painful pre- 
 sentiment of a recoil, which would follow this great 
 " step forwards." His dread that the adherents of 
 the old order in alliance with the Court party would 
 predominate was, however, not fulfilled ; on the con- 
 trary, the activity for reform displayed by the 
 Government continued unbroken for two years, 
 and was not even checked by the incendiarism of 
 1862, and the ever more frequent excesses of the 
 St. Petersburg Radical press. Meanwhile in the 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 229 
 
 country the authorities were occupied exclusively 
 with the administration of the la,w of emancipation 
 and settlements between owners and former serfs. 
 Koshelev was not successful in persuading his 
 peasants to buy up their portions of land at once, 
 for the most nonsensical reports were circulated with 
 regard to a "new liberation by the Tsar" — a gra- 
 tuitous partition of all the land in the immediate 
 future. "^ It was at last possible to induce the ill- 
 advised serfs at least to come to terms with respect 
 to the change from forced to free labour. Koshelev 
 bears exceedingly favourable testimony to the " medi- 
 ators of peace," new officials, who were first chosen 
 to superintend the change from the old to the new 
 condition of things, and to examine and ratify all 
 newly-made compacts, but he sorrowfully adds that 
 the promising beginning lasted only a little while, 
 and that the second generation of the " mediators 
 of peace " were indolent and useless. The rich 
 owner of Pessochna, who had had a long ex- 
 perience, did not escape the inevitable fate of others 
 when the change took place from bondage to free 
 labour with hired servants : the apprentice fee had 
 to be paid, and losses incurred through waste, and 
 the damage done to machines, horses, and cattle ; 
 but Koshelev appears to have emerged from this 
 crisis more quickly and easily than the majority of 
 his compeers. Embarrassments were so general 
 ' See Appendix, Note 34. 
 
230 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 that an absence of gaiety and sociability in Moscow 
 marked the winter of 1862-3. Koshelev was at 
 that time elected president of the Moscow Agri- 
 cultural Society : in this capacity he had to maintain 
 a violent conflict with the Government, which he 
 took up with his usual ardour, and at last carried 
 through victoriously. He settled some months in 
 Dresden, and wrote a brochure (translated into 
 German by Haxthausen), in which he proposed 
 " no constitution," but the summoning of a "general 
 land-assembly " with only consultative power {Zem- 
 skaya Douma). Koshelev often returned subsequently 
 to the same thought (entertained as far back as 1853) 
 in order to repeat with greater emphasis that he was 
 on principle an upholder of the unlimited power of 
 the Tsar, but at the same time regarded a deliberative 
 assembly " as was usual at a former time " (the 
 seventeenth century is meant) as indispensable for 
 the removal of the deeply rooted evils of the Russian 
 State and administrative mechanism. 
 
 It can be easily understood that this last clause 
 could not be omitted by a disciple of Khomyakov, 
 and an adherent of the Slavophil doctrine. It 
 appears all the more astonishing that a man of 
 Koshelev's sobriety of judgment, experience, and 
 lucidity of view should have remained all his life 
 under the delusion (confessedly shared by many 
 intelligent and well-meaning Russians) that a mere 
 deliberative assembly of popular representatives was 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 231 
 
 possible as a permanent institution, and recon- 
 cilable with absolute monarchy. It is apparent to 
 the unprejudiced that all popular representation 
 must have the natural tendency of gaining security 
 for the carrying out of its " decrees " by the acqui- 
 sition of definite political and financial powers, and 
 that the summoning of a consultative body would 
 accordingly be nothing more than the first step to 
 constitutionalism. Another of Koshelev's cherished 
 propositions appears entirely unjustified : his con- 
 tention was that the specific peculiarities of the 
 character of the Russian common people offered a 
 satisfactory guarantee against any encroachments 
 on the part of a deliberative assembly into the legis- 
 lative and administrative domain, and that un- 
 limited monarchy had nothing to fear from this side. 
 The experience of the provincial assemblies estab- 
 lished since 1864 has taught directly the contrary ; 
 they present a series of constantly recurring conflicts 
 between the administration and the provinces, and 
 numerous attempts to a forcible extension of the 
 powers entrusted to the latter. Koshelev's insistence 
 on this demand, which in spite of its palpable incom- 
 pleteness and obscurity became rather popular, is to 
 be attributed partly to the influence of those same 
 Slavophil notions, which made him the champion of 
 the undivided commune, partly to the discord which 
 now exists between the different classes of Russian 
 society. " The education of the nobility is substan- 
 
232 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 tially Western and modern Liberal, while the bulk of 
 the Russian people hold fast to the national ideas of 
 the divine unlimited sovereignty of the Tsar. The 
 classes in whose name Koshelev speaks were too 
 clear-sighted to overlook the importance of this last 
 factor. They believed, and believe, that a recon- 
 ciliation between the two really mutually exclusive 
 principles was to be found in a " deliberative as- 
 sembly." This " reconciliation " is nothing more 
 than self-deception. It ignores the fact, with 
 almost incredible short-sightedness, that the Rus- 
 sian Empire, which had entered into the possession 
 of Poland, Lithuania, the Caucasus, Finland, and 
 the Baltic Provinces, cannot possibly be identified 
 with the Moscow Russia of Michael and Alexis 
 Romanov, and that the brother of Peter the Great, 
 the Tsar Feodor Alexeyeevich, had reasons for no 
 longer summoning the territorial assembly. 
 
 In September, 1862, Koshelev returned to Mos- 
 cow, where he regularly spent the winter, from one 
 of those journeys which took him almost every year 
 to Germany. Six months later the Polish-Lithu- 
 anian insurrection, which was equally dangerous to 
 both Poles and Russians, broke out, and in February, 
 1864, before it was completely quelled, Koshelev 
 received, through Prince Cherkasky, a summons 
 to go to Warsaw' and undertake the chief direction 
 of the financial department. He was a Polish 
 minister in all but the name. Cherkasky was 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 233 
 
 entrusted with the direction of the Interior. The 
 conversion of Poland into a Russian province was 
 definitely decided upon ; the Government was in 
 reality to be carried on by Russians, and there was 
 to be an entirely new organisation of the agrarian 
 relations favourable to the emancipated peasantry at 
 the expense of the rebellious nobility. The Secre- 
 tary of State, Milyutin, who, since the time of the 
 emancipation law, had been well known for his 
 extreme Radical views, was entrusted with the 
 carrying out of these affairs, and a commission 
 to which Koshelev's friend and opponent, Cher- 
 kasky, and Juri Samarin belonged, was found to 
 look after the scheme. The executive was to be in 
 the hands of the Warsaw Organisation Committee, 
 consisting of Count Berg, the Viceroy {Nanihtnik) 
 of Poland, and a small number of high Russian 
 officials, including the director of the financial ad- 
 ministration. 
 
 As the invitation proceeded from Milyutin, Koshe- 
 lev was extremely doubtful as to how he should 
 receive the offer, which was entirely unexpected. 
 He writes as follows on the subject : " I read the 
 draft of organisation ; I perceived that the property 
 of the Polish nobility was to be sacrificed for the 
 sake of an improved position of the peasantry. I 
 thought, however, in looking back to former oppres- 
 sions, and the rebellion for which this nobility were 
 responsible, that I could see no violation of justice 
 
234 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 in this sacrifice. Besides, I was obliged to recog- 
 nise tliat it was absolutely necessary, in considera- 
 tion of a complete subjection of the country under 
 the Russian dominion, to gain over the affection of 
 the Polish peasantry, and to limit the power and 
 influence of the nobility. Accordingly the scheme 
 of organisation appeared to me acceptable ; but, as 
 I knew Milyutin and Prince Cherkasky very inti- 
 mately, I could not rid myself of the fear that in the 
 hands of these men the law in question would not 
 be so much the final measure for the suppression of 
 the Polish revolt, as the starting-point for more 
 sweeping measures aimed directly at the repression 
 and ruin of the Polish nobility. I was an opponent 
 of this nobility on principle, but, under the circum- 
 stances, I regarded them as incapable of being 
 replaced, and as in need of a certain amount of con- 
 sideration. Besides, oppression and acts of despo- 
 tism were foreign to my whole nature. I could not 
 doubt for a moment that the men who had called 
 my positive objections to the draft scheme of the 
 law of emancipation a 'pamphlet,' would resort to 
 violence and oppression. For these reasons I refused 
 Milyutin's offer." 
 
 This reluctance to take ofBce was in vain. Mil- 
 yutin sent Koshelev an official note asking him to 
 undertake the financial administration of Poland, 
 and to enter the Warsaw Organisation Committee. 
 He invited him to St. Petersburg, and so arranged 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 235 
 
 matters that the Emperor commanded the " Court 
 Councillor," A. Koshelev, to a private audience. 
 Koshelev was received by his monarch in the 
 Summer Palace at Tsarkoye Selo early in May, 
 1864; it was in the Emperor's study that the 
 meeting took place. 
 
 " I know," said his Majesty, " it is hard for you to 
 leave the private life to which you have been accus- 
 tomed, but I beg you to make this sacrifice for your 
 country, and to accept office as a member of the 
 Organisation Committee and director of finance in 
 the kingdom of Poland. I am convinced you will 
 not decline that from me.'' 
 
 " These words " (so we read in the " Memoirs ") 
 " decided me to go to Warsaw. I expressed my 
 entire readiness to fulfil his Majesty's will, and only 
 asked that I should be given a few months to make 
 investigations before entering upon the duties of 
 finance director. The Emperor consented to this, 
 and allowed me four weeks' delay to arrange my 
 private affairs.. He shook me heartily by the hand 
 at the termination of the very friendly audience." 
 
 Four weeks later, June 11, 1864, Koshelev 
 reached Warsaw in company with a younger official, 
 who joined him at Moscow. At first he was 
 received in a very unfriendly spirit. Count Berg, 
 the Viceroy of Poland, being a German and a Con- 
 servative, was a determined opponent of Milyutin's 
 Radical politics. He had convinced himself that 
 
236 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXAhWER III. 
 
 the new Minister of Finance was a tool in the hands 
 of Milyutin, whose political power was constantly 
 increasing. Accordingly, when Koshelev presented 
 himself Berg kept him waiting half an hour, then 
 received him standing, and neither shook hands with 
 him nor offered him a chair. This first painful 
 impression was, however, soon obliterated, as Berg 
 apologised at their next meeting, and showed him- 
 self anxious to establish friendly relations. Berg 
 was at that time seventy-four, but, in spite of his 
 high position, had never become popular in Russia. 
 Koshelev speaks of him as follows : — 
 
 "Count Berg was very judicious, extraordinarily 
 active, moderately enlightened, courteous, and very 
 ingratiating in his manners. . . „ His power of work 
 was unrivalled ; he slept very little, showed himself 
 always eager for work, and even when roused in the 
 middle of the night rose fresh and active, without 
 ever betraying a trace of weariness or fatigue. The 
 sittings of the Oi-ganisation Committee began at 
 nine o'clock in the evening, and frequently lasted till 
 late in the night. On one occasion the debate on a 
 motion brought forward by Prince Cherkasky was 
 kept up till three o'clock in the morning. My motion 
 was to follow, but I assumed that the sitting would 
 be adjourned on account of the advanced hour. 
 Berg, however, without further ado, called upon me 
 to speak, and the matter was settled. It was the 
 greatest pleasure to work with him ; his quickness 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 237 
 
 of apprehension was extraordinary; he always 
 divined what was in the mind of another, and was 
 ready at any time to give a decision." . . . 
 
 The Committee of Organisation for the reform of 
 the administration and the agrarian affairs of Poland, 
 over which Berg, the viceroy, presided, consisted 
 at first of four, and later of five members, besides 
 the president, Koshelev, and Prince Cherkasky. 
 Side by side with this committee there existed an 
 administrative council, which directed the current 
 administration, and to which five other higher 
 officials in addition to those already named were 
 attached. Amongst their number were three Poles 
 and one German, Witte, the director of education. 
 The administration of finance was conducted tempo- 
 rarily by Baynevski, a Pole — that is, until Koshelev 
 finally took it in his own hands. Koshelev per- 
 ceived at the first glance that two hostile parties 
 stood opposed to each other in both committees. 
 Count Berg and the majority formed the moderate 
 party, and were influenced not so much by political 
 as practical administrative considerations ; on the 
 other hand, superior talent and greater influence 
 were on the side of Cherkasky and Solovyev. 
 They were supported by Milyutin from St. Peters- 
 burg. With the help of this ally they often carried 
 out plans which remained in a minority in the com- 
 mittee ; they frequently tyrannised over the majority, 
 and " distinguished themselves by audacity and pre- 
 
238 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 conceived designs." Koshelev at first reserved his 
 opinions, then he took up an intermediate position, 
 but at last he felt himself compelled to throw in his 
 lot with the majority, and make common cause with 
 Berg, in spite of all his antipathies to the " bureau- 
 crats" and "Germans." He offered the most deter- 
 mined opposition to Cherkasky on all the more 
 important questions, although he was his "friend" 
 and a fellow-member of the Slavophil party. The 
 opposite camps tried to remain personally in friendly 
 relations ; professionally they carried on an almost 
 uninterrupted war. The imperious Cherkasky at- 
 tempted not only to exercise supreme control in 
 questions of organisation, but even on occasions to 
 encroach upon the province of the finance director, 
 and so prepare difficulties for him with the aid of his 
 allies in St. Petersburg. His policy was syste- 
 matically directed — as Koshelev repeatedly shows 
 — to the material ruin of the Polish nobihty, to the 
 sowing of dissension between them and the pea- 
 santry, to the uprooting of all the traditional insti- 
 tutions, and to the complete exclusion of the Polish 
 element from the bureaucracy and the administra- 
 tion. Koshelev was diametrically opposed to all 
 this, and was of opinion that the Government, if they 
 rightly understood their own interests, ought never 
 unnecessarily to persecute the already hard-hit 
 Polish nobility and thus take up an unjustifiable 
 position. The existing institutions ought to be 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 239 
 
 altered only as far as was necessary for the unity of 
 administration. The majority of Russian institu- 
 tions were so imperfect, and so much in want of 
 reform, that Koshelev regarded their extension to 
 Poland as most impolitic. He was still more 
 decidedly opposed to Cherkasky's scheme for the 
 complete exclusion of the Polish element from the 
 bureaucracy. Russia suffered from a want of 
 upright, reliable, and properly equipped State 
 officials ; it would therefore, he contended, be just as 
 senseless to drain the mother country of her best 
 sons as to surrender the future of Poland at random 
 to inexperienced immigrants from Russia, totally 
 unacquainted with the local condition of the country. 
 There was no lack of useful and competent Polish 
 of&cials ; it was only a question of finding them out 
 and enlisting them in the service of the State. " A 
 country that possesses a relatively high, even 
 although unsound, civilisation " (so he writes), 
 " and can look back upon a historical development 
 of a thousand years, cannot as a rule be remodelled 
 suddenly and all at once." 
 
 The limits of these pages prevent a complete 
 enumeration of the controversies which took place 
 between the two parties of the Warsaw Committee 
 of Organisation. The first vigorous encounter oc- 
 curred when Koshelev presented the list of those 
 persons, whom he wished to admit to the com- 
 mission over which he presided for the remodelling 
 
240 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 of the system of taxation in Poland. A still more 
 vigorous conflict arose over the discussion of a bill 
 relating to the regulation of the compulsory service 
 of the peasantry and the commutation of their right 
 of commonage and pasturage in the seignorial 
 forests. It was recognised, on the one hand, that 
 an eminently important question was presented for 
 discussion, and that the destruction of forests caused 
 by the peasants threatened a serious injury, not only 
 to the nobility, but to the entire country; and, on 
 the other, that the proposals brought forward v^ere 
 reasonable and just. For the rest, however, dia- 
 metrically opposite opinions were held. Cherkasky 
 said openly that he could give his assent to no 
 commutation and regulation of such compulsory 
 service, however reasonable, " because Russian in- 
 terests of State demanded the continuance of hostile 
 relations between the nobility and the peasantry 
 of Poland." And he was able, with the help of 
 Milyutin, to prevent the ratification at St. Petersburg 
 of the bill, which had been accepted by the great 
 majority of the committee. 
 
 These constantly recurring differences compelled 
 Koshelev to go to St. Petersburg, where he requested 
 an audience of the Emperor, and explained to him 
 the discord between his opinions and those of 
 Milyutin and Cherkasky. Without mentioning 
 names, he emphasised the unanimity with which 
 all desired the amalgamation of Poland with the 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 241 
 
 Russian Empire ; and he pointed out that the 
 means employed to that end, the suppression of the 
 Polish nobility, the violation of existing rights of 
 property, and the appointment of Russians of 
 doubtful fitness to all important posts, seemed to 
 him very questionable. In his opinion Poland could 
 only be won by a furtherance of her real interests 
 and of her material prosperity, and the attempt 
 should be made to bring over to Russia the 
 numerous reconcilable and intelligent elements of 
 that country. If his Majesty did not approve of 
 these views, then he (Koshelev) must send in his 
 resignation. " The Emperor listened to my remarks, 
 which went into numerous details, attentively and 
 sympathetically. When I finished he embraced me, 
 with the words: 'No; you carry out my wishes. 
 I approve of your course of action, and request you 
 to continue as heretofore.' " (Beginning of September, 
 1865.) 
 
 Koshelev returned joyfully to Warsaw. Shortly 
 before, in spite of his humble rank, he had received 
 the star and ribbon of the order of Stanislaus, of the 
 first class. He was soon to discover that everything 
 remained upon the old footing, and that the proposals 
 to which he attached the greatest importance were 
 met, now as formerly, with contradiction and ob- 
 struction at the centre of action. But little later 
 his carefully-worked-out plan for the remodelling of 
 the Polish system of taxation was similarly treated, 
 
 17 
 
242 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 and made no progress. His patience was now ex- 
 hausted, and he sent in his resignation. The answer 
 was his nomination as Actual Councillor of State 
 (passing over two intermediate grades), and a letter 
 from Count Adlerberg to the Viceroy in the name 
 of his Majesty, which reiterated the wish that 
 Koshelev might remain in the office he had directed 
 with so much success. In obedience to the imperial 
 suggestion, Koshelev restrained his wishes in the 
 hope of better days. But, instead of improving, 
 the position became constantly worse. The Budget 
 proposals for the financial year 1866, which he had 
 handed in in November, 1865, were returned to him 
 only in March of the following year, in a condition 
 from which he saw clearly "that the changes deter- 
 mined upon were made in complete ignorance of 
 the subject, and solely with the intention of irrita- 
 ting me and the Viceroy." Four weeks later, 
 Milyutin, who had long been the actual leader 
 of Polish politics, was nominated in the place of 
 Platonov, Secretary of State for the kingdom of 
 Poland. Koshelev now definitely determined, after 
 the completion of two of his most important labours 
 (the project with regard to the reform of taxation, 
 and the introduction of a duty upon brandy) to 
 give up the hopeless struggle, and to resign on 
 the ground of ill-health. To the surprise of Berg, 
 he carried out his intention to return to private 
 life three months later; the attempt on the life 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 243 
 
 of the Tsar by Karakosov, and the fear that 
 it should produce a departure from the policy 
 of reform which had been hitherto followed, had 
 strengthened him in the wish to leave the service of 
 the State. On the xath of July, 1866, twenty-five 
 months after he had entered the Warsaw Committee 
 of Organisation, he finally left Warsaw. In his 
 "Memoirs" Koshelev is firmly of opinion that the 
 Russification of Poland is an unavoidable necessity. 
 He thought that he had successfully paved the way 
 for the attainment of this object, and had done 
 real service to the Russian interest in Poland. He 
 had succeeded — in his opinion without compulsion 
 or oppression — in introducing in his province the 
 use of Russian language. He had induced the 
 public institutions in relationship with the financial 
 administration (among others the Polish Realeastate 
 Banking Company) and numerous private institu- 
 tions to present Russian documents. He had 
 established friendly relations with a large part of 
 the society of Warsaw, both male and female. " I 
 have left in Warsaw" (he writes to a friend) "a 
 pleasant recollection of myself, and have done better 
 service to my fatherland than those who have done 
 otherwise." A passing reference must here be made 
 to M. Leroy Beaulieu's representation of the Polish 
 "system" of Milyutin in his panegyric, Un homme 
 d'etat msse. The author of " U empire des Tsars et 
 les Russes," a laborious and deserving, but much 
 
244 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 overrated work, has here drawn an optimistic pic- 
 ture, which, in spite of its wealth of material, is 
 thoroughly misleading. It is contradicted in all 
 essential points by Koshelev's account of the work 
 of the Warsaw commission, and of his relations to 
 Milyutin and Cherkasky. Those familiar with the 
 subject will understand from the above remarks that 
 the learned Frenchman is upon the wrong track in 
 his whole conception of the Russian agrarian ques- 
 tion, and that he has been led into errors from 
 which other and less accurately informed French- 
 men—for example, M. Leonce de Lavergne (who 
 knew neither Russian nor Polish) — have, with an 
 inborn instinct for the truth, contrived to keep free. 
 Any one who studies the above-mentioned books of 
 Leroy Beaulieu, comparing them with our " Memoirs," 
 will recognise in them a scarcely credible depend- 
 ence upon the more than partial representations of 
 Samarin and Cherkasky, and will be confirmed 
 in the frequently repeated experience, that he only 
 is entitled to utter an opinion upon Russian affairs 
 who can read between the lines of the Russian 
 authorities and official accounts. This art, in which 
 Koshelev was a master, has not been learned by 
 M. Leroy Beaulieu, in spite of his researches into 
 Russian legislation, for the reason that it can be 
 learned by non-Russians only when they have 
 grasped the fact that the preconceived opinions of 
 Western Europe are once for all not applicable to 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 245 
 
 the Russian situation. Of the circumstance that on 
 the other side of the Weichsel quite other concep- 
 tions from those of the Germano-romance world are 
 bound up with the same words and names, M. Leroy 
 Beaulieu has either heard, or has wished to hear, 
 nothing whatever. ^ 
 
 After a stay of several months in foreign countries 
 Koshelev took up his residence for the latter part 
 of the autumn of the year 1866 in Riasan, for the 
 winter in Moscow, where he was especially intimate 
 with Pogodin. The chief object of his activity and 
 interest was henceforth the electoral provincial in- 
 stitutions (zemstvo) introduced in the year 1864, upon 
 which he built great hopes, because he regarded 
 them as forerunners of the convocation of the 
 central representative body {Zemskaya Douma), for 
 which he had longed for ten years. He took on 
 every occasion a lively Interest in the proceedings 
 of the assembly of the province of Riasan, and of the 
 provincial board {Zemskaya Ouprdva) chosen by it, 
 but he was constantly forced to recognise that the 
 efficiency of these bodies was very limited, the Govern- 
 ment and the officials seeking as far as possible to 
 curtail their power and narrow their sphere of action. 
 He found that the greater number of the resolutions 
 they made existed only upon paper, and there 
 appeared to be not even a distant intention that the 
 country should participate more actively in the ad- 
 ' See Appendix, Note 35. 
 
246 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 ministration and legislation of the State. Accustomed 
 to persevere in the way upon which he had once 
 set out, he did not lose his courage ; he attempted 
 to set at defiance the difficulties which the growing 
 influence of the conservative body of officials, opposed 
 as it was to every act of independence of the smaller 
 circles, year by year heaped up. A large number of 
 pamphlets, published in Berlin, and regularly for- 
 bidden by the censor, quickly followed each other. 
 In these the unwearied Koshelev returned again 
 and again to his most cherished ideas, and sought 
 to prove the impossibility of any further healthy 
 development in the purely bureaucratic path. 
 Events appeared to prove that he was right. The 
 prosperity of the peasantry, the achievements of 
 the administrative authorities, and the development 
 of national education were obviously on the de- 
 cline ; the public humour became more sombre, and 
 the increase of nihilist and revolutionary activity 
 weighed upon all the friends of law and progress. 
 He felt, with the more regret, that this state of 
 matters changed nothing in the decisions of the 
 Government, which was driven into an ever more 
 decided opposition to the parties of reform and of 
 the people. Besides this condition of public affairs, 
 Koshelev had also to undergo various painful per- 
 sonal experiences, which we pass over. We only 
 mention that he decided upon the publication of a 
 monthly political review. After two numbers had 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 247 
 
 been burnt by order of the administration of tlie 
 press, he was compelled to abandon the continuation 
 of his enterprise. 
 
 The "Memoirs" do not linger over these events, 
 of which they give a very summary account. But 
 they had made upon Koshelev a deeper impression 
 than he was willing to confess. That part of the 
 "Memoirs" which refers to the history of his last 
 years betrays a bitterness against all contemporary 
 developments, which finally increases to an almost 
 hopeless pessimism. He, who had formerly been so 
 indefatigable, now limited his part in public affairs 
 almost exclusively to attendance upon the provincial 
 assemblies, which less and less realised his ideals, 
 and became more and more divided and unin- 
 fluential. He therefore published in Berlin, almost 
 every year, pamphlets which discussed from the 
 most different sides the necessity of convoking a 
 general assembly of the people. Because this wish 
 remained unfulfilled, Koshelev became opposed to 
 every influential personage in his country, and 
 launched forth into attacks upon their entire line of 
 policy. Valuev was for him a German in disguise, 
 Katkov a coarse fanatic and blind advocate of 
 reaction, Count Tolstoi ^ a danger to the community, 
 an enemy of all education and of all progress. The 
 war of 1877 he judged essentially from the stand- 
 
 ' Demetrius Tolstoi, the Minister of Education, and after- 
 wards of Internal Afifairs.— Ed. 
 
248 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 point of the Slavophil party, which in other things 
 incurred his censure ; and he gave his unconditional 
 assent to the condemnation pronounced by Aksakov 
 upon the results of the Congress of Berlin in 1878. 
 
 What he says of the events which followed, the 
 era of attempted assassination and of exceptional 
 enactments, shows an almost complete hopelessness. 
 The author regards the fanaticism of the nihilist 
 revolutionary party as the natural consequence of 
 departure from the principles of the early reforming 
 period of the previous Government. A ray of light 
 appears to him to break during the last months of 
 the rule of the Emperor Alexander II. In his 
 foreign travels Koshelev had frequently met Count 
 Loris Melikov, who had won his confidence, and 
 shown himself a truly liberal-minded statesman. 
 The Count had positively assured him that the 
 Emperor waited only for the time when men's minds 
 should be more calm and the peace of the Empire 
 more stable, to return to the projects of earlier 
 years and to commence the longed-for foundation 
 of a central " assembly of the provincial councils " 
 by the convocation of deputies of the provincial elec- 
 tive bodies. Koshelev knew that the decision on 
 this point, prepared for a considerable time before- 
 hand, would take place in March, 1881, and looked 
 forward with eager impatience to that moment when 
 his dearest wish should be realised. All the more 
 violent was his indignation at the outrage which 
 
ALEXANDER KOSHELEV'S MEMOIRS. 249 
 
 ended the earthly career of the " Tsar- Liberator " at 
 the very moment when he was prepared to crown 
 the great work of reform, and the more grief-stricken 
 his lament, that with the dismissal of Loris Meli- 
 kov, Abaza, and Count Milyutin,^ all hope of further 
 development in a Liberal sense appeared to be 
 annihilated. 
 
 The nomination of the former Minister of Edu- 
 cation, Count Tolstoi, as Minister of the Interior 
 (May, 1882), affected him more painfully than any- 
 thing else. To this he always returns with uncon- 
 cealed bitterness. As Koshelev's death (November, 
 1882) was sudden — his varying health appeared to 
 have improved after a course of treatment in the 
 summer of his last year — the "Memoirs" cease in 
 the middle of a bitter reflection upon the falling 
 away of modern youth from all political and humane 
 idealism. The result of this harmoniously consti- 
 tuted life, filled by unwearying activity, by ceaseless 
 desire of work, appears to be a profound discord. 
 The account of it will rank among the most im- 
 portant productions of the memoirs bearing upon 
 recent Russian history, and will retain among them 
 an enduring place. 
 
 ■ Minister of War, and brother to State-Secretary Nicholas 
 Milyutin, so frequently mentioned in this chapter.— Ed. 
 
XV. 
 
 KRAYEEVSKY AND BYELINSKY. 
 
 In the frivolous Berlin of the time of Frederick 
 William II. a privy counsellor is said to have 
 existed who often played cards with three ladies, 
 each of whom had once upon a time been his wife. 
 I was reminded of this strange individual when I 
 made the acquaintance, about the middle of the 
 'sixties, of the now dead journalist, Krayeevsky, in the 
 person of a stout and lively little gentleman. It was 
 known of him that he had once edited each of the 
 great St. Petersburg papers of his time (the Russian 
 Invalid, the St. Petersbourg Gazette, the Golos ("The 
 Voice "), the Zapiski, and the Sovremennik), and that 
 he had been very fortunate with each of them.' 
 
 It is not very long ago since this remarkable roan 
 ended a life of nearly eighty years. He had so close 
 a connection with the history of recent Russian lite- 
 rature, that a few remarks upon the deceased master 
 of the Russian press may not be inappropriate in 
 this place. 
 
 " See Appendix, Note 36. 
 
KRA YEE VSKY AND B YELINSKY. 25 1 
 
 Krayeevsky was born in the year 18 10. While he 
 was still little more than a boy he obtained a position 
 in the Government offices at Moscow, and acquired a 
 taste for literature from occasional employment upon 
 the review Moshovshi Vestnik. About the begin- 
 ning of the 'thirties he migrated to St. Petersburg, 
 where he was put at the disposal of the Minister of 
 Education, and employed alternately as tutor of the 
 corps of pages and editor of the Journal of the 
 Ministry of Education. He was versatile and, 
 according to the standard of his time, highly accom- 
 plished. He had written, at the order of the Minister 
 Uvarov, a dissertation upon the philosophy of a 
 certain Abb6 Bottin. These circumstances brought 
 him into closer relations with the literary world of 
 St. Petersburg, which was at that time divided into 
 two hostile camps. On the one side, grouped round 
 Pushkin and his fashionable friends, stood the elite 
 of the literary circle, belonging, as nearly all the 
 more prominent talent of the time, to the so-called 
 romantic school (in opposition to the pseudo-classic) ; 
 on the other, the party of literary hirelings and of 
 vulgar taste, supported by Gretsch and Bulgarin, the 
 editors of the Northern Bee and panegyrists of the 
 existing system. Krayeevsky leagued himself at first 
 with the latter party. He organised literary matinees, 
 in which poets and beaux esprits of the second rank 
 took part, and he published in the Son of the Father- 
 land — a journal of little repute, connected with the 
 
2 52 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 Northern Bee — an article, which he had brought from 
 Moscow, upon the Tsar Boris Godunov. His keen 
 sense for what was the most advantageous for the 
 moment then caused a sudden desertion to the oppo- 
 site camp. There he became the friend of Pletnev (the 
 confidant of Pushkin) and of Prince Odoyeevsky, and 
 went so far in his veneration of the latter as to imi- 
 tate the arrangement of his rooms and his working 
 suit. He further attracted the attention of both 
 parties by publishing an essay entitled " Thoughts 
 upon Russia," in which he adopted the tone, new to 
 St. Petersburg, of the Moscow Slavophil, and treated 
 Russia as a world entirely different from the rest of 
 Europe — as a " sixth division of the world." 
 
 This article, according to the testimony of 
 Panaev, excited some attention, and for a few days 
 the " sixth division of the world" was talked of both 
 in and beyond the literary circle of St. Petersburg. 
 Although he wrote no more than this trial essay, 
 Krayeevsky had become so well known by it, that the 
 Literary Supplement to the Russian Invalid, hitherto 
 edited by Voinikov, soon fell into his hands. The 
 Invalid was, and still is, the property and organ of 
 the Ministry of War. The Literary Supplement, un- 
 fortunately not very consistent with the character of 
 the paper, had been called into being because at that 
 time the necessary permission from the authorities 
 to publish new journals was extremely difficult to 
 obtain. Once in possession of the Supplement, Kra- 
 
KRAYEEVSKY AND BYELINSKY. 253 
 
 yeevsky managed it with so much skill, that after the 
 death (in 1837) of Pushkin, who had founded the 
 Sovremmnik, he was appointed joint-editor of that 
 periodical. That his name could appear beside those 
 of the celebrated and aristocratic friends of the great 
 poet, so lately dead, meant for the young writer a 
 success, the more marked that the actual conduct of 
 the magazine shortly passed into his hands. Two 
 of his colleagues. Prince Vyasemsky and the poet 
 (and privy counsellor) Shukovsky, were distinguished 
 men, whose appointment was merely honorary ; 
 Pletnev, the third (subsequently Rector of the Uni- 
 versity of St. Petersburg and Professor of the History 
 of Literature), understood in his capacity of bel-esprit 
 and poet practically nothing of the commercial side 
 of journalism. Therein lay Krayeevsky's strength. 
 The young editor produced little, and had still less 
 desire to write, but he was always looked upon as 
 an author, and was able in this way to associate 
 as a colleague with his fellow-workers, to reckon 
 with their weakness and their strength, to follow 
 the taste of the public and to keep in touch with 
 it. He quickly became acquainted with the manual 
 and the pecuniary sides of his undertaking, and with 
 his economy and regard to his own advantage soon 
 saw that the surrender of Pushkin's organ to the 
 aristocracy hindered its wider circulation. His repu- 
 tation was assured him by the Sovremennik, and he 
 had numerous connections. These advantages en- 
 
254 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 abled him, after a few years (1839), to farm from 
 Svinin, the bookseller, for the sum of five thousand 
 roubles (banco) per annum, his monthly review, the 
 Otechestvenniya Zapiski. After the death of Svinin 
 the periodical became his exclusive property. He 
 was thus raised to the first rank among the littera- 
 teurs of St. Petersburg, a position which he occupied 
 for almost fifty years. 
 
 As, under the Emperor Nicholas, all discussion of 
 political questions was interdicted, journals and re- 
 views were limited exclusively to the publication of 
 novels and poems, and to literary and theatrical criti- 
 cism. Krayeevsky, who had married a daughter of the 
 famous actor, Briansky, devoted himself during the 
 first ten years of his journalistic career entirely to 
 the interest of belles lettres. With exceptional tact 
 he obtained for the first number of his Zapiski the 
 services of the most popular poets and novelists. 
 Many of the best-known poems of Lermontov 
 appeared in its pages. The " folk-poet," Kolisov, 
 contributed several charming songs, Count Sollohub 
 his original and artistic novel, " A Pair of Goloshes " ; 
 Prince Vyasemsky his story of " Princess Sisi " ; 
 and the well-known poet-translator, Huber, the first 
 Russian version of "Faust." Only a literary critic 
 was wanting. He was the more necessary, since, 
 in the absence of political and other public news, 
 literary criticism took the place of a chronicle of 
 events, was eagerly read even by the greater public, 
 
KRA YEEVSKY AND BYELINSKY. 255 
 
 and hence played an important part. Krayeevsky 
 was unfortunate in his first attempts to find among 
 the writers of St. Petersburg a critic who should 
 equal in merit even Senkovsky, the reviewer of the 
 trivial and unprincipled type, who, in spite of his 
 coarseness and vulgarity, was both witty and auda- 
 cious. He turned to Moscow, and brought thence 
 Meshevich, the critic of the Telescope — a review of 
 that city which had recently been suppressed. He 
 was no more successful than his predecessors. In 
 despair Krayeevsky asked advice of a younger col- 
 league on the Zapiski, Ivan Panaev, afterwards well 
 known as a Radical writer. Panaev proposed to 
 him a man, who soon after made an epoch in 
 Russian literature, but at that time was in extreme 
 destitution, and more feared than loved by those 
 who knew him. He was the ex-student of medi- v 
 cine, Vissarion Byelinsky, and had been expelled 
 from the University of Moscow "for incapacity." 
 
 Byelinsky was one of the most remarkable Russians 
 of his time. Very incompletely educated, he could 
 speak no foreign language, and knew mere fragments 
 of the literature of Germany, England, and France. 
 He possessed only two of the qualifications of a 
 great critic, but these in a high degree : a brilliant 
 talent for representation, and a fearless love of truth. 
 " I was born for a (sc, political) pamphleteer," he 
 says himself. "That career I desire most keenly, 
 and yet I am condemned to sing for ever the old 
 
256 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER in. 
 
 litany of Lermontov, Pushkin, and Gogol, Gogol 
 and Pushkin and Lermontov — aesthetics, sesthetics 
 for ever and a day." In Moscow, Byelinsky had been 
 content to wear these chains. He had taken his 
 stand as a zealous disciple of Hegel upon " Art for 
 Art's sake ; " he had shared the sovereign dislike of 
 Goethe and Pushkin to the "influence of the rabble" 
 in art, in the state, and in society ; he had fought for 
 his Conservative principles many a hard fight with 
 the Young Hegelians of the school of Herzen. His 
 standpoint was allied in one point only to that of 
 these forerunners and originators of Russian Radical- 
 ism ; he was, in spite of an intimate personal rela- 
 tionship to Constantine Aksakov, an enthusiastic 
 advocate of Western ideas, and a violent opponent 
 of the Slavophil party and their worn-out old- 
 Russian and Byzantine antiquities. 
 
 Byelinsky, who was then twenty-nine years old, 
 received Krayeevsky's invitation to go to St. Peters- 
 burg as critic of the Zapiski, with a yearly salary of 
 a thousand roubles, at the moment of a serious 
 intellectual crisis. As he worked upon an essay, 
 " Against Menzel, the critic of Goethe," serious 
 doubts of the correctness of his standpoint attacked 
 the apostle of "Art for Art's sake." A few months 
 after his removal to St. Petersburg Saul had become 
 Paul ; the enemy of Liberal and democratic ideas 
 had espoused their cause. " A plague o' your lofty 
 ideas ! " he wrote to his friend Botkin at the begin- 
 
KRAYEEVSKY AND DYELINSKY. 257 
 
 ning of 1841, " we live in evil days, and fate forces 
 us to a vow of renunciation. We must suffer for 
 our children's welfare. . . . My acquaintance with 
 the society of to-day, in which rogues and medio- 
 crities predominate, has been almost fatal to me. . . . 
 All praise to Schiller, the noble defender of humanity, 
 the liberator of society from inherited prejudice. For 
 me the personality of man, the individual, stands 
 higher now than society, than mankind itself. . . . 
 As I review my past, two things distress me ; . . . 
 my wretched complaisance to a shameful reality. 
 What abominable trivialities I used to write, and 
 how fanatically I believed in them ! " 
 
 This short introduction sufficiently characterises 
 the man who in 1839 became the critic of the 
 Zapishi, and for eight years held the post with 
 brilliant though slowly recognised success. Under 
 the thin mask of a critic persecuting false authority 
 and bad taste in current literature — a mask impene- 
 trable only to the shortsightedness of the censorship, 
 he waged war against the existing order of things 
 in society and the state. Under the form of a 
 vigorous condemnation of the Slavophil party he 
 attacked the hostility to education of the whole of 
 retrograde Russia under Nicholas. His success was 
 so remarkable, that Byelinsky was considered by his 
 contemporaries and successors the greatest of all 
 Russian critics. In recent memoirs his name 
 occurs more frequently than any other. Turgenev, 
 
 18 
 
258 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 who called him the Russian Lessing, dedicated to 
 him the greater part of his souvenirs ; Alexander 
 Herzen has covered with praise the opponent who 
 afterwards became his ally ; Constantine Aksakov 
 was his close friend for years. The second part of 
 Panaev's memoirs is devoted chiefly to Byelinsky, 
 and Byelinsky is the fondest theme of the more recent 
 works of Annenkas, the literary historian. Long 
 before he became more widely known, the haughty 
 Pushkin used secretly to send his journal to the 
 poor ex-student in his garret in Moscow, and to 
 value very highly a favourable judgment from his 
 young critic. Gogol, whose pride, vanity, and 
 weakness afterwards ended in insanity, received the 
 destructive criticism with which a private letter of 
 Byelinsky's visited his last book (the reactionary 
 " Letters to my Friends ") with a resignation which 
 was almost a complete submission. Suspected as a 
 Radical, and surrounded with spies by the political 
 police, his favour was yet humbly courted by writing 
 and scribbling generals and privy counsellors of the 
 Emperor, anxious to propitiate his severity and to 
 find favour in the eyes of the dreaded critic. When 
 Byelinsky, weakly, shy, and awkward, came occa- 
 sionally to his Saturday evening receptions, Prince 
 Odoyeevsky regarded it as a great honour ; and 
 General Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky, the military writer, 
 did not rest until the untitled civilian had accepted 
 at least one of his Excellency's numerous invitations 
 
KRA YEE VSKY AND B YELINSKY. 259 
 
 to dinner. Byelinsky gives a humorous description 
 of the meal, and the unwearying attentions which 
 the aristocratic giver lavished upon his modest guest. 
 The General addressed him continually as " little 
 father," ceremoniously requested permission to in- 
 troduce his daughter, then eighteen years old, and 
 desired her among other things to set the pipe of 
 the " honoured little father " agoing with her own 
 charming lips. Yet every one knew that Byelinsky 
 could only with great difficulty be induced to accept 
 invitations, and that in a large company he scarcely 
 spoke a word. 
 
 Krayeevsky was undoubtedly aware of the tendency 
 of his coadjutor's views, and of the danger to which 
 he exposed himself in permitting his review to become 
 the organ of so bold a revolutionary. This circum- 
 stance made his conduct the more praiseworthy, and 
 the decision with which he refused attention to the 
 complaints against Byelinsky of wounded vanities, 
 great and small, of anxious friends, and of calum- 
 nious enemies, redounds the more to his credit. 
 For himself it was a decidedly critical position, and 
 it must be admitted that his famous colleague 
 was not excessively accommodating. Commercially, 
 Krayeevsky's magazine was certainly very prosperous, 
 and gained steadily in repute and circulation, while 
 he who was the cause of this success was, in spite 
 of his poverty, very modest in his demands. The 
 two men were perfectly polite, but they remained 
 
26o RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 strangers to each other. Krayeevsky became rich, 
 and Byelinsky famous. The former occupied, how- 
 ever, the more favourable position, so long as no 
 one had the courage to enter into more intimate re- 
 lations with the most feared and the most dangei-ous 
 writer in Russia. 
 
 Nevertheless, a rupture came at last. In the 
 summer of 1847 two warm friends of Byelinsky, and 
 younger contributors to the Zapishi, Panaev, who 
 has already been mentioned, and the poet, Nekras- 
 sov, obtained possession of the Sovremennik. This 
 periodical, of which the joint editorship had helped 
 to create Krayeevsky's influence, belonged to the 
 heirs of Pushkin, but was now more and more unsuc- 
 cessful. Byelinsky abandoned his connection with the 
 Zapiski and joined the staff of the journal taken over 
 by his friends, the success of which seemed likely to 
 depend mainly upon his contributions. But fortune 
 once more favoured Krayeevsky ; in May of 1848, the 
 year of the Revolution, the famous critic died of con- 
 sumption, before the commencement of any serious 
 rivalry. It was perhaps fortunate for him, for a few 
 weeks before his death the sick man was summoned 
 before the Forum of the "third division," and there 
 informed that the chief of the secret police, General 
 Dubbelt, desired to make his " acquaintance." It 
 was at all' events fortunate for Krayeevsky and his 
 review, for both were henceforth relieved from the 
 dangerous rivalry of the Sovremennik. Both maga- 
 
KRA YEEVSKY AND B YELINSKY. 261 
 
 zines went on side by side, nor did the one seriously 
 interfere with the circulation of the other. But 
 Krayeevsky from a prosperous man became a rich 
 one, and contrived to steer past all the rocks which 
 threatened Russian journalism during the last years 
 of the reign of the Emperor Nicholas. While the 
 Government became from year to year more sus- 
 picious and more tyrannical, and the anxiety of the 
 censorship finally outran all bounds. Liberal and 
 Radical tendencies became increasingly strong among 
 the educated public. It seemed an impossible prob- 
 lem to reckon with both factors with a like success ; 
 but Krayeevsky so successfully solved it, that the 
 Zapishi survived the reign of Nicholas, and that its 
 editor was yet, at the beginning of the new era, num- 
 bered among the most prominent of the iniluential 
 Liberals in the journalistic world of St. Petersburg. 
 
 With his characteristic sharpsightedness Krayeev- 
 sky recognised that the predominance of reviews was 
 past, and that the altered tendencies of the time 
 favoured the rise of the daily press. The Zapishi 
 still flourished,^ and had begun actively to discuss 
 the political questions of the day ; but in the midst 
 of the emotional movement which preceded the 
 abolition of serfdom its editor farmed the St. Peters- 
 bourg Gazette {Peterbourgskiya Viedomosti), the property 
 of the Academy of Sciences. It was easy for a man 
 of his experience in journalism to make of this 
 ' See Appendix, Note 37. 
 
262 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 paper, the only one that circulated largely among 
 the cultured classes of St. Petersburg of that 
 period, an influential organ, to double in a short 
 time its circulation and its income from advertise- 
 ments, and to destroy the remaining reputation of 
 servile journals of the character of the Northern Bee. 
 His example was eagerly imitated. The Journal of 
 the Bourse and the Russian Invalid were completely 
 remodelled, as early as 1862 : their former size 
 was doubled, and leaders appeared in them which 
 attempted to excel in boldness and Liberal declara- 
 tions those of the 5^. Petersbourg Gazette. But the 
 last-mentioned paper preserved its dominant position. 
 Some of its numbers were in themselves political 
 events, and went the entire round of the Empire. 
 We may instance the number of January i, 1862, 
 which published, under the title " 862 to 1862," the 
 talented historian Kostomarov's famous proclama- 
 tion of the millennium. We quote a few sentences : 
 " Russia has existed a thousand years. . . . The hour 
 strikes, but it is not the knell of a dying race ; nay, 
 it is the call to a new birth, to a new life of all the 
 Slavonic peoples ! . . . Your hands, brothers ! with 
 a new millennium begins a new existence 1 " and so 
 forth. But Krayeevsky was not yet satisfied. The 
 sum he had to pay to the Academy of Sciences for 
 the possession of their paper was considerable, and 
 the continuance of the relationship demanded a sacri- 
 fice which could be more profitably devoted to other 
 
KRA YEEVSKY AND B YELINSKY. 263 
 
 purposes. Instead, therefore, of renewing the con- 
 tract, which expired upon December 31, 1862, he 
 obtained the proprietorship of a new paper. The 
 academic daily was handed over to the well-known 
 Liberal writer, V. Korsh, and Krayeevsky left it, 
 after having secured for his new daily, the Golos 
 ("The Voice"), which appeared in the same form as 
 the Viedomosti, the collaboration of his most influ- 
 ential colleagues, and a large number of subscribers. 
 The new undertaking was crowned with a suc- 
 cess yet greater than that of the St. Petersbourg 
 Gazette and of the Zapiski. The Golos was favoured 
 by the incessant demand for new political food, and 
 by the feverish excitement which had seized upon 
 Russian readers since the outbreak of the revolt in 
 Poland and Lithuania. In the course of a few 
 months it obtained a circulation which had been 
 reached by other journals only after as many years. 
 The experienced and enterprising editor bestowed 
 equal care upon all the departments of his ambitious 
 undertaking. The services of the most prominent 
 literary and aesthetic critics of the Liberal party 
 were secured for the feuilleton by high salaries. The 
 chronicle of the day surpassed that of any similar 
 enterprise, even the satirical Whistle (Svistok) of the 
 Radical Sovremennik, in audacity, wit, and comba- 
 tiveness.^ The financial news gave daily evidence of 
 Krayeevsky's intimate acquaintance with the trans- 
 ' See Appendix, Note 38. 
 
264 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 actions of the money market. The greater number 
 of the political articles was written by Professor 
 Bilbassov, the friend, and afterwards the son-in-law, 
 of Krayeevsky, a man of high culture, and with a 
 knowledge of all the details of Viennese journalism, 
 which had then just begun to come to the front. 
 It was chiefly due to his tact and flexibility that the 
 Golos was able to surmount the difficulties which the 
 condition of the Russian daily press had thrown in 
 the way.' Since the spring of 1863 the Polish 
 Revolution had been the chief object of public 
 attention, and during the first half of that 
 memorable year diametrically opposite views of 
 the question prevailed in educated Russia. The 
 Polish revolutionaries had wrongly counted upon 
 direct support from those in Russia who espoused 
 their cause. The attempts of the emigres from 
 London, notably Bakunin and Alexander Herzen, 
 to bring the Varsovian rebels armed assistance, met 
 with a pretty general condemnation. None the less 
 did Liberal Russia regard Muraev's politics of 
 Russification and oppression as imperilling the 
 future of their fatherland ; none the less did the 
 still numerous Radical party sympathise moi^e 
 keenly with the secret government of Warsaw 
 than with certain of the advisers of the Emperor 
 Alexander IL Krayeevsky, himself of Polish origin, 
 had yet, without prejudice to his Russian education 
 ' See Appendix, Note 39. 
 
KRA YEE VSKY AND B YELINSKY. 265 
 
 and antecedents, espoused the plan of Vielopolsky, 
 in accordance with which Poland was to be auto- 
 nomous in matters of internal politics, a sister- 
 kingdom of the great Russo-Slavonic world. His 
 experience and cool insight told him that this plan 
 was hopeless, and that the insurrection would result 
 in the complete destruction and subsequent Russi- 
 fication of the unhappy country. Yet he was 
 reluctant to take the side of the vulgar fanatics, 
 who would destroy everything Polish, root and 
 branch, and build up an empire of force upon the 
 ruins of the order Vielopolsky had produced. On 
 the other hand, the party pf national fanaticism, 
 led by the Moscow Gazette, and embodied in the 
 person of Katkov, made such constant progress 
 that open and direct opposition to it was surrounded 
 with dangers. For some time the Golos took its 
 stand by the side of the official opponents of the 
 Moscow press dictator. It supported the timid 
 attempts at moderation and tranquillity which were 
 made by Valuev, the Minister of the Interior, and 
 a man of Western ideas, and by Golovnin, the 
 Minister of Education. It sought to give its 
 polemic against Katkov the air of a struggle for 
 St. Petersburg against Moscow, and as circum- 
 stances and the political humour changed, it adopted 
 now a Liberal, now a national attitude. But this 
 moderate position in time became untenable. The 
 flood of nationalism rose daily higher, and began to 
 
266 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 burst its dams. The artillery of the Moscow Gazette 
 was directed not only against Poland, but with a 
 still hotter fire against Finland and the Baltic 
 provinces. After the dismissal of Golovnin, Kat- 
 kov's friend, Count Dmitri Tolstoi, the oberproconror 
 of the Synod, became Minister of Education. The 
 Golos was thus compelled to make concession after 
 concession to the ruling tendency, to join periodically 
 in the outcry of the party in power, and to hide as 
 carefully as possible the loopholes that it still kept 
 open. It sought to disarm Katkov's blind fury of 
 denunciation by occasional violent articles against 
 Polish and German aristocrats, against Catholic and 
 Protestant " hierarchs." It endeavoured to flatter 
 the national feeling by animosity to the rising power 
 of Germany; and it regarded with apparent cheer- 
 fulness the evident reactionary tendencies of those 
 newly in power. But in everything, and particularly 
 in the polemic against Poles and Germans, it re- 
 mained more Liberal than national. Krayeevsky and 
 Bilbassov never attempted to deny that their true 
 politics were those of reform, and that they adhered 
 to the Liberal traditions of the early years of the 
 'sixties. Wherever circumstances seemed to permit of 
 it, whenever the authority of the national fanatics of 
 Moscow diminished, the Golos attempted to return to 
 its old standpoint, and to adopt the role of a Liberal 
 opposition paper. The supporters of Golovnin's 
 educational reforms were as much opposed to 
 
KRA YEE VSK Y AND B YELINSK Y. 267 
 
 Tolstoi's system of classical education as they 
 were to the efforts to lessen the independence of 
 the provincial assemblies, ot to limit the absolute 
 power of the tribunals in the interests of adminis- 
 trative omnipotence. Krayeevsky and Bilbassov had 
 no sympathy with the partiality for Prussia and 
 Germany of which the Court and those about the 
 Emperor were accused in 1870 and 1871. Care- 
 ful readers of the newspapers will still remember 
 the furious diatribes which the Golos hurled at the 
 victoriously advancing German army. They found 
 classical expression, the day after the capitulation 
 of Paris, in the article headed " Consummatum 
 est." Hatred of the Prussians, which the champion 
 of the Polish cause had never concealed, and a cool 
 speculation on the national vanity and the party 
 prejudice of the Russian public, contributed equally 
 to an attitude by which the editor of the Golos 
 desired, while flattering the racial fanaticisms of 
 his readers, to secure for himself the right to hoist 
 once more the flag of Liberalism. 
 
 As Russia began to look more calmly at the con- 
 sequences of the power of Germany, the opinions of 
 the Golos gradually underwent a change. Without 
 disguising its preference for France, Krayeevsky's 
 paper, as Katkov's had already done, declared itself 
 in favour of the alliance between the three emperors; 
 and when, shortly afterwards, the fires of the German 
 KuUuykampf were kindled, Krayeevsky thought it 
 
268 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 due to his Liberal reputation to become a decided 
 supporter of the Prussian cause. Questions of 
 foreign policy were then for a time put in the. 
 background. Accordingly, after 1875 attention was 
 increasingly directed to internal dissensions, and 
 especially to the struggle between the representa- 
 tives of reform and the reactionary school of Tolstoi. 
 As the Golos had the most accurate information on 
 the situation in Central Asia, and was supplied 
 with news by the most talented political and 
 financial correspondents in the capitals of Western 
 Europe, it appeared to be indispensable to the 
 commercial circles of St. Petersburg, Moscow, 
 Odessa, &c., and its opinions and judgments were 
 constantly quoted in the German, French, and 
 English press. It began with increasing emphasis 
 to represent the Liberal middle class, which during 
 the last ten years had been forming in the larger 
 towns of Russia, and which temporarily supplied 
 the place of a genuine bourgeoisie. A shade of 
 censure was discernible in the greater number of the 
 articles, in which the most influential of the Russian 
 daily papers expressed its views on questions of 
 internal politics ; but it abstained as carefully from 
 overstepping the respect due to the authorities as 
 from revolutionary paroxysms, or from stirring up 
 the impulses of the mob. 
 
 The fateful days of the Turkish war began. True 
 to its constant traditions, the Golos sought, imme- 
 
KRA YEE VSK Y AND B YELINSK Y. 269 
 
 diately after the declaration of war, to turn the 
 prevailing excitement to the profit of Liberal reform. 
 The same number which published the manifesto 
 expressed the hope, in an apparently harmless article 
 in the feuilleton, " that society would be permitted 
 some direct participation in deciding upon the 
 measures to be taken in preparation for the war." 
 In Russian terminology "participation of society" is 
 a euphemism for the forbidden word "Constitution."^ 
 The sentence was so understood by the Government, 
 and the answer was a decree of the overseers of the 
 press suspending the Golos for three months. This 
 decree was set aside in a few weeks, upon the inter- 
 cession of influential friends, but Krayeevsky and 
 Bilbassov were henceforth strictly watched, and 
 treated with the same severity which at this time 
 deposed V. Korsh from the management of the 
 St. Petersbourg Gazette. For a time the Golos 
 carefully restrained itself; but when in the spring 
 of 1879 the indignation at the unhappy issue of the 
 war and of the Congress of Berlin afforded an 
 opportunity for new attacks upon the Government, 
 it came into fresh contact with the censorship. To 
 lag behind public opinion appeared to the veteran 
 journalist at least as dangerous as to advance too 
 far. When at the beginning of 1879 the jurors 
 acquitted Vera Sassulich, who had attempted the 
 
 ' The author of \kivs, feicilleton was a certain Markov, and was 
 otherwise little known. 
 
270 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 life of Trepov, the chief of the police, the Golos 
 was one of the journals that approved of the 
 acquittal. The number of those who lauded this 
 outrageous breach of the law was so great that the 
 Government did not consider it judicious to attempt 
 to punish them. I A few weeks later the Golos 
 remarked, apropos of an occurrence in Odessa, "that 
 it was extraordinary that a boy of eleven years of 
 age should be excluded from the Gymnasium^ in that 
 town on account of his political opinions." This 
 drew down a warning severe enough to show that 
 the last remaining organ of a quasi- European 
 Liberalism in St. Petersburg had finally forfeited the 
 favour of the chiefs of the censorship. The fact 
 first became fully apparent after the death of 
 Alexander II., when Count Loris Melikov resigned 
 the post of Minister of the Interior. With his 
 disappearance the last traces of consideration for 
 the Liberal reform period and its traditions vanished. 
 Up to 1881 the criticism of foreign affairs had been 
 considered an open field, in the ordinary course of 
 things unregarded by the censorship. Under the 
 regime of Ignatiev all this was so completely altered 
 that the Golos was suspended for six months, when 
 it ventured to question the utility of the changes 
 in the constitution of Bulgaria. Its fate was shared 
 by the Novaya Gazeta (" The New Gazette "), which 
 Krayeevsky had bought to supply the subscribers and 
 ' See Appendix, Note 40. '^ See Appendix, Note 41. 
 
KRA YEE VSK Y AND B YELINSK Y. 271 
 
 advertisers of the Golos during its suspension. The 
 crime of the Gazeia was the expression of regret for 
 the withdrawal (which was, it must be explained, 
 voluntary only in form) of the Grand Duke Con- 
 stantine from the administration of the marine. 
 
 When the six months' suspension was at an end 
 the Golos once more appeared before the public, but 
 for a short time only. Count Tolstoi, the former 
 Minister of Education, took the place of Ignatiev 
 in May, 1882. He was an old and sworn enemy of 
 the tendencies of Krayeevsky, and had from the first 
 decided to overthrow him on the earliest opportunity. 
 In spite of all the vigilance of the management, this 
 opportunity presented itself in February, 1883 ; and 
 a ministerial decree commanded the complete sup- 
 pression of the Golos, which was accused of sys- 
 tematic and malicious opposition to the Government. 
 Krayeevsky, now nearly seventy-five years of age, 
 laid down for ever the pen he had guided for more 
 than half a century. Several years before he had 
 sold the Zapiski to his former colleague and sub- 
 sequent rival, Nekrassov,! and he had long possessed 
 a fortune of over a million roubles. He retired from 
 business, but remained president of the " Literary 
 Fund " and the " Society for the Support of Needy 
 Writers and Artists," both founded by him.^ He 
 was, besides, a member of the St. Petersburg town 
 
 ' Later on this monthly has also been suppressed. 
 ' See Appendix, Note 42. 
 
272 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 assembly of deputies {Gorodskdya Douma), to which 
 he had belonged since 1870. In this capacity he 
 gave his attention chiefly to educational improvement 
 in St. Petersburg, it is said with a large amount of 
 success. He died in his eightieth year, having sur- 
 vived his wife, his two sons, and several grandchildren 
 His very extensive collection of letters and manu- 
 scripts, of great importance to Russian literary his- 
 tory, was bequeathed to the imperial public library 
 in St. Petersburg. 
 
 The " Nestor of the Russian press " was neither 
 a great writer nor a great character, but essentially 
 a talented and industrious literary man of business. 
 Sympathising at bottom with humane and Liberal 
 ideas, he never made any real sacrifice for them. 
 On the contrary, he more than once temporised in 
 his personal interest. Yet it would be as unjust to 
 refuse him the praise due to the intelligence and 
 energy he employed in improving the Russian 
 periodical press, as to deny his services to the 
 cause of humanity in his fatherland. He pursued 
 journalism as a business, but it was a decently 
 conducted business. He never became the tool of 
 obscurantism and the rule of might, nor allowed 
 himself to be the plaything of the caprices of the 
 rabble. Even where he followed a doubtful path he 
 remained a gentleman, a " homo liberalis," who felt 
 that he had once been the companion of such 
 writers as Pushkin, Byelinsky, and Turgenev. It 
 
KRA YEE VSKY AND B YELINSK V. 273 
 
 is perhaps not much to have to say in his praise, 
 but it is incomparably more than can be said 
 of nine -tenths of the present representatives of 
 Russian journalism ! Most of the journals with 
 which the Golos had in its time to compete 
 have long disappeared. The Radical monthlies. 
 The Russian Word and The Annals of the Fatherland, 
 the Slavophil Day, Moscow, and The Citizen of Moscow 
 {Moskvich), the Retrograde Tidings, and the Liberal 
 Golos rest in the grave dug for them all by the hands 
 of the censorship. Repeatedly worried and injured 
 by warnings, by suspensions and confiscations, Ivan 
 Aksakov had lost the best part of his. strength, when 
 he founded his last paper, the Rous, shortly before 
 his death. To escape the censorship, Aksakov's 
 former friends, Samarin and Koshelev, had begun 
 as early as the 'seventies to publish their Slavophil 
 pamphlets in pagan Germany instead of in Holy 
 Russia. Korsh died in Heidelberg, after he had 
 been, by an arbitrary act of Tolstoi's, unjustly de- 
 prived' of the editorship of the St. Petersbourg Gazette.. 
 Finally, Krayeevsky's paper was suppressed in 1883, 
 and with it died the last European-Liberal journal 
 of Russia.^ The organ of brutal nationalism, the 
 Moscow Gazette, was the last of the independent 
 newspapers, and it lost the remainder of its interest 
 at the death of Katkov. 
 
 The Russia of to-day possesses newspapers and 
 ' See Appendix, Note 43. 
 19 
 
274 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 reviews in considerable number. But there is not 
 one among the many daily papers of St. Petersburg, 
 some of them of very large size, that could justly claim 
 to be dignified and independent — not one the contri- 
 butors to which are notabl}' talented. Such as Novoya 
 Vreutya, Novosti, Svyet, and Grazhdanin, represent 
 nothing more than the frolics of weak-minded oppor- 
 tunism or Chauvinistic tendencies. They are all 
 frothy; they have no kernel, no definite contents. 
 How should it be otherwise ? The questions that most 
 interest the reading world must either not be discussed 
 at all or discussed only as the Government wishes. 
 Undesirable news is prosecuted like undesirable 
 opinions, and only one province is open to indepen- 
 dent discussion — that of foreign and international 
 relations. Almost the half of a Russian newspaper, 
 therefore, is filled with political chatter and con- 
 jecture, discussions ad nauseam of such favourite 
 subjects as the villainous Kalnoky and the still more 
 villainous Bismarck, or the imposing reserve of the 
 great Tsar-governed and Tsar-blessed Russia. The 
 remaining pages are occupied by speculations on 
 the credulity of the Bourse, abstracts from official 
 documents of Russia's material and military re- 
 sources, lamentations over the increase of German 
 influence, denunciations of Poles, Finns, Livonians, 
 Armenians, Jews, &c. ; and lastly, dissertations, 
 friendly to-day, hostile to-morrow, upon France, 
 ■" the ally of our future." At Court and in so-called 
 
KRA YEEVSKY AND B YELLXSKY. 275 
 
 " society " the Grazhdanin, edited by Prince Mesht- 
 chersky, has a recognised influence. That this 
 miserable would-be aristocratic sheet, edited by a 
 man of noble name and ignoble disposition, should 
 obtain even a trace of credit, indicates the moral 
 and intellectual condition of the governing classes. 
 The reader of Turgeniev's Smoke will understand 
 us if he will recall the political discussion in the 
 tenth chapter in a company of Russian generals 
 and fashionable women assembled at Baden-Baden. 
 Meshtchersky's political judgment is on the level 
 ■of this specimen of pretentious thoughtlessness. 
 Colloquially written and larded with French phrases, 
 the author's glosses upon current events appear to 
 certain readers original and witty, while their real 
 triviality surpasses anything that others would dare 
 to print. Some importance has occasionally been 
 attached, in Vienna and Berlin, to the fact that 
 Meshtchersky will have nothing to do with France 
 or the projects for a Franco-Russian alliance. The 
 casual opinions of the princely writer have really no 
 serious importance. They are the productions of a 
 racial blindness which would reject the whole of 
 Western civilisation, and would incidentally flatter, 
 in the humblest manner, the fashionable aversion to 
 a republican form of government. The Grazhdanin 
 adopts the reactionary programme, formerly Tolstoi's, 
 with regard to questions of internal policy. It 
 struggles to show its aristocratic independence by 
 
276 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 occasional attacks upon the officials, the absolute 
 power of the State, and so on. 
 
 The last light of educated and Liberal opinion in 
 this journalistic morass is the monthly Messenger of 
 Europe (edited by Spassovich, the literary historian, 
 and the advocate, Stassulevich).i In the last ten 
 years almost all the surviving witnesses of the 
 Liberal period have formed a connection witli this 
 estimable revievi'. The Messenger of Europe makes a 
 decided protest against the existing system, but it 
 is compelled to the greatest prudence and reserve, 
 and hence it has not its due influence. The 
 language employed by Stassulevich and Spasso- 
 vich is, besides, too moderate and cultured to be 
 understood and appreciated by the heroes of the 
 market-place. For them the password will appa- 
 rently still be for a time, "Ruere in servitium." 
 The wind will then change once more, and what 
 will prevail will be the very opposite of all that has. 
 been so long revered and practised.^ 
 ' See Appendix, Note 44. ' See Appendix, Note 45. 
 
XVI. 
 
 RUSSIAN PIONEERS. 
 
 There are two kinds of missionaries in Russia, 
 religious and political. The former labour chiefly 
 among the Mahometans and Buddhists in the 
 Eastern provinces of the Empire, in the Caucasus 
 and in Siberia. Their success is, however, scanty ; 
 the converts frequently return to Islam, or to 
 heathenism, and not seldom seduce the " true 
 believers " to join their ranks, as is admitted even 
 by Pobyedonostsev, the truest of true believers. In 
 the " good old times " of the Emperor Nicholas and 
 Count Protassov there was even talk of a project 
 to form a " transitional religion," in view of the 
 invincible sympathy for Judaism among the Buriates 
 of Siberia, and it was intended to confer upon this 
 first step on the road to orthodox Christianity the 
 prestige of a governmental sanction. 
 
 The political missions of Russia are more im- 
 portant than the religious. Since 1864 it has 
 become usual to give the name of missions to 
 political and national propaganda. The emissaries 
 
278 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 of Russification (for the most part dismissed and 
 disgraced Government officials), who were sent in 
 large numbers into Poland and Lithuania, were 
 called by the high-sounding title of " missionaries 
 of our national cause," and were rewarded as an 
 expression of the holiness of the cause with con- 
 fiscated estates and highly-paid appointments.^ 
 
 In spite of the lamentable failure of this enterprise, 
 and the numberless scandals to which it gave birth, 
 it is at present in process of revival. The reforms 
 it is intended to introduce in the Baltic provinces, 
 are to be carried out with the help of national 
 outcasts, and the German-Protestant districts of 
 the Baltic shore are to be thus initiated into the 
 secrets of the old Slavonic arts of bribery and 
 extortion (" Lichoimstvo " and " Msdoimstvo.") 
 
 Older and more remarkable than this mission 
 within the limits of the Empire is that to foreign 
 countries, which is most active in the Slavonic 
 districts of Austria and Turkey. Its first station 
 was founded under Peter the Great, in Montenegro, 
 the land of " our only true ally," and was much 
 extended eighty years afterwards under the Emperor 
 Paul.^ Next in order came Servia, whither the 
 bishop, Menadovich, of Belgrade, had, on his 
 secret mission to St. Petersburg, invited his Rus- 
 
 ' See Appendix, Note 46. 
 
 - Documents referring to its foundation were published by 
 the Allgemeine Zeitung. 
 
RUSSIAN PIONEERS. 279 
 
 sian friends (1804). Thirty years later a Russian 
 mission, composed at first of volunteers, began to 
 work in Bohemia. The first messenger of the 
 Eastern faith to reach the Moldau was a well-known 
 savant, Professor Pogodin, a Slavophil of the old 
 school of absolutism and reactionary principles. He 
 formed a connection with many inquiring spirits in 
 Prague, but he was too clumsy in his negotiations 
 to obtain an enduring success. Instead of being 
 satisfied with the propaganda which had then begun 
 in favour of Bohemian literature, the author of 
 "Russian Letters" wished at once to import a 
 Russo-Slavonic policy, for which the time was not 
 yet ripe. He was defeated by the circumstance that 
 certain leaders of thenational party, who had leanings 
 towards Liberalism, did not appreciate the absolutism 
 of the Emperor Nicholas which Pogodin preached. A 
 change for the better took place twenty years later, 
 when the Liberal reforms of Alexander H. began to 
 attract the attention of the Slavonic world outside of 
 Russia. About the same time the most capable and 
 the most fanatical of all the Russian missionaries to 
 Austria was sent to Vienna, in the person of M. 
 Rayevsky, priest of the embassy. In spite of the 
 extraordinary tact shown by this dangerous agitator 
 during his thirty years' residence on the Danube, 
 the cause progressed at first but slowly. It had 
 become in the meanwhile so popular in Russia, 
 that the well-known writer, Alexander Koshelev, who 
 
28o RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III- 
 
 twenty years earlier had sworn by the land of Goethe 
 and Schiller, volunteered in 1857 to go to Prague as 
 inspector of the mission, that he might establish rela- 
 tions with Hanka, Schassarik, Schumavsky, Tomek, 
 and others. To his regret Koshelev was able to dis- 
 cover only one "Russian Bohemian," Herr Hanka; 
 the remaining nine of his acquaintances were con- 
 tent to be " Bohemian Bohemians." Schassarik 
 ■explained this " discouraging circumstance " in a 
 manner which elucidates the progress since made 
 by the national party. The statement made by the 
 famous scholar to his Russian friend was word for 
 word as follows : — 
 
 " The national agitation has gained in extent in 
 the last twenty years, but has lost in strength and 
 courage. We have no funds, because our aristocracy 
 belongs almost exclusively to the hostile party. Our 
 nobility does not live in Prague ; it wishes to be 
 Austrian,, not Bohemian, and it speaks German by 
 preference. The money sent us from abroad injures 
 rather than helps us. . . . You Russians, and par- 
 ticularly Pogodin, have designs in politics by which 
 you do harm to us, to yourselves, and to the cause. 
 Do not trouble yourselves about us. Sweep your 
 own doorstep, do something creditable for yourselves, 
 then we shall look to you, and try to promote at once 
 our own and the Slavonic cause." 
 
 Koshelev travelled in the company of Hanka 
 from Prague to Vienna, where he discussed the 
 
RUSSIAN PIONEERS. 281 
 
 subject in detail with Rayevsky. The right reverend 
 father complained of the indifference of the mass of 
 the people, and of the Germanisation of the Slavonic 
 nobility. He deplored the diplomacy of the Austrian 
 Government, and its success in seducing Slavonic 
 minds to the Austrian interest. The priest of the 
 Russian Embassy was remarkable even then for the 
 number and diversity of his connections with society. 
 Xusmin.the dean of the Slavo-Lutheran College, the 
 celebrated Miklovich, the Protestant preacher Urbar, 
 Hurbak the Slovak, and Karadiez, the " esteemed 
 apostle of Slavonic unity," belonged among others 
 to the number of his friends. Among them also 
 the lack of funds was generally deplored. They 
 declared that the desertions to the German camp 
 had made it a chronic evil. In the opinion of 
 Krayeevsky only three of the five existing "matitsi," 
 or literary clubs, those of Lemberg, Agram, and 
 Prague,- did their duty satisfactorily. Pesth and 
 Klagenfurt were accused of a scandalous inactivity, 
 and the Moravian union of a downright tendency to 
 Catholicism. 
 
 It became manifest a few years later that the right 
 reverend father had not lost heart, in spite of these 
 unfavourable circumstances, but had successfully 
 continued his work. His cause, we grant, at first 
 lost ground. After the year 1864 many of the 
 revolutionaries fled from Russia and took refuge 
 in Prague, Lemberg, Agram, Vienna, and other 
 
282 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER HI. 
 
 towns, where they spread dismal accounts of the 
 despotism in Russia and Poland. They cautioned 
 the Slavs against the government of St. Petersburg, 
 and declared that their only hope of success lay in 
 a general revolution. Basil Kelssiev, the most 
 prominent apostle of this new doctrine, has de- 
 scribed in a bulky volume his wanderings through 
 Hungary, Gallcia, and Bukovina, and his attempts- 
 to stir up a revolution among the Russian refugees 
 and adherents of the old faith inhabiting these 
 provinces. 
 
 " Ah ! had I but monej', 
 I'd soon find my wits," 
 
 the unhappy man might have sung, when he was 
 finally driven mad by privation, and returned to St. 
 Petersburg praying for mercy. Krayeevsky, however, 
 who did not lack money, retained full possession of 
 his wits. With his co-operation the agrarian politics 
 of conciliation of the peasantry, adopted in Russian 
 Poland in 1864, were made the starting-point of a 
 most successfully inaugurated agitation among the 
 Ruthenian inhabitants of Galicia. At the same 
 time a change " for the better " took place in 
 Bohemia, which completely contradicted the pes- 
 simistic prophecies of Koshelev's guest. In June, 
 1868, a triple festival took place at Prague. The 
 foundation-stone of the Bohemian theatre was laid, 
 and the jubilee of the national museum at Prague 
 
RUSSIAN PIONEERS. 283, 
 
 (founded, as is well known, by a German) was 
 celebrated at the same time as the seventieth birth- 
 day of Father Palacky. These events gave occasion 
 to spectacular displays, which proved that the ap- 
 parently Germanised nobility of Bohemia were good 
 Bohemians, and that the Bohemians themselves had 
 become good Russians. The first festival oration was 
 delivered by an aristocrat, Count Clam-Martinitz ; 
 but the Universities of Moscow, Kiev, and St. 
 Petersburg, the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences, 
 and the Rumianzow Museum at Moscow were much 
 more numerously represented in the festival associa- 
 tion than the scientific institutions of Vienna and 
 German Austria. Rayevsky, adorned with the gold- 
 embroidered robe of the high priest, was prominent 
 in the foremost rank of the guests as honorary 
 member of the jubilee institution. Rieger and 
 a Count Anersperg were his neighbours, and of 
 the honorary members chosen for the celebration 
 of the day seven were Russian, and only one was 
 German. The air was rent by Slav cries as the 
 " glorious " names of Pogodin and Hilferding were 
 mentioned among the number. 
 
 The "thorough Russian " who bore the German 
 name of Hilferding was then Russian Consul in 
 Seraievo, and was known far and wide as the mortal 
 enemy of Austria. As was natural for this genuine 
 patriot, Hilferding was a missionary in the first 
 place, and only incidentally an official. He was 
 
284 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III. 
 
 a scholar, but in real life a man of little resource. 
 He received the greater part of his instructions not 
 from Prince Gorchakov, but from his friend Ra- 
 ievski, who, on this occasion as on others, played 
 the part of counsellor to the Embassy.^ The piping 
 treble voice and the turgid Slavonic oratory of the 
 loquacious consul were much ridiculed in Seraievo, 
 while in St. Petersburg his achievements were 
 highly estimated. The events of 1878 indicated 
 for the first time, in the most humiliating way, that 
 the successes of the great Russian were mere vapour 
 and smoke. He removed in the meantime to St. 
 Petersburg, where during the last years of his life he 
 still played a not unimportant part as the scholar 
 and orator of the Slavonic Benevolent Society. 
 Rayevsky also has recently returned to the maternal 
 lap of this society, in the desire to end his days in 
 his native country. 
 
 The Slavonic Benevolent Society, originally called 
 the Slavonic Committee, was founded in 1857 by 
 Privy-Counsellor Bachmetiev, the curator of the 
 University of Moscow. It was divided into a 
 Moscow and a St. Petersburg section, and its osten- 
 sible object was the support of Slav reading clubs 
 in foreign countries. But it announced from the 
 first that its sympathies were political, and not 
 literary or philanthropic. Bachmetiev's successor 
 in the presidency of the Moscow section converted 
 ' See Appendix, Note 47. 
 
RUSSIAN PIONEERS. 285, 
 
 the committees into real nurseries for the mission 
 to the Western Slavonic countries with such success 
 that his successor, Ivan Aksakov, was able to 
 secure the nomination in 1877 of Prince Vladimir 
 Cherkasky, a member of the committee, since then 
 called the "Benevolent Society," to the control of 
 the civil administration of Bulgaria, at that time 
 occupied by the Russian troops. 
 
 This apparent success proved in the sequel to be 
 the worst possible mistake. Both the Russian 
 mission in the Balkan peninsula and the Russian 
 credit in Bulgaria received a blow from the election 
 of Cherkasky, from which the poHtics of St. Peters- 
 burg have not yet recovered. The feted friend of 
 the people and leader of the Slavophil party had 
 taken the knout across the border with him. He 
 made so free a use of this national instrument 
 of education, which he had learned to value in 
 the days of his missionary activity in Poland, that 
 the Bulgarians soon began to groan under its lashes, 
 and to regard the new Muscovite Pasha as a Greek 
 or a Turk in disguise. Although Cherkasky died 
 upon the day when the peace of San Stefano was 
 concluded, the unfavourable impression made by the 
 first Russian Governor of Bulgaria long survived 
 him. Its effects were subsequently still further 
 strengthened. The majority of the civil officials 
 and generals afterwards sent into the principality 
 pursued Chei'kasky's system of oppression with 
 
^85 RUSSIA UNDER ALEXANDER III- 
 
 such conscientiousness and success that the final 
 result of the Russian achievements in the cause 
 •of liberty in 1877 ^""i 1878 has been the complete 
 discredit of their name. 
 
 It was unavoidable that Bulgaria should be struck 
 ■out of the list of Russian mission stations in foreign 
 countries. For this reason the majority of our 
 political missionaries have returned to their original 
 occupations. Embittered by the ingratitude of their 
 Western brethren, these excellent men have begun 
 the liberal dispensation of their benevolence among 
 the gagged dwellers by the Vistula, the Duna, and 
 -the Baltic Sea, as well as in Finland lately. There 
 they undergo a practical preparation for the high 
 calling that awaits them in the West. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 Note i, Page i. 
 
 It is difficult to guess whom the German author regards " the 
 ■most competent of Russian historians," since he does not mean 
 A. N. Pipin, ex-Professor of the St. Petersburg University, 
 who is regarded in Russia as the authority on modern Russian 
 history. In his excellent work, " The Movement in Russia 
 imder Alexander I.," he says of the "Decembrist" lyi.e., the 
 participants of the mentioned conspiracy and rebellion in De- 
 cember, 1825) : " History accords to them the credit of under- 
 standing the social and pohtical problems so far as to advocate 
 the liberation of the serfs, the reform of the Court, and some 
 other points of Russian development, and of being the sole 
 representatives of Liberal ideas at their period. They could do 
 little towards putting their ideas into practice, but they prepared 
 what came after, through calling attention to the wants of the 
 people, through pointing out the best means towards general 
 reform, and finally through the example of moral courage and 
 of deep convictions which they showed in the sufferings they 
 ■endured for their ideas." In fact the reaction began long be- 
 fore the outbreak of 1825, and there could be, and never was, 
 any doubt that with the accession of Nicholas to the throne 
 " autocracy would become the special aim " of the new reign, 
 whether the rebellion had taken place or not. Even so early 
 .as 1818, when Alexander I. delivered the Liberal and constitu- 
 tional speech in Warsaw, Nicholas — then heir to the crown — 
 showed himself strongly in opposition to the Emperor, and, 
 together with the State historiographer, Karamzin, a very 
 
 287 
 
288 APPENDIX. 
 
 influential person at the time, and many others, most decidedly- 
 condemned the Liberalism of Alexander I. — Ed. 
 
 Note 2, Page 5. 
 
 Such a qualification of the May fires of 1863 is altogether 
 unfounded. When those fires broke out throughout Russia, 
 with, so to say, unusual persistence and fury, rumours of arson 
 began to circulate, as is always the case on such occasions in 
 Russia. M. N. Katkov (see chap, xiii.) introduced the matter 
 into the press, insinuating that the malefactors were revolu- 
 tionists. No single fact, however, has been produced in sup- 
 port of the calumny. On the contrary, those revolutionists, 
 who at'terwards were condemned, as Serno-Solovievich, Bene,, 
 and others, formed volunteer fire brigades and worked in their 
 ranks. On the other hand, the Government undertook a series, 
 of inquiries into the matter, and persons like the Governor- 
 General of St. Petersburg, Prince Souvorov, and Adjutant- 
 General Den (personal adjutant of the Tsar), the latter, after 
 his inquiry upon the subject made in Simbirsk, declared that 
 the suspicion was void. — Ed. 
 
 Note 3, Page 10. 
 
 It deserves to be noted that the manifesto calling the pro- 
 posed assembly had been already signed by Alexander II., and 
 would undoubtedly have been published had it not been that 
 Ignatiev, thinking to gain supreme influence, regarded it as 
 justifiable to cast suspicion on his colleagues in his first audience 
 with the new monarch, and to express doubts with regard to the 
 project for which he had formerly voted. The publication was 
 stopped, and the Liberal ministers named above were soon dis- 
 missed. Ignatiev was master of the situation. So came the 
 " father of lies " to be the founder of the present absolute 
 regime. 
 
 Note 4, Page^ ii. 
 
 Official nationalism, as it is practised nowadays in Russia, is. 
 by no means a thing that "had not been tried" before. The 
 Russian historian, Karamzin, when arguing, in his addresses to- 
 
APPENDIX. 289 
 
 Alexander I., against Liberalism, already used the formula 
 {loyalty to), " orthodoxy, autocracy, nationality," as the basis of 
 " sound " policy for Russia. This formula was repeated by 
 Nicholas I., and became under him an official one, and his 
 whole reign was nothing but a permanent attempt to carry it 
 out in reality. The difference between the official nationahsm 
 of Alexander III. and that of Nicholas is only that the former 
 is more Slavophil than the second, and that Alexander III. per- 
 sonally is more a man of convictions, while Nicholas was a 
 man of position. Therefore so long as the Jews remained 
 ■"loyal" to Nicholas, persecutions against them, such as the 
 one we are now witnessing, were impossible under that mon- 
 arch ; they became possible only with the accession to the 
 throne of an individual who is convinced that the Jews are 
 obnoxious because they are neither of Russian origin, nor or- 
 thodox. — Ed. 
 
 Note 5, Page 16. 
 
 His social nature shows itself in the free and easy musical 
 evenings, which he holds in the most intimate circle, and in 
 which he co-operates. How many a one, in the hope of gaining 
 an entrance to these " beer-evenings," has taken pains to learn 
 an out-of-the-way instrument, e.g., the deep bassoon ! Art 
 has to serve the ambition of such people : it is not a question 
 of bread and butter. 
 
 Note 6, Page 17. 
 
 This holds good of the persons who actually influence 
 Alexander III.'s course of action, and who form his intimate 
 entourage, but not of all the ministers who have to serve the 
 Emperor's will. Everybody knows that Nabokov— formerly 
 Minister of Justice— looked after his own interests without any 
 fanaticism, and that Vuishnegradsky's calculating cunning was 
 attributed to everything except fanaticism. 
 
 Note 7, Page 18. 
 
 Another circumstance must be noted. From his disinclina- 
 tion to persons who might influence him is explained the fact 
 
 20 
 
290 APPENDIX. 
 
 that Alexander III., when he is absent for a considerable time, 
 as, e.g., at Copenhagen, does not take with him such persons 
 as the well-informed and skilled Count Adlerberg, but only 
 those who are not accustomed to hold, or at least to profess 
 opinions of their own. This circumstance attained supreme 
 importance in the summer of 1886, when the sharp handling 
 of Alexander of Battenberg brought about the political tension 
 still felt in Europe. 
 
 Note 8, Page 22. 
 
 It is difficult to understand what our author means by the 
 "popularity" of the present Empress. If there is any con- 
 sideration for her among the masses it is a kind of awe inspired 
 by her position, but not by her personal character, as the people 
 know absolutely nothing about it. We readily admit that she 
 may be popular on account of her personal character, but the 
 sphere where she can be so is exceedingly narrow, as is the 
 circle within which she is moving. The Court, a couple of 
 privileged boarding schools for girls of the nobility, and those 
 Gatchina policemen and soldiers of one or two regiments of the 
 guards to whom she distributes red shirts and kerchiefs at Christ- 
 mas, may admire her very much, but that is all. Her popularity 
 as "Princess Dagmar" was very great and widely spread 
 indeed. It can be explained partly by her being not a German 
 princess, but mainly because of her fate being associated with 
 the late heir to the crown, Nicholas (brother of the present 
 Tsar), of whom great expectations were entertained. But since 
 then the old halo has faded away, and no deeds have created a 
 new one suited for the new position of the former Danish 
 princess. — Ed. 
 
 Note 9, Page 36. 
 
 Plenary sittings of the chamber take place only very 
 seldom. The regular business of this high council, which is 
 entrusted with the examination of the budget and the Bills 
 elaborated in the ministries, is conducted in the sittings of its 
 three departments and the justiciary. Only one part of the 
 members of the //««/;«, and that the smallest, belongs to these 
 
APPENDIX. 291 
 
 departments. Of the five members of the imperial family who 
 belong to the chamber, not one belongs (not even the president) 
 to either of the departments, which have special presidents, and 
 for the most part contain only five members : the same thing 
 holds good of the ministers and superior directors, who by 
 virtue of their office are members of the plenum. (It is hardly 
 necessary to mention that none of the members of the Council 
 of State are either elected or hereditary, but all are appointed 
 by the Emperor. — Ed.) 
 
 Note 10, Page 41. 
 
 So far as rumours go Vannovsky is not liked in the army. It 
 must be admitted that he did something to better the material 
 position of the soldier, but, on the other hand, the rigid main- 
 tenance of unnecessary discipline among them, and the espion- 
 age introduced among the officers, make his administration 
 hateful to many. On the other hand, the fact that " he has 
 hardly anything in common with his predecessor" is not a very 
 flattering recommendation, as Count Demetrius Milyutin (brother 
 of Nicholas) was undoubtedly one of the most remarkable 
 Russian statesmen. He reformed the whole army system^ 
 making it the duty of all citizens to serve, and reducing the 
 term of service from twenty-five to four years, and he did more 
 for education in Russia than any Minister of National Educa- 
 tion, and was always on the side of Liberal reforms when he 
 could. — Ed. 
 
 Note ii. Page 41. 
 
 General Annenkov, the constructor of the Caspian Railway, 
 also belongs to the category of those military men who have 
 intimate relations with France and Parisian society. Annen- 
 kov is a brother-in-law of the ex-diplomatist and academician. 
 Count Melchior de Bogne, who, as a widely-read author, has. 
 revealed modern Russia, and especially Russian romance 
 literature, to France, and has helped to make Russia popular 
 with the third republic. 
 
292 'APPENDIX. 
 
 Note 12, Page 46. 
 
 Ignatiev was subsequently the determined and bitter oppo- 
 nent of his former patron, whom he attempted to overthrow 
 and to succeed during the twelve months that he had the 
 direction of the Ministry of the Interior — attempts which 
 contributed largely to the downfall of this revengeful man 
 (May, 1882), and provoked the violent anger of the Tsar. 
 
 Note 13, Page 48. 
 
 The talents of Mr. Zinovyev were splendidly illustrated by 
 the diplomatic documents printed by the Bulgarian press. It 
 must be remarked, however, that both he and Von Giers are 
 only executors of the Tsar's plans, the general direction of the 
 external Russian policy being entirely in his hands. This in- 
 formation is derived from a personal friend of the Servian ex- 
 Premier Pashich, a diplomatist who went to St. Petersburg on 
 a diplomatic errand, and found that such was the real position 
 of affairs. — Ed. 
 
 Note 14, Page 62. 
 
 To be distinguished from the wealthy and distinguished 
 ex-Governor of Moscow of the same name, who is president 
 of the Slav committee, &c., and also from Privy Councillor 
 Peter Dournovo, Director of the Police Department, who, 
 though a subordinate of the minister, plays a rather prominent 
 part, as he is the real chief of the political police, and a far 
 more able, ambitious, and unscrupulous personage than his 
 chief. — Ed. 
 
 Note 15, Page 68. 
 
 The selection of these agents did not prove fortunate. The 
 technical chef was very accommodating, but was too fond of 
 getting money into his hands. A member of the official secret 
 police at that time started a joke which became popular, 
 saying that everything obligatory would soon become voluntary. 
 The State navy could be dispensed with to make room for a 
 '' volunteer cruiser fleet," and lastly they would have a volunteer 
 artillery, a volunteer cavalry, volunteer infantry, &c. 
 
APPENDIX 293 
 
 Note 16, Page 84. 
 
 It is difficult to see how one could '' open the eyes " of a 
 sovereign who "wishes to avoid the discussion of subjects with 
 which he is unacquainted," and who " never allows discussion 
 of minute points, because he fears explanations which may lead 
 to difficulties.'' Mind, this feature of the Tsar's character was 
 officially stated by his Minister. In a circular addressed by 
 Count Demetrius Tolstoi to all the governors of the different 
 provinces of European and Asiatic Russia (and which, very 
 naturally, greatly scandalised all the Tsar's most loyal subjects), 
 that Minister informed them that some of them indulged in 
 their yearly reports to the Emperor about the condition of their 
 provinces in too many particulars, and that His Majesty wishes 
 him (the Minister) to advise them to be shorter ! — Ed. 
 
 Note 17, Page 89. 
 
 It may be of interest to those who are unacquainted with 
 Russian life, or who only know it from a distance, that as far as 
 regards these holy wells, it is not a question of deep religious 
 conviction, such as would rouse fanaticism or give an opportu- 
 nity for the multiphcation of sects, but simply one of those cases 
 of orthodox deception which are so common in Russia, and 
 which the law has tried to stop. (A law for their prevention 
 was passed in the time of Nicholas I.). The simplest way to 
 make such a deception (which might euphemistically be called 
 a piafratis) successful, is to throw a holy image, which may be 
 bought for a few pence, into a wtW, and then to celebrate the 
 finding of this ima^e as a miracle. Russian literature is full of 
 examples of these deceptions. It is sufficient in this place to re- 
 call a description by Dostoevsky. From this it is clear that such 
 proceedings have nothing to do with religious motives : they 
 are simply set on foot for the sake of gain. The holiness of the 
 infirm father Sossima was celebrated by his cloister brothers as 
 long as they speculated upon the fact of being able to exploit 
 his bones as wonder-working relics. But after the death of the 
 holy father, when the smell of corruption proceeding from his 
 body could no longer be concealed, his cloister brothers de- 
 
294 APPENDIX. 
 
 famed his memory, and branded him as a heretic who had 
 disturbed them in their theological speculations. (" Die Bruder 
 Karamazov," Leipzig, 1884.) These religionists are not ashamed 
 to make use of such deceptions for ecclesiastical and political 
 ends. At Piichlitz, in Esthonia, a holy well was created to lend 
 a. pretext for forbidding the completion of the neighbouring 
 Lutheran affiliated church at Illuk (which building went to 
 ruins in the meantime), and to instal a Greek orthodox priest 
 at Piichlitz. 
 
 Note 18, Page 89. 
 
 One of the most enlightened men and accomplished officers 
 of his time, Petr Yakovlevich Chadaev attempted to do so half 
 a century ago : he was officially declared to be mad, was arrested 
 and placed in charge of a doctor. No one has had the courage 
 to follow his example. 
 
 Note 19, Page 92. 
 
 The so-called " Religious Union of Lithuania " (to Roman 
 Catholicism) was effected on December 23, 1595, in Rome. It 
 was altogether a sham business, concocted by the Jesuits, 
 against the wishes of the Lithuanian and Oukrainien people, 
 then under the rule of the Polish kings. Two dishonest 
 bishops, Hypatius Potsey and Cyril Terletsky, treacherously 
 acted as representatives of the Lithuanian and Oukrainien 
 (orthodox) clergy and people, after which the Polish kings and 
 magnates began to enforce the "Union" among the Lithuanians 
 and Oukrainiens. The misfortunes and miseries, together with 
 the bloodiest civil wars that followed, were indescribable. The 
 greater part of the orthodox population did not submit to the 
 Union, but a small minority was forced into it, and as centuries 
 went on they became as devoted Roman Catholics as their 
 forefathers were Greek Catholics. In 1839 a " Uniat " bishop, 
 Syem^shko by name, with some other persons of the same 
 stamp, played, in an opposite direction, the same part which 
 Potsey and Terletsky played centuries ago. They concocted a 
 petition signed in the name of the " Uniats," asking for reunion 
 
APPENDIX. 295 
 
 with " Orthodoxy," and presented it to the Emperor Nicholas 
 I. That petition never really represented the wishes of the 
 bulk of the Uniat population. Nevertheless it was most 
 graciously received by the Tsar, and the "Union" of 1595 
 annulled. Since then if the former Uniats do not choose to 
 regard themselves as " Orthodox " they are treated like violators 
 of the religious laws of the Empire, they are harassed, perse- 
 cuted, and exiled. — Ed. 
 
 Note 20, Page 98. 
 
 " Vart land ar fattigt, kail so bli 
 For den, som guld begar ; 
 En framling far oss stolt forbi." . . . 
 
 (" Our country is poor, and will remain so 
 For him who desires gold ; 
 A stranger passes us proudly by." . . .) 
 
 Note 21, Page ioi. 
 
 Dr. E. Mechehn, " Das Staatsrecht des Grossfiirstentums 
 Finnland," in " Handbuch des offentlichen Rechts der Gegen- 
 wart," &c., edited by Dr. Heinrich Marquardsen, iv. 2, Freiburg 
 im Breisgau, 1889, p. 245. 
 
 Note 22, Page 121. 
 
 The revolution had already been accomplished in Stockholm 
 by a mere chance, even at the time when Sprengporten was 
 going to embark with the Finnish troops, who had taken the 
 oath of fidelity to the king. 
 
 Note 23, Page 126. 
 
 The following figures may give an idea of the importance 
 of this development. About 1620 the number of inhabitants 
 in Finland was estimated at scarcely 300,000. By the end of 
 
2q6 appendix. 
 
 r 
 
 the seventeenth century it had increased to 700,000. The 
 terrible years of bad crops and famine, 1 674-1 676, 1 687-1 688,, 
 and 1695-1697, in the last of which alone 100,000 people died, 
 together with emigrations and the sufferings of the Northern 
 war, reduced the population after the peace of Ngstadt (1721) 
 to 200,000, or at most 250,000 The first census of 1749 
 (the first that was taken) showed for Swedish Finland about 
 420,000, and for Russian Finland about 100,000 ; in 1785,. 
 680,000 + 177,000 ; and in 1809, 900,000 + 200,000. Of these, 
 through the failure of crops and increased mortality, lo5,26o' 
 people died in a single year. In the whole of Finland, in the 
 years 1812, 1825, 1853, and 1865, the number of the inhabitants 
 amounted to 883,832, 1,259,151, 1,698,101, and 1,843,000 re- 
 spectively. After the terrible failure of crops and the autumn 
 frosts of 1 867- 1 868, the population in 1869 only numbered 
 about 1,736,000, but in 1880 it rose to 2,060,782, and at the end 
 of 1886 it was 2,232,378. Whereas during a long period of the 
 Swedish rule trade and industry had been artificially kept down 
 in Finland, in 1851 it possessed 148 manufactures with a produce 
 value of about five million Finnish marks (or francs), and in 
 1876 this value reached the figure of 60 millions. In the year 1850' 
 the total trade returns of Finland only amounted to 43 millions, 
 but in 1882 it reached 286 millions (in 1881 : imports, I54'8: 
 millions ; exports, 107' 3 millions). In the year 1825 Finland 
 possessed only 250 ships trading with foreign parts, in 1851 
 she had 539, together with 900 coasting vessels ; although the 
 number of Finnish merchant ships had been reduced by the 
 Crimean war to 341, in 1882 the mercantile navy of Finland 
 comprised 1980 vessels, among them 152 steamers. The state 
 revenue which in former 'times did not exceed the value of 
 1,300,000 Finnish marks, represented in 1810, 1830, and i860 
 the figures 6,700,000, 8,560,000, and 19,900,000 respectively,, 
 whereas in 1882 it reached the impressive total of 36,320,714. In 
 1880 Finland possessed a University with about 700 students, 
 a polytechnic institution, two agricultural academies, a school, 
 of forestry, a cadet corps, and several naval and commercial 
 schools, together with 17 grammar schools, and 7 higher schools 
 for girls, as well as 570 national schools vi'ith some 27,000- 
 scholars. 
 
APPENDIX. 2C)r 
 
 Note 24, Page 132. 
 
 " Yet this land we love ; 
 For us, with' moors, fells, and scars, 
 A land of gold it is ! 
 
 Thy blossom, enfolded as in a bud. 
 
 Will burst forth. 
 
 Behold, by our love will arise 
 
 Thy light, thy splendour, thy joy, thy hope : 
 
 Then louder let us sing once more 
 
 The song of our native home." 
 
 These lines are the immediate sequel to those given on page 
 295, note 20. The whole (11 strophes) is from the pen of John 
 Louis Runeberg ; the tune to it was composed by Pacius. 
 
 Note 25, Page 136. 
 
 The first meeting between the two, and the cordial reception 
 of Marie in the house of her father-in-law, are described in few 
 and homely words, but with an incomparable depth of feeling. 
 This passage may be confidently compared with the most 
 beautiful passages in the literature of the world. The trans- 
 lation gives a flat and colourless rendering of it. 
 
 Note 26, Page 166. 
 
 Chadaev, a former officer of the guards, was a tragic figure 
 in modern Russian history. A man of brilliant abilities and 
 noble heart, he resented bitterly the degrading position in 
 which the Russian nation was tyrannically kept under Nicholas 
 I. One of the results of that patriotic resentment was an 
 article, entitled "A Philosophical Letter," which he inserted 
 (1836) ina Moscow review called The Telescope. In his essay 
 Chadaev denounced the (then) present condition of the 
 Russian people as a hopeless, blank desert, or rather a stagnant 
 morass. His explanation of the fact was not very happy. He 
 rightly sought it in Russia's deplorable past, but the conclusion 
 derived by him. from his researches was that the misfortune of 
 
298 APPENDIX. 
 
 the Russians was their not being Roman Catholics. His praise 
 of Catholicism did not produce much effect, but his criticism of 
 Russian life did. Unfortunately a mean individual, Vi'gel by 
 name, called the attention of Count Benkendorf (the chief of 
 the state police) to the article by sending him a vile insinuation 
 against Chadaev. The latter was by order of the Tsar 
 proclaimed a madman, and forbidden to write anything more, 
 and everybody who had to do with the publication of Chadaev's 
 "letter" was severely punished. Alexander Herzen after- 
 wards stigmatised all that revolting episode thus : " The Ger- 
 man, Vigel, took offence on account of offended Russia, the 
 Protestant, and future Roman Catholic, Benkendorf, took 
 offence on account of offended (Greek Catholic) Orthodoxy, 
 and Chadaev, by virtue of His Imperial Majesty's public lie, 
 was proclaimed insane, and a signed promise not to write any 
 more was wrung from him." — Ed. 
 
 Note 27, Page 212. 
 
 This is precisely the attitude of mind of the non-Chauvinist 
 Russian patriots of to-day — i.e., of those who find themselves 
 debarred from giving expression to their opinions in the press. 
 They desire nothing more ardently than a disaster to the Russian 
 arms. This they regard as the entirely necessary preliminary 
 condition for the more prosperous future of Russia. The 
 eagerness of the Chauvinists for a war is in this way ac- 
 centuated. • This dangerous circumstance is unhappily too 
 little regarded by Europe — politically rent asunder and there- 
 fore threatened. 
 
 Note 28, Page 217. 
 
 It is difficult for an unprejudiced outsider to see "firmness" 
 on the part of Alexander II. in the fact of his conducting a con- 
 versation in a way which leads the interlocutor to believe that 
 the Emperor was " shaken " while he all the time was deter- 
 mined to take a decisive step. Nor can we call " firmness " 
 the method of appointing men opposed to reforms for their 
 carrying out. In fact, Alexander II. was anything but a deter- 
 
APPENDIX. 299 
 
 mined man, and facts which seem to the German avithor to 
 prove his firmness, prove quite the contrary — that he was a 
 "trimmer" and an insincere man, who always wavered in his 
 decisions, never fully believed in his own plans, and therefore 
 put obstacles in the way of fulfilling those very plans, thus pre- 
 paring them to be a failure from the first ; and, having in his 
 character a good deal of sentimentality (not real warmth) and 
 indifference, tried, as the first thing, to keep peaceful and plea- 
 sant relations with everybody by means of seeming to agree with 
 them (compare also pp. 240-241, and note 35, p. 302). It 
 was a generally known fact that signs of increasing affection on 
 the part of the Emperor were alanning to his ministers, mean- 
 ing approaching dismissal, and when the latter finally happened 
 Alexander II. embraced his " faithful servant," thanked him for 
 his "good work," and sometimes even shed a few tears "of 
 regret." His son and successor is said to have inherited his 
 father's insincerity, without, however, any sentimentality. It is 
 well known that, at his accession to the throne, when a mani- 
 festo about the event was discussed at the ministerial council, 
 he showed to the then Prime Minister, Loris Melikov, all the 
 tokens of his benevolence, and accordance with Melikov's, 
 Milyutin's, and Abaza's constitutional views ; but Loris Melikov 
 had not had time to make up a draught of the manifesto before 
 another one was drawn by Pobyedonostsev in the diametrically 
 opposite sense, and approved by the Emperor without Melikov 
 knowing anything about it. The writer of these hnes has 
 learned from Chamberlain J. J. Krassovsky (and Governor of 
 the Tomsk province) — quite a reliable source in that instance — 
 a fact of minor significance, but of the same character. When 
 the felonious squandering of national lands in the Oufi and 
 Orenbdurg provinces (1859-1880), perpetrated by Governor- 
 General Krizhanovsky and others, came to light, that gentleman 
 went to St. Petersburg to ask for a few months' leave. Not 
 only was he admitted in the Emperor's presence, but' the latter 
 showed him no signs of displeasure, shook hands with him, and 
 gave him the leave, while, in fact, the man was already a dis- 
 missed official, and the next morning informed of it. It must 
 be remembered that the Governors-General are appointed and 
 dismissed by the Tsar personally. — Ed. 
 
300 APPENDIX. 
 
 Note 29, Page 333. 
 It was theoretically supposed that the profit a serf-owiier 
 derived from his serfs was a kind of payment given by the 
 latter for those portions of their master's land they tilled for 
 themselves. Consequently it was decided in principle that the 
 liberated serfs should have to pay their former masters for the 
 land they were to be endowed with a sum which would com- 
 pensate the landowners for the profits they were now going to- 
 lose, together with the souls and bodies of the peasants. In 
 reality the overwhelming majority of the serf-owners got from 
 them, not only the rent (for the land), but without comparison 
 more, simply profiting by their power over the peasants, and 
 making them work as much as they possibly could. Thus the 
 adoption of the above principle of compensation for allotinents 
 meant in reality making the peasants pay not only for the land 
 they got, but also — under that pretext — for their personal 
 liberation. In other words, the obligatory price of the allot- 
 ments was raised enormously. The projects of the Formulating 
 Commission were finally brought before the Chief Committee, 
 and here Alexander II.'s system — to put the bitterest enemies- 
 of a reform in those very institutions which had to carry out 
 the reform^produced its bitter fruit, notwithstanding the Tsar's- 
 personal support of the Liberal party. The Chief Committee,, 
 which consisted of the most inveterate representatives of the 
 slave-holding school, like Prince Orlov, Count Pdnin, &c., cur- 
 tailed the 7wrm of the allotments, raised still higher the valua- 
 tion, and introduced a very cunning new scheme (Gagarin's 
 plan) : any serf, if he preferred to do so, could have, instead of 
 his allotment, for which he had to pay, only one-fourth of it 
 free of charge. This in reality meant the making of those 
 unfortunate owners regular proletaires, and a large portion of the 
 peasantry went into the trap. As for the valuation, it was- 
 proved many years later that, for example, in the Chernigov 
 province the peasant allotments were valued thirty times higher 
 than the market price of the land in those localities. — Ed. 
 
 Note 30, Page 224. 
 Koshelev and his German eulogiser unfortunately forgot oa 
 
APPENDIX. 301 
 
 that occasion that the local committees consisted of representa- 
 tives of only one of the parties interested — the nobility. As to 
 the serfs, they had no representatives. 
 
 Note 31, Page 224. 
 
 The members of the local committee took part in the 
 <iebates of the committee of supervision in two series. 
 Koshelev belonged to the first series : a fruitless attempt 
 was also made by the members of the second series to enlarge 
 the powers of the deputies. 
 
 Note 32, Page 226. 
 
 The gradual impoverishment of the peasantry was to be 
 •easily predicted. But it would be a great mistake to believe 
 that the explanation of the fact lies in "the peasants' failure to 
 manage their own affairs." With the best abilities possible no 
 ■one could prosper under conditions like the following : i. The 
 valuation of the land allotted to the peasants was so high that 
 they had to pay away for years and years all the revenue which 
 their lots yielded them, and to get some accessory income (by 
 extra work, cattle-breeding, or the like) to pay the surplus ; 2. 
 The budget of the State, which fell mostly upon the peasantry, 
 increased year after year in an alarming proportion ; and 3. 
 The movements of the people, and the spirit of enterprise, as 
 also the popular education, were hindered at every step by the 
 bureaucratic system of administration. — Ed. 
 
 Note 33, Page 227. 
 
 For the saTie of completeness it must be noted that 
 Koshelev's friend, Khomyakov, and Constantine Aksakov, the 
 iprincipal founders of the Slavophil party, died about this 
 time. Ivan Kiryeevsky predeceased them in 1856. From that 
 time the authoritative influence of Ivan Aksakov and Samarin, 
 to whom Koshelev was opposed, began. 
 
 Note 34, Page 229. 
 This shows that Koshelev did not know everything about 
 
302 APPENDIX. 
 
 the Russian peasantry. And really the peasants were not at 
 all so stupid and illogical as the German author believes then\ 
 to have been. They were "serfs," i.e., men "bound to the 
 soil." Were the law strictly observed they ought not to be sold 
 separately from the land they tilled. Consequently they 
 regarded themselves as inseparable from the soil (and the idea 
 was quite in accordance with history). They did not deny- 
 their being a kind of living property of the nobles, but a pro- 
 perty inseparably combined with the land. Now that the Tsar, 
 who, both according to law and public opinion, had all the 
 right to restore them their liberty, did so— they understood they 
 were liberated with the soil, of which they were always regarded 
 as the attributes. They could not conceive what it was they 
 had to pay for. And it was also as inconceivable to the Radi- 
 cals. There was certainly not either much justice or logic in 
 making the victims of a historical crime pay the expenses of 
 its redemption. If, however, it was supposed that to compen- 
 sate the serf-owners for their losses was practically unavoidable^ 
 it was a duty for the whole nation, not for the peasants alone. 
 The Government ought to make a fair valuation of the lands 
 allotted to the peasants and pay the value from the fisc. And, 
 such were the suggestions of the Radicals at the time. — Ed. 
 
 Note 35, Pagh 245. 
 Koshelev has enlarged upon the difference between his. 
 conceptions and those of Cherkasky in a detailed record 
 appended to his " Memoirs," which he sent to the Emperor m 
 November, 1866, and of which the Emperor fully approved. 
 The day after this record was sent in, Milyutin had an apoplec- 
 tic seizure ; Cherkasky hastened to St. Petersburg, received 
 from the Emperor the assurance that the previous system would 
 be adhered to, and already regarded himself as the successor of 
 Milyutin in the Polish State secretaryship. Next day he learned 
 that an opponent of his principles, the afterwards notorious 
 minister of justice, Nabokov, had received this appointment.. 
 He was commanded to return immediately to his post at 
 Warsaw. He replied by sending in his resignation, which was 
 at once accepted. The Prince went to Moscow, where he was. 
 soon afterwards chosen Lord Mayor. 
 
APPENDIX. 303 
 
 Note 36, Page 250. 
 
 The two latter periodicals were monthlies. Of these, Kra- 
 yeevsky never either edited or published the Sovremennik ("The 
 Contemporary"). But when that Radical and socialistic maga- 
 zine was suppressed by the Government, its chief editor, the 
 poet Nekrassov, entered into an agreement with Krayeevsky, ac- 
 cording to which Krayeevsky's monthly, Otechestverftiya Zapiski 
 (" The Annals of the Fatherland "), which by this time had 
 become altogether insignificant, and without any definite 
 political and social platform, came into the hands of the Sovre- 
 mennik staff, now strengthened by some new and talented men, 
 and continued the traditions of Sovremennik, while Krayeevsky 
 remained nominally its editor, and in fact its chief owner. — Ed. 
 
 Note 37, Page 261. 
 
 Only comparatively, because by that time the Sovreme?inik 
 had acquired in the person of N. Chernish^vsky a worthy suc- 
 cessor to Byelinsky, and had taken up the lead among the better 
 part of reading Russia. — Ed. 
 
 Note 38, Page 263. 
 
 Never did any other satirical leaflet surpass in these qualities 
 the Svistok, which at that time was conducted by a writer of 
 first-class talent, equally skilful in prose and verse, Dobrolubov 
 by name, who was assisted by such brilliant stars as Saltikov, 
 Chernishevsky, Nekrassov, and Elisseev. But the Golos had. 
 over the Svistok the advantage of being a daily, while Svistok 
 (as a supplement, incorporated with the Sovremennik) appeared 
 only once a month. — Ed. 
 
 Note 39, Page 264. 
 
 It must be plainly said that while this "flexibility" was 
 inevitable for the existence and development of a paper with 
 the circulation and resources of the Golos, it meant, on the other 
 hand, unsteadiness in principle, and, by its practice, cultivated 
 in the public the inclination to treat unflinching adherence to 
 principles very lightly. — Ed. 
 
304 APPENDIX. 
 
 Note up. Page 270. 
 
 1 1 is only fair to remind the reader how really that " outrageous 
 breach of the law" happened, and what it really meant. General 
 Trepov, a personal favourite of the late Imperial couple, ordered 
 2. political prisoner, and former student of the St. Petersburg 
 University, Bogolubov by name, to be flogged in the so-called 
 " House of Preliminary Detention," a model prison of the 
 capital. This outrage was a breach of both the inner sense 
 and the formal side of the law, as it was utterly unprovoked by 
 Bogolubov, and as the prison was under the rule of the Minister 
 ■of Justice (Count P^len), and Trepov had no right to give any 
 orders there. Besides, it, was the vilest insult to humanity, 
 because the whole brutality was done to show openly and pro- 
 vokingly that Trepov in his position could defy any law and the 
 so-called rights of man. People were already sick with the 
 tendency of Russian officialdom to trample down the rights of 
 citizens, and the general expectation was that this time inso- 
 lence would be punished by the Government. It was bound to 
 put Trepov to trial by the very laws it had proclaimed. But 
 the'Government preferred to break the law. Months passed, 
 and it only tried to hush the case. Then a courageous young 
 woman resolved to punish the offender in the name of insulted 
 humanity, or rather, to bring the case before the tribunal of 
 the conscience of the nation. And the verdict of the jury has 
 shown that she acted in accordance with the imperative, though 
 unoutspoken, requests of that conscience. — Ed. 
 
 Note 41, Page 270. 
 
 A school corresponding, as to its place in the educational 
 system, to an English high school or grammar school, but 
 -with a more encyclopaedic course. — Ed. 
 
 Note 42, Page 271. 
 
 Both titles belong really to the same association, the first 
 being its colloquial, the second its official, name. It was 
 
APPENDIX. 305 
 
 founded by a well-known writer and translator of Shakespeare, 
 Drouzhinin, but Krayeevsky was for a long time its president.^^ 
 Ed. 
 
 Note 43, Page 273. 
 
 The best Liberal daily paper ever published in Russia was 
 the Moscow Telegraph (1881-83), edited by the barrister, Rod- 
 zevich (in Moscow), but it was suppressed very quickly. — Ed. 
 
 Note 44, Page 276. 
 
 Here the German author makes again a mistake. Spasso- 
 vich (who, by the way, is a lawyer) never edited the Messenger 
 of Europe. Its joint editor is Pipin, formerly Professor of 
 Universal Literature at the University of St. Petersburg, and 
 later joint editor of the Sovrem^nnik. Stassulevich in former 
 times was also Professor (of History) at the same University 
 (but never a lawyer), and Lecturer on Universal History to 
 Czarevich Nicholas (brother to the present Emperor), who 
 died when heir-apparent. — Ed. 
 
 Note 45, Page 276. 
 
 Besides the Messenger of Europe there are at present two 
 other monthlies in Russia which try to be independent, honest, 
 and advanced : the Russian Thought and the Northern Mes- 
 senger. The former has secured the collaboration of the most 
 noted and brilliant of Russian leading spirits in Russian 
 literature, N. K. Mikhailovsky, the commentator, and opposer, 
 in a certain sense, of H. Spencer and B. Darwin. The Nor- 
 thern Messenger tries to bring to the front the new generation 
 of writers. Both, however, cannot speak openly on the most 
 urgent questions, and their existence is a hard one in every 
 way. — Ed. 
 
 Note 46, Page 278. 
 
 Kamatscheiew, a Russian Governor of the province of 
 Kovno, in 1866 wrote as follows on the subject of these 
 missionary officials :— 
 
 " Our internal administration has always lacked capable and 
 21 
 
3o6 APPENDIX. 
 
 trustworthy officers. When Muraev asked in 1864 that Russian 
 officials should be sent to, the territory under the Governor- 
 General of Vilna, the chiefs of our administration took the oppor- 
 tunity to get rid of the pack with whom they could do nothing 
 at home. These good-for-nothings flung themselves upon the 
 Western (Lithuanian) provinces like vultures upon carrion. My 
 predecessor was compelled to send them home by waggon 
 loads, at the expense of the State. I could only follow his 
 example, taking the greatest precautions to prevent the travel- 
 lers from spending their journey-money upon drink. The 
 Polish officials were incomparably more respectable and 
 intelligent than those sent out to us, but they were politically 
 unreliable," and so on. 
 
 Note 47, Page 284. 
 
 A part of the correspondence between Hilferding and 
 Rayevsky fell in 1877 into the hands of the Turkish officials, 
 by whom it was published. Little attention was paid to these 
 important documents, which were soon forgotten in the tur- 
 moil of that year of war.