\0 n -^ V- wv ^-^ ^ ^ ^ -~^^ "^^ V* O- V 0) ' . t- ^v^ V .'^^ ..-Jy^ ,-^^ C A • ^' '^^^■^ .A 0^ ^' .^ -^^o.*^ -x<'\- V. *■ ^^^y^-'Li-' :^ V- , :M .0' ,^^ '^^^^ ^^ V^ <' ■? " H -r. Contemporary Ubougbt Series I. ZIONISM AND ANTI-SEMITISM. By Max NoRDAU and Dr. Gustave Gottheil. Price, 75 cents net. II. THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA. By Alfred Rambaud. Second Edition enlarged with an Es- say on **The Russian People" by J. Novicow. Price, ^i.oo net. III. ISSUES OF THE NEW EPOCH. Essays on the Important Political and Social Questions of the United States. By Joseph B. Bishop, Chief of the Editorial Staff of the New York Globe. Price, $1.25 net. IV. PROBLEMS OF THE EAST. A series of Es- says by Max Nordau, Kentaro Kaneko, Charles W. Conant, Prof. F. W. Williams, Prof. Garrett Droppers and the Hon. John W. Foster. Price, $1.25 net. V. ART AND ARTISTS. Essays by John La Farge, Russell Sturgis, W. J. Stillman, Ken- yon Cox, and Will H. Low. Price, ^^1.50 net. Contents : 1 . ART AND ARTISTS, by John La Farge. 2. RUSKIN, ART AND TRUTH, by John La Farge. 3. FINE ART AS DECORATION, by Rus- sell Sturgis. 4. ART AS A MEANS OF EXPRESSION, by W. J. Stillman. 5. NATURAL EXPRESSION IN AMERI- CAN ART, by Will H Low, 6. ENGLISH PAINTING AND FRENCH, by Kenyon Cox. Other Volumes to be Announced Later SCOTT-THAW COMPANY 542 FIFTH AVENUE : : : : : NEW YORK THE ! EXPANSION OF RUSSIA PROBLEMS OF THE EAST AND PROBLEMS OF THE FAR EAST BY ALFRED RAMBAUD "Wiib. an Essay on the RUSSIAN PEOPLE BY J. NOVICOW j^ SECOmSPltlON :> : ■ ■ >' :> y NEW YORK SCOTT-THAW COMPANY J904 ^'ol^^^a^ .7? 'd '2. -i 1 LIBRARY of CONGRESS Two Cooles Received APR 21 1904 Ctpyrieht Entry CLA'SS CtXXc. No. COPY A Copyright by FREDERICK A. RICHARDSON 1900 Copyright by SCOTT-THAW CO. 1904 c c c c r 'CO ac • a *;s Contemporari? 'Sbougbt Series THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA • AND THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE CONTENTS PAGE THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA 1 The Origin of the Russian State and Na- tion. The Tartar-Mongols. Principality OF Moscow. The Unity of Russia. Isola- tion. The Aim of Russian Diplomacy. THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA IN EUROPE. 25 Peter the Great. Poland. The Eastern Question. Latin and Greek Churches. Catherine the Great. Turkish Wars. Greek Independence. Crimean War. The Balkan States. Nihilism, Results of European Wars. Nicholas II. THE SOUTHWARD EXPANSION OF RUSSIA IN ASIA 57 An Asiatic Power. Wars and Treaties with Persia. A Way to the Indian Ocean. In the Caucasus. Paramount in Persia. FURTHER CONQUESTS 68 Expansion towards India. Napoleon. The Conquest OF THE Khans. In Afghan- istan. The " Key of the Indies." In Touch with India. Abyssinia. British Over-Confidence. CONTENTS PAGE THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST 90 The Opening of Siberia. Value of Siberia. Chinese Wars. Settlements on the Pacific. Chinese Cessions. Vladivostock. Russian Influence at Pekin COREA 102 The China-Japan War. Interference of Russia. Conflict with Japanese Inter- ests. Russia's Gain. CHINA 108 Russian Concessions. Port Arthur. Rail- ways. Loans. Corea. Germany. Great Britain. The United States. THE MEANS AND METHODS OF RUSSIAN EXPANSION 116 Fruits of Diplomacy. Absolutism of Russian Government. An Enlightened Despotism. "^ Russian Colonists. Race Characteristics. Religion. Population. Franco - Russian Alliance. From the Baltic to the Pacific. THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE: A Psychological Study 139 I. Race and Teimperament. II. General Psychology. III. Sentiment. IV. Intel- lect. V. Politics. VI. Present State THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA. The Origin of the Russian State and Nation — - The Tartar-Mongols — Principality of Moscow — The Unity of Russia — Isolation — The Aim of Russian Diplomacy. We fail to discover, however far back we go towards the beginnings of the Russian State, any indication that this was ever des- tined to become a maritime power. In the ninth centm-y, the Slavic tribes that were to form the first political organization desig- nated by the name Russian, — the Slavo- Russian tribes, — occupied a territory securely shut in on the west, by the Poles and the Lithuanians; on the north, by the Finnish tribes, the Livonians, the Tchudis, and the Ingrians; on the east, Finnish tribes again, the Vesi, the Merians, the Muromians, and two Turkish tribes, the Meshtcheraks and the Khazars, that occupied all the northern 1 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA coast of the Black Sea; allowing but a single one of the Slavo-Russian peoples to hold a position upon its shores. Except at this point, these Slavo-Russian tribes nowhere had access to the coast. The shores of the White Sea and the Arctic Ocean were Fin- nish; those of the Baltic, Finnish or Scan- dinavian; those of the Black Sea were held by the Khazars, the Caucasian tribes, the Byzantine Empire, and the Bulgarians, a Finnish tribe that had imposed its name and sovereignty upon a certain number of Slavic tribes. In the East and North, the Slavs were not to be found even in those regions where afterwards rose the Russian capitals, Mos- cow and St. Petersburg. Beyond began those immense spaces that stretch away into the depths of Central Asia, and even to the Pacific Ocean, spaces peopled with Finnish and Turkish tribes, and other branches of the Uralo-Altaic family. Then, still further east, 2 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA were to be found certain peoples of the yellow race. To speak now only of the Russia of Europe, how did the Slavo-Russians, who in the ninth century held scarcely a fifth part of their present territory, succeed in securing pos- session of it all? A two-fold change came about during the centuries. On the one hand, the Slavo-Russians, very venturesome in disposition, following, at first, the course of the rivers and their tributaries, spread out over the vast plains that stretch away to the Ural Mountains; founding everywhere cities, villages, and markets right in the midst of the territory of the aboriginal tribes. On the other hand, they absorbed the greater part of those tribes, and imposed upon them their language, religion, and even their man- ners and customs. A double colonization, therefore, took place, a colonization of the soil and a colonization of the native. The ancient Uralo- Altaic tribes, subjugated or absorbed 3 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA by the Russians, has disappeared from the map of the empire. There persist still only some scattered remnants of them, surrounded by men of Russian race and speech, and destined soon to disappear. These aborigines are to be foimd in fairly compact groups only in those places where the severity of the climate, the barren character of the soil, the thick- ness of the forest, and the desert steppes check Russian civilization, an ethnographical medley, moreover, occupying only a very small and indifferently valuable part of the Euro- pean Russia of to-day.' Thus the primitive tribes of the Slavo- Russians formed an agglomeration which was everywhere well-nigh entirely shut off from any sea. This had a character essentially continental; the population was wholly agri- (0 Thus the Suomi, the Karelia and the Laplanders in Finland; the Zyrians and the Permians, in the northeast; the Tcheremisa, the Mordva, the Votiaki, the Meshtcheraks, and the Bashkirs on the river Volga, or between the Volga and the Ural Mountains and river. THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA cultural in character, and, except as fleets of light boats descended the Dnieper in the tenth century to harass Constantinople and to commit piracy on the Byzantine shores of the Black Sea, there was nothing to indi- cate that it would one day come forth as a maritime power. The Russia of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries was scarcely European. She was bound to Europe only by her form of relig- ion, and even that, borrowed from Byzantine, was an Oriental, an almost Asiatic form of Christianity. When there came about in the eleventh century the rupture between the Latin and Catholic Church of the West, and the Greek and Orthodox Church of the East, a still higher barrier was raised between the two parts of Europe. To the Western Christians, the Greeks and the peo- ples that they had evangelized, the Bulgar- ians, the Servians, the Moldavo-Wallachians, and the Russians, were only schismatics. 5 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA Now, while the Catholic peoples of the West, thanks to more favorable historical circum- stances, began to take shape as powerful nations in which an already well-advanced civilization went on developing, the schismatic peoples of Eastern Europe, assailed by suc- cessive invasions, from Asia, and after having long served as a living bulwark against bar- barism for ungrateful Europe, were checked in their historic evolution, and fell one after the other into servitude to pagan Mongols or Mohammedan Turks. The country where the Slavo-Russians first established themselves was only a prolonga- tion of the great plains which, scarcely broken by the Ural Mountains, extend to Behring's Sea, Okhotsk Sea, and the Sea of Japan. Geographically, topographically, this prim- itive Russia was already Asiatic. Just as the winds from Asia swept unhindered all this immense plain, so could the migration of peoples and invading expeditions, at times 6 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA originating near the Great Wall of China, pour unchecked over the Russian plains as far as the Carpathian Mountains and the Vistula. One of those revolutions, so frequent among the nomadic tribes of Asia, brought together from 1154 to 1227 under the blue banner of Temuchin, called Jenghis Khan, numerous tribes of shepherds and mounted nomads. They adopted as their collective name that of the Tartar-Mongols. At their head "the Inflexible Emperor," ^Hhe Son of Heaven," conquered Manchuria, the kingdom of Tan- gut, North China, Turkestan, and Great Bokhara, and founded an empire which extended from the Pacific to the Ural Moimtains. Under the successors of Jenghis Khan, these mounted hordes, maddened by the fury of war and conquest, crossed into Europe, fell upon Russia, then divided into numerous principalities, carried the capital cities by assault, annihilated, one after the other, the 7 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA armies of foot and horse sent against them, and in 1240 converted all Russia into a mere province of the Mongol Empire. The Russian princes and the chieftains of the Finnish tribes became vassals of the Great Khan/ who held his court on the banks of the Onon, an affluent of the Amur, or at Karakorum on the Orkhon, a stream emptying into Lake Baikal. They were also more directly the vassals of one of his vassals, the Khan of the Golden Horde, who was stationed at Sarai on the lower Volga. At this period the Tartar-Mongols, among whom Mohamimedanism was disseminated until about 1272, were still Buddhists, Sham- anists, or fetich worshippers; at heart very indifferent in matters of religion, and strangers to any thought of propagandism or of intoler- ance. They, therefore, . left the Russians in undisturbed possession of their religion, their (0 Consult Howorth, History of the Mongols, London 1876. Wolff, Geschichte der Mongolen, Breslau, 1872. L^on Cahun, Introduction a Vhistoire de VAsie, Paris, 1896. 8 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA laws, and their own princely dynasties. They merely exacted' tribute, and, in certain contin- gencies, military service; and every new Russian prince must go to receive his investiture either at Sarai, or even by a journey that would occupy years, at the court of the Great Khan. There they were compelled to prostrate them- selves at the foot of his throne, to defend them- selves against the accusations of enemies, or of their Russian rivals; and the Khan disposed of their heads as of their crowns. Many Russian princes were executed before his eyes. Some among these, the Russian Church honors as martyrs. Among the Russian princes who went there to prostrate themselves before the Horde were those who had founded round about a little market-town, the name of which is met with for the first time in 1147, a new principality, that of Moscow, one of the most insignificant of the Russian states of that period. It was established in the midst of a Finnish country, 9 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA among the Muromians. It formed, therefore, a colony of primitive Russia. The princes of Moscow knew how to turn to their own advantage the Mongol yoke that weighed on all Russia. They were more adroit than the others in flattering the common master and the agents that represented him in Russia. One of them, George (1303-1325), even married a Tartar princess. In their struggles against other Russian princes, they alway carried the controversy to the court of the Khan, who almost always decided in their favor, and sent them away with the heads of their rivals. They secured from the Khan the privilege of collecting the tribute, not only from their own subjects, but from the other princes of Russia. This function as tribute collector for the Khan raised them above all their equals; and the more humble vassals of the barbarians they showed themselves to be, the better did they establish their suzerainty over the other Chris- tian states. They succeeded thus in building 10 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA up a powerful state, which was called the ''Great PrincipaUty'' of Moscow. When they felt themselves to be strong enough, and perceived that the Mongol Empire had grown sufficiently weak through internal dissension and divisions to warrant the attempt, they turned against the barbarians the power that they owed to them. In 1380, the Grand Prince Dmitri, having refused payment of tribute, defeated Mamai, the Khan of the Golden Horde, at Kulikovo on the Don. But the Mongols were not yet as weak as Dmitri Donskoi (hero of the Don) had thought. Tamerlane, or Timur- Leng, had just conquered Tiu-kestan, Persia Asia Minor, and North Hindustan. One of his lieutenants, Tokhtamysh, having vainly summoned the Grand Prince, Dmitri, to appear before him, marched against Moscow, captured the city and its Kremlin, sacked the other cities of the principality, and everywhere reestablished Asiatic supremacy. Nevertheless, the Mongol yoke was not to survive long the 11 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA heroic effort made at Kulikovo. The great barbarian empires founded by Asiatic conquerors quickly fall to pieces. This historical law was verified in the Empire of Tamerlane, as in that of Jenghis Khan. Towards the end of the fifteenth century, the Mongol Empire of Asia was divided in the Mongol Empire of China, the Mongol Empire of India, the Mongol Kingdom of Persia, and a large mmiber of khanates in Turkestan and Siberia; and all those states were scarcely any longer Mongol save in name. In Russia itself, the Golden Horde was broken up. From its debris were formed the czarate of Kazan on the middle Volga, the khanate, or czarate, of Sarai, or Astrakhan, on the lower Volga, the horde of the Nogais, and the khanate of the Crimea. In 1476, Akhmed, the Khan of Sarai, sent a demand for tribute to the Grand Prince of Moscow, Ivan the Great. Ivan put the ambass- adors to death. Four years later, the Khan Akhmed marched upon Moscow with a large 12 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA army. Near the rivers Oka and Ugra he met the army of Ivan the Great; but neither of the adversaries dared force the passage of the two rivers. They remained there several days exchanging insults and darts from the opposite shores. Then a panic simultaneously arose in both armies; the one fleeing in the direction of Moscow, the other in the direction of Sarai. It was in this bloodless, inglorious way that the Mongol power in Russia came to an end. The Mongol yoke had continued two hundred and fifty-six years (1224-1480). It left in Russia traces that were for a long time ineffac- able. Before the Tartar conquest, the power of a Russian prince was founded upon Euro- pean origins. It recalled the patriarchal author- ity of the old-time chieftains of the Slavo- Russian tribes; the martial authority of the heads of the Scandinavian or Variagian clans, like Rorik and other Variagian chiefs, called into Russia, it is said, by the Slavs; and the authority, at once civil and religious, of the 13 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA Byzantine-Roman emperors, whom the succes- sors of Rorik, Hke all the barbarian chieftains of Eastern Em-ope, hked to take as models. After the Tartar conquest, on the contrary, the Russian princes, and especially the Grand Princes of Moscow, selected as prototypes of their own authority the Khans and Great Khans with their autocratic power, — coarse, irresponsible, Asiatic. From that time forward, they treated their vassals as they themselves had been treated by the Khans. Between the Grand Prince and his vassals, and between these and the peasants, the relations were those of brutal masters and trembling slaves. The sover- eign of Moscow did not differ from a Mongol Khan, from a Persian Shah, or from an Osmanli Sultan, save as he professed the orthodox reli- gion. He was a sort of a Christian Grand Turk. When the title of Grand Prince seemed to him unworthy of his increased power, the title that his ambition chose was none of those that the Christian rulers of the West then bore; it was 14 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA the one which the Khans of Siberia, of Kazan, or of Astrakhan had arrogated; it was the title of Czar, which, of course, has not any etymo- logical connection with that of Csesar, a fiction invented very much later. Such was the title that the heir of the Grand Princes of Moscow, Ivan the Terrible, solemnly took in 1547. Many other facts attest the predominance of Asiatic influences over the Russia of the six- teenth century. The costumes of the Czar of Moscow and of the other great lords, the princes and boyars, were Asiatic; Asiatic was the servile etiquette of the court; touching with the brow the foot of the throne, and the humble formulas in which the highest personages declared them- selves to be slaves; Asiatic was the seclusion of the women in the terem, which was a Russian harem ;^ Asiatic was the equipment of the royal (1) However, it is proper to call attention to the fact that the servile character of the court etiquette may also have been borrowed from Byzantium, and that the Russian terem may have had its original in the gynsecium of the Greeks. lo THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA cavalry with their high saddles and short stir- rups; their boots with the toe in the form of an upturned crescent; their armor reminding one of the Chinese and Japanese; their curved swords, their bows and quivers, and their head- dress, which resembled a turban surmounted by an aigrette. All this oriental apparel was to continue in vogue imtil the time when Peter the Great, with the violent measures of an Asiatic despot, forcibly introduced into Russia the short clothing of the West, — '^German dress,'' that is, European. With this change in cos- tume, he also brought in the fashion of shaving the face; the holding of social gatherings, which the recluses of the terem were compelled to attend; the etiquette of the Christian courts; the formulary of the German bureaucracy, and the imiforms, equipments, and tactics of the armies of the West While Russia was still groaning under the Mongol yoke, the Grand Princes of Moscow, utilizing their servitude as an instrument of 16 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA power, caused the other princes to bow before the terror of the Mongol, and brought about 'Hhe consoUdation of the Russian territory,'' that is to say, they founded the unity of Russia. When the family line of the Grand Princes and Czars of Moscow died out in 1598, and when there began for Russia 'Hhose troublous times (smoutndie Vr^mia)/' which the accession of the Romanofs brought to an end in 1613, the czar- ate of Moscow was already a very powerful state. In the North especially, by the annexation of the territories of the ancient republics of Nov- gorod and Pskof , the Muscovite supremacy was extended to the White Sea and the Arctic Ocean. On the west, in a series of wars against the Lithuanians and the Poles to ^'recover" from them Russian territory which they had formerly conquered, the Moscow czarate had carried its power beyond Pskof and Lake Pei'pus, and had reached the Dnieper at Kiev and Smolensk. In the South, it had reached 17 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA neither the Black Sea nor the Sea of Azov, from which it was separated by the Ukraine that still belonged to the Poles, by a republic of adventurers and pirates called the Zaporo- vians, by the khanate of the Crimean Tartars, by the camping-grounds of the Nogaian Tar- tars, and, finally, by the maritime power of the Ottomans on the Euxine. Eastward, Russian conquest and colonization had made great advances. The uniting of the old territories of Novgorod, and the annexation of those of the republic of Viatka, brought the Muscovite dom- ination to the Ural Mountains. The conquest of the czarate of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible, in 1552, gave him all the region of the middle Volga, and the conquest of the czarate of Astrakhan, two years later, placed in his power all the lower Volga country, with a part of the coast of the Caspian Sea. Finally, the con- quest of the khanate of Sibir, between the years 1579-1584, by the Cossack Irmak, carried the Russian eagles beyond the Urals, and 18 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA opened before them the immensities of Siberia. But the more extensive the Muscovite Empire became, the more it suffered from not having access to any sea which was all the year free from ice, or which would afford an outlet to the ocean. The Harbors of the White Sea were closed with ice eight months of the year; the Caspian Sea is only a great lake without an outlet. To reach the Baltic Sea, it would be necessary to battle against the Germans, the Poles, and the Swedes, the masters of all its shores. To gain access to the Black Sea, there were, again, the Poles to be fought, as well as the Tartars, the Zaporovians, and the Grand Turk. Now, the European neighbors of Russia were beginning to fear this great barbarian empire. They were convinced that it would become truly a terror to them the day on which, by obtaining regular communication with the West, it could thereby learn something of their civilization, their indus- tries, and, above all, their military art. They 19 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA understood that the backward condition of its civiUzation was the only safeguard against its ambitions. They, therefore, closed against it their eastern frontiers, and barred it out of the Baltic. At the time when Ivan the Terrible, profiting by the decadence into which the Sword- Bearers, the religious military order of the Livo- nians, had fallen, took their lands away from them, and raised his flag at their port of Narva, Poles, Germans, and Swedes imited against him; they incited fresh invasions of the Crimean Tar- tars, conspiracies and rebellion among his nobil- ity; and, after a bitter struggle of twenty-four years, compelled him to abandon his conquest in 1582. So long as Narva was in the hands of the Czar, Sigismund, King of Poland, did not have a moment's peace. When English merchants began to resort there, he wrote threatening let- ters to Queen Elizabeth, sununoning her to for- bid that traffic. ''Our fleet will seize all those who continue to sail thither; your merchants will be in danger of losing their liberty, their 20 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA wives and children, and their Hves/' And this confession escaped him: "We see by this new traffic the Muscovite, who is not only our enemy to-day, but the hereditary enemy of all free nations, furnishing himself thoroughly, not only with our guns and munitions of war, but, above all, with skilled workmen, who continue to prepare equipments of war for him, such as have been hitherto unknown to his barbaric people. * * * It would seem that we have thus far conquered him because he is ignorant of the art of war and the finesse of diplomacy. Now, if this comimerce continues, what will there soon be left for him to learn? '^ Thus, it was not merely unpropitious nature that kept Russia in a condition of blockade; but the jealousy of her neighbors mounted a most rigorous guard around these " barbarians'' of the North. The empire of Moscow remained condemned, like the agglomeration of Slavic tribes of the ninth and tenth centuries from which it had sprung, to a purely continental 21 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA life. It was shut up to its vast northern plains like the Swiss to his mountains, and seemed to have as little chance of ever becoming a maritime power. Hitherto, the Muscovite Empire with its mili- tary organization wholly Asiatic, with its noble-born knights and free peasants, with its infantry militia, the streltsy, with its old- fashioned artillery, with its regular troops of Cossacks, Tartars, and Calmucks, had been able to withstand victoriously Asiatic forces; but it could not maintain a struggle against the regular troops and improved weapons of the western nations. In order to make her mark in Europe, it was necessary for Russia to become European; but she could not become European if Europe persisted in holding her in a condition of blockade. It was a 'Wicious circle''; and it was reserved for the genius of Peter the Great to succeed in breaking that circle. Henceforth, we see Russian diplomacy, with 22 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA tireless patience, with a shrewdness equal to its persistency, endeavoring simultaneously in all directions to pierce the blockade. She strives to secure access to the Baltic Sea; and we shall have the Northern War of Peter the Great, the partition of Poland under Catherine II., the Finland question under the Czarina Ehzabeth, and under Alexander I. She strives to secure access to the Black Sea; and we shall have the Eastern Question in all its forms, from the first efforts of Peter the Great down to the war of 1877-78 of Alexander II. She strives to make herself mistress of the Caspian Sea, and the attempt made by Peter the Great will reach an end only imder Alexander III. She strives to secure access to the Indian Ocean, and we shall have the wars and treaties with Persia, Afghanistan, and England. She strives to secure access to the Okhotsk Sea, the Sea of Japan, and the Pacific Ocean, and we shall witness the work of Siberian colonization and all the phases of 23 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA the Far Eastern Question. The matter of securing new territory concerns her much less. It has been the supreme end of her efforts, at times continued for centuries, to reach a sea, — a sea free from ice, a sea opening into the ocean. 24 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA IN EUROPE. Peter the Great — Poland — The Eastern Question — Latin and Greek Churches — Catherine the Great — Turkish Wars — Greek Independence — Crimean War — The Balkan States — Nihilism — Results of European Wars — Nicholas II. We know with what energy and alterna- tion of success and failure Peter the Great struggled against the Swedish masters of the eastern and southern shores of the Baltic. We are amazed when we reflect that a war, lasting more than twenty-one years: a war that convulsed all Europe; that brought the Swedes into the heart of Russia and the Russians into the centre of Germany; that brought about the creation of a Russian army and navy imder the fire of the enemy, and that numbered a score of battles on land and sea, — should have ended in results apparently so 25 RUSSIA IN EUROPE meagre as were those gained by Russia in 1721 at the Treaty of Nystad; namely, the acquisition of four small provinces, Livonia, Esthonia, Ingria, and Karelia. But these provinces gave him on the Baltic the ports of Riga, Revel, and Narva; they gave him also the mouths of two rivers, the broad Neva and the Duna, or Dvina (not to be confounded with the other Dvina that empties into the White Sea). It was on the islets of the Neva that Peter the Great had founded, in 1703, on lands still disputed by the Swedes and by the floods, the capital of European Russia, St. Petersburg, protected on the west by the maritime fortress of Kronstadt. Yes, ''the Giant Czar" considered himself amply repaid for his efforts of twenty-one years by the fact that for his vast continental empire, still wrapped in Asiatic darkness, he had been able ''to open one window on Europe." This ^dndow was still a very narrow one. It was somewhat enlarged by Elizabeth, when, 26 RUSSIA IN EUROPE after a war foolishly undertaken by Sweden, she made that country, in the Treaty of Abo, 1743, surrender some districts in Finland. Later, Alexander I., during his short-lived aUiance with Napoleon, conquered from his recent ally, Gustavus III., all of Finland (Treaty of Fredericksham, 1809). Russia had now no longer anything to seek in that direction. Westward, between Russia, already power- ful and always war-like, and Prussia, now grown great in glory and strength, lay an extremely weak state made up of the king- dom of Poland, the grand duchy of Lithuania and some old-time Russian districts. The first three partitions of this state (1772, 1793, 1795), carried the Russian frontier to the Niemen, the Warthe, and the Dniester. Catherine II. completed these conquests by the annexation of Courland, w^hich had been a vassal dependency of the fallen kingdom. It is to be noted, however, that in what is 27 RUSSIA IN EUROPE called "the partition of Poland/' Catherine XL did not acquire any Polish, but merely Lithuanian territory that formerly had been Russian. If Napoleon I. had not attempted to reestablish on the Russian frontier a Polish kingdom under the name of 'Hhe grand duchy of Warsaw/' perhaps Russia would not have been ambitious to secure possession of any former Pohsh territory. After the fall of Napoleon, the Czar Alexander I. was obliged to appropriate a considerable part of this under the name of "the kingdom of Poland/' were it for no other reason than to prevent an in- crease of territory upon the part of the two German powers. Henceforth the western frontier of Russia was fixed. It has not changed since 1815, and, to admit the possibility of a change in the future, it would be necessary to admit the possibility of a total overturning of the European balance of power. Though Russian expansion towards the north was stopped by the icy solitudes of Lap- 28 RUSSIA IN EUROPE land, westward by the frontiers of states as firmly established as the German and Austro- Hmigarian Empires, yet for a long time a broad Avay remained open to Russia in the direction of the south. The decadence of the Ottoman Empire seemed to offer her the same favorable opportunities as did the decline of the Polish-Lithuanian Empire. In this di- rection, acquisition of territory promised to be infinitely more precious. The Russians could dream of the Black Sea, the Propontis, and the ^gean Sea becoming Russian lakes; of Christian peoples of the same religion (Rou- manians and Greeks), — and of some of the same religion and race (Bulgarians, Servians, Croatians, Bosnians, Herzegovinians, and Montenegrians), — welcoming the armies of a Liberator Czar, and joyfully accepting the domination of Russia in exchange for that of the Ottoman; and, finally, they could dream of Constantinople, the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire, freed from the yoke of the 29 RUSSIA IN EUROPE infidel; and of the cross taking the place of the crescent on the dome of Saint Sophia. Nevertheless, it was, perhaps, in the direction of the south, that Russia, in her schemes for expansion, after some brilliant successes, found herself the most completely deceived. For a long time the sovereigns that sat upon Russia's throne at Moscow, and then at St. Petersburg, were infatuated with this Oriental mirage. The Russian Orthodox Church urged them on in this course through sympathy with the Orthodox Christians who were in subjection to the infidel. Even the Roman Catholic Church at a certain time encouraged them in the hope that the sword of the Czar might accomplish both the deliv- erance of the Christians and the union of the two churches, that is to say, the subordination of the Greek Church to the Roman. It was Pope Paul III., who, at the advice of the Greek cardinal, Bessarion, offered to the Grand Prince of Moscow, Ivan the Great, the hand 30 RUSSIA IN EUROPE of his ward, Sophia Palseologus, the niece of the last Christian emperor of Constantinople. It was at Rome that the marriage took place, and it was the Pope who gave a dowry to the heiress of the Csesars of the East.^ It is from the time of this marriage that the double- headed eagle of the Palseologus took its place on the escutcheons and standards of the Rus- sian sovereigns. Paul III. was deceived in both his hopes; for the union of the two churches was never accepted at Moscow, and many years passed before a Russian army was able to advance a step southward. The second of the Romanofs, Alexis, father of Peter the Great, set the first landmark southward in the Treaty of Andrussovo with Poland, in 1667, by acquir- ing a part of the Ukraine, extending as far as the upper course of the Dnieper. Vast spaces still separated the Russian and the Ottoman Empires. Nevertheless, in the coolest and (i) Le R. Prerling, La Russie et Vorient — mariage d'un tsar au Vatican, FsLYis, 1891; La Russie et le saint-siege, 2 vols., Paris, 1896-'97. 31 RUSSIA IN EUROPE shrewdest minds brooded the idea of a holy war against the infidel. Peter the Great, still young and journeying in Western Europe, learning its arts and himself wielding the car- penter's axe at Saardam, wrote, in 1697, to Adrian, the Patriarch of Moscow: '^We are laboring in order thoroughly to conquer the art of the sea, so that having completely learned it, on our return to Russia, we may be vic- torious over the enemies of Christ, and by His grace be the liberator of the down-trodden Christians. This is what I shall never cease to desire until my latest breath." Upon his return to Russia, however, his struggle with Sweden occupied all his attention. It was only in 1711, when his enemy, Charles XII., a refugee in the domains of the Grand Turk, earnestly sought to have the latter take up arms against Russia, that Peter the Great allowed himself to be tempted by the appeal which the hospodars of Moldavia and Wallachia, Montenegrian envoys, and Greek 32 RUSSIA IN EUROPE agents addressed to him in the name of Chris- tians who were oppressed and ready to rise in revolt. He found immense spaces to be trav- ersed; and crossed the Pruth with only thirty- eight thousand starving and harassed soldiers. He discovered that all the promises of the Levantines were unwarranted; he met neither allies nor help; and beset by two hundred thousand Turks, or Tartars, he had to consider himself fortunate to get back again across the rivers, after having signed the Treaty of Falksen, or of the Pruth, which restored to the Ottomans his first conquest, the city of Azov. The second southward step of the Russians was the conquest of a bit of territory that was peopled with Servian colonists, and that was called New Servia. This acquisition was won by the Treaty of Belgrade in 1739; but it had cost the Empress Anna Ivanovna three years of war and useless victories, and nearly one hundred thousand men. The third was a gigantic step. After the 33 RUSSIA IN EUROPE first war against the Turks, Catherine II. found herself checked by the intervention of Prussia and Austria, who -compelled her to renounce nearly all her eastern conquests, and to accept a compensation in Poland. Nevertheless, by the treaty of Kai'rnaji, in 1774, she had ceded to her Azov on the Don, and Kinburn at the mouth of the Dnieper. She forced the Sultan to recognize the inde- pendence of the Tartars of the Bug, of the Crimea, and of the Kuban. This was to pre- pare for their annexation to Russia, which was successfully accomplished and sanctioned by the Constantinople Compact of 1784. All the north shore of the Black Sea and of the Dniester, as far as the Kuban River, now became Russian. The last Mohammedan states of Russia were converted into prov- inces of the empire, and the last vestige of "the Tartar yoke'' was effaced from Russian soil. At once in the Tauric peninsula and at the 34 RUSSIA IN EUROPE mouths of the rivers arose formidable for- tresses, Kherson, Kinburn, and, on a bay of the Crimea, Sevastopol was made ready- to control the Black Sea. An entire Russian fleet was built up, which could in two days cast anchor before the walls of the Seraglio. The conquest of the Turkish Empire, impos- sible to Peter the Great, seemed to become easy for Catherine the Great. In the trium- phant journey that she next accomplished through the conquered provinces, her route was crowded with triumphal arches, bearing this inscription: ''The way to Byzantium.'^ She herself provoked the second Turkish war (1787-1792). The Russian armies, every- where victorious, advanced to the Danube. The janissaries and spahis of the Sultan could not stop them in their course. But again did European diplomacy intervene. Catherine II. had to give up the Roimianian hospodarates, which had been entirely subdued, and be sat- isfied with Otchakov, and a strip of territory 35 RUSSIA IN EUROPE between the Bug and the Dniester, and with guarantees more explicit than those of 1774 in favor of the Roumanian principahties. This arrangement, accompUshed at the Treaty of Yassy, 1792, estabUshed over these prin- cipahties a sort of distant Russian protectorate. Thus, although four Russian interventions had already occurred, not an inch of Christian territory had been wrested from the Sultan, and not a Christian tribe had been delivered from his yoke. The fifth intervention took place under Alexander I. So long as his alliance, made at Tilsit in 1807, with Napoleon continued, his armies were victorious. The Roumanians were again conquered as far as the Danube; Bulgaria, conquered as far as the Balkans; and under George the Black (Kara-Georges), Servia won her independence with her own forces alone. The rupture with Napoleon compelled the Czar to sign the peace of Buch- arest with the Sultan in 1812. Of all his con- 36 RUSSIA IN EUROPE quests, he retained only a bit of Roumanian territory, Bessarabia between the Dniester and the Pruth, — as also Ismail and Kilia on the lower Danube. The Roumanians and Bul- garians fell again under the Ottoman yoke, and Servia was abandoned to herself. Never- theless, an amnesty was stipulated in favor of the Servians, and guarantees were given in favor of the Roumanians. In 1827, Nicholas I., by the Akerman Agreement, which was an explanation of the Treaty of Bucharest, caused the guarantees accorded the Romnanians to be clearly defined. As for the Servians, crushed for a time by Ottoman retaliation, they had taken up arms under Milosh Obre- novitch, and, thanks to European intervention, they obtained, with certain restrictions, their autonomy. The sixth intervention of Russia occurred on the occasion of the Greek revolution. On July 8, 1827, Russia, France, and England entered into concerted action by the Treaty 37 RUSSIA IN EUROPE of London. The united fleets of the three powers annihilated the Turkish and Egyptian fleets at Navarino (October 20). While a French army was operating in the Morea to insure Greek independence, Nicholas I. took it upon himself to settle the rest of the Eastern Question. His European army again con- quered the Roumanians and Bulgarians, invaded Thrace, and entered Adrianople. In Asia, his forces occupied Turkish Caucasia. The Treaty of Adrianople, concluded in 1829, guaranteed the autonomy of Moldavia, of Wallachia, and of Servia, and consummated the independence of Greece, which was formed into a kingdom, Thus were the hopes that Peter the Great had entertained respecting the Christians of the East partially realized; but Russia did not secure any territory in Europe except the isles of the Danubian delta; reserving for herself freedom of navigation in the Black Sea, and an open way through the straits of the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles. 38 RUSSIA IN EUROPE Only in Asia did she secure a territorial indem- nity. The second eastern war, undertaken by Nicholas I., and which began like the others by the conquest of the Roumanians, brought about the intervention of France and England in the Crimea, which caused the Czar Nicholas to die of grief, and which ended in the Treaty of Paris (March 30, 1856). By this treaty, his successor, Alexander II., had to renounce all the advantages gained in Europe by the Treaty of Adrianople; to give back the delta of the Danube; to consent to limiting of his military power in the Black Sea; and to abdi- cate his exclusive right of protection over the Danubian principalities, which were hence- forth placed under the collective protectorate of the great powers. When France found herself engaged in a bloody duel with the German Empire, Russia profited by the occasion to have a conference called at London in March, 1871, by which she 39 RUSSIA IN EUROPE secured the suppression of article two of the Treaty of Paris, which Umited her military- power in the Black Sea. The last and the most decisive Russian inter- vention was the one provoked in 1877 by the Bulgarian massacres, the Bosnian and Herze- govinian revolution, and the uprising in Servia and in Montenegro. In addition to the help of these different forces, Russia made sure of the armed assistance of the principality of Roumania, that had been formed in 1859, by the union of the two old-time hospodarates of Moldavia and Wallachia. She again made the conquest of Bulgaria and of a part of Thrace. This time, it was in plain sight of Constanti- nople that the victorious armies of Alexander II. halted. The Sultan had with which to oppose them only twelve thousand men, encamped on the heights of Tchadalcha. It seemed, there- fore, to be in the power of the Czar to bring to an end the Ottoman domination in Europe, to proclaim the liberation of all the Christian 40 RUSSIA IN EUROPE peoples, and at last to plant the cross on the dome of Saint Sophia. But before the threat- ening demonstration of England and the disquieting attitude of Austria and Germany, he did not dare to do so. He contented him- self with imposing upon the Porte the Treaty of San Stefano (March 3, 1878), which secured for the proteges of Russia an actual dismem- berment of European Turkey. Montenegro saw its territory doubled in extent; Servia and Roumania were declared entirely independent. The first received the districts of Nisch, Lesko- vatz, Mitrowitz, and Novibazar; the second acquired Dobrudscha, but on the condition that it return to Russia the delta of the Danube, which Wallachia had acquired in the treaty of 1856. Bulgaria was to form a vassal principal- ity of Turkey. Her territory extended from the Danube to the Black and ^Egean Seas, leaving around Constantinople and Salonica only some fragments of Ottoman territory. In Asia, Russia acquired the fortresses 41 RUSSIA IN EUROPE and districts of Batum, Kars, Ardahan, and Bayazid. Moreover, Turkey was to pay a war indemnity of three hundred and ten million rubles. Thus Russia took, so to speak, nothing for herself in Europe. It was sufficient for her that Roumania, Servia, Montenegro, and Bulgaria were completely liberated and organized. Of course, she hoped that these petty states that owed their very existence to her would be more docile to her influence than to that of the Sultan , less accessible to the hostile influences of the German and English powers; that their ports would be open to her, and that their armies would constitute auxiliary corps of the Russian army. An early disillusion came to the ^'Liberator Czar." The relative disinterestedness of which he had given proof at San Stefano did not fore- see the jealousy of Austria, fostered as this was by Germany and England. Under threat of a general war, they demanded a revision of 42 RUSSIA IN EUROPE that treaty. England would have even desired that the treaty of 1856 should be taken as a basis for discussion, as if she could proceed with the victorious Russia of 1878 as she had done with the Russia of 1856, conquered in the Crimea. The Czar agreed to the calling of a congress in Berlin. The treaty that was signed there July 13, 1878, curtailed Monte- negro of half the part assigned her, and for- bade her having a navy; took back Novibazar and Mitrowitz from Servia, and was particu- larly harsh towards Bulgaria; reducing her territory by one-third, and carving the remain- der into two provinces: Northern Bulgaria, with the title of '^vassal principality," and Southern Bulgaria, under the name of the province of Eastern Roumelia, which continued under Turkish domination, but which was to be administered by a Christian government. Increase of territory was granted to Greece by the addition of a district of Epirus (Arta) and almost all of Thessaly. There was even 43 RUSSIA IN EUROPE quibbling over the territory that Russia had retained in Asia. Bayazid was taken from her, and Batum was to be dismantled and to become an open port. ^Vhat especially irri- tated the Czar was the fact that the two powers that were thus depriving him of the fruits of his victories found means to shce off a share for themselves. Under the pretext of adminis- tering their affairs, Austria secured Bosnia and Herzegovina, and, by a separate treaty, Eng- land had given to her by the Sultan the island of Cyprus (30th of May and 4th of June) and a controlling situation in Anatolia.^ Emperor Alexander II. had run the danger of a European war in order to carry out his programme of ''liberation.'' The danger still remained imminent, so long as he did not accept the provisions of the Berlin Treaty. There threatened to spring up again, at each of the manifold incidents that arose over the (0 A. d'Avril, Negociations relatives au traite de Berlin et aux arrangements qui ont suivi. Paris, 1886. 44 RUSSIA IN EUROPE task of settling the boundaries of the ceded countries, armed protests, now by Greece, and now by the Albanians, against certain decisions of the powers that were not to their fancy, and intrigues by Austria and England for the purpose of alienating from Russia the sympathies of the nations emancipated by her victories. In addition to this, the Panslavic agitation, which had been sufficiently strong in Russia to lead the government to run those risks in the East, did not subside. The most impetuous minds found cause of grievance against the Czar, that he had not carried out his undertaking to the end, and had his vic- torious regiments enter Stamboul, at the peril of a conflict with the English in the very streets of that capital. The Liberals made a pretext of the constitutions granted the Roumanians, the Servians, and the Bulgarians, to demand a constitution for Russia. The Panslavist and Liberal agitation had, perhaps, some connec- tion with the rise of another agitation which 45 RUSSIA IN EUROPE soon made its appearance, an agitation called Nihilism, of a character entirely revolutionary and subversive, and which fitly terminated on that tragic day of March 13, 1881, when the "Liberator Czar'' became the "Martyr Czar." For his successor, Alexander III., the results of the eastern war were preparing another series of disillusions. The only fruit that Russia could still expect from her sacrifices and her victories was the strengthening of her influence over the Christian peoples emancipated by her, — and their eternal gratitude. Now immediately after this war the most short- sighted Russian statesmen were constrained to confess that the success of their arms had just created on that "Way to Byzantium," which Catherine II. had so thickly strewn with pre- mature triumphal arches, obstacles more insur- mountable than those which the armies of the Sultan had ever been able to oppose to the armies of Alexander I. or of Nicholas I., — • more insurmountable than the Danube or the 46 RUSSIA IN EUROPE Balkans, formerly bristling with the fortresses of the Ottomans. These new obstacles con- sisted in the existence itself of the emancipated nations, and their attachment to their newly found freedom. Thus it was that France, after she had emancipated Belgium under Louis- Philippe and Italy under Napoleon III., found that she had raised upon her northern and southeastern frontiers barriers far more impreg- nable than the armies or fortresses of Austria; that she had closed forever against herself those Belgian and Lombard battlefields over which her ensigns of victory had so often floated. In the formation of an Italian kingdom, France created the chief obstacle in the way of her own expansion on the shores of the Mediterranean. The French have naturally and repeatedly denounced the ingratitude of Italy; nor can the Russians be blamed for their grief over the ingratitude of the Romnanians, the Servians, the Bulgarians, and the Greelvs. But such is human nature! The feeling of independence 47 RUSSIA IN EUROPE and of national pride among newly born peoples will always outweigh the feeling of gratitude towards their liberators. In this respect there was no difference between the peoples joined to the Russians merely by religion, like the Roumanians and the Greeks, and those who were related to them both by religion and race, like the Bulgarians and the Servians. In former times, when the Ottoman yoke rested upon them with its frightful burden, assuredly they would all have joyfully accepted the lord- ship of the Czar in exchange for that of the Sultan; but now, when it was a question of choosing between the domination of the Czar and their own independence, there could be no hesitation with any of them. The Russias had done much for the Rou- manians. Even when they had been imsuc- cessful in wresting their territory from Turkey, they had in the treaties of Kairnaji, Yassy, Bucharest, Akerman, and Adrianople, stipu- lated precious guarantees for their prot^g^s and 48 RUSSIA IN EUROPE then, later, secured for them an almost com- plete autonomy. In concert with France, in 1861, they had made the Sultan accept the union of Moldavia and Wallachia into one province. In 1878, they assured this prin- cipality of Roumania its full independence, and, in 1881, they consented to its being organized into a kingdom. But the new King of Roumania, Charles of Hohenzollern, and his new subjects meant to remain independent of every other power, to have their own army and navy, their own national policy and diplo- macy, and to exercise the right, whenever their liberators showed themselves in the slightest degree meddlesome, to seek help even from Russia's rivals, Austria, Germany, and Eng- land, or, even more than this, from their old- time oppressor, the Sultan of Constantinople. More than once, the Roumanians raised com- plaint against Russia, because, in 1812, she had annexed the little Roumanian district of Bessarabia, and because, in 1878, she compelled 49 RUSSIA IN EUROPE them to give back to her the islands of the Danubian delta. It was the same with the principaUty of Servia, also made into a kingdom in 1882, and which, according to the needs of its national or dynastic policy, did not cease to oscillate between Russian and Austro-German influences. It was the same also with the kingdom of Greece, which paid no heed to the remon- strances of Russia, when her national ambition was involved, and which had no scruples in troubling the peace of the East every time that it was possible for her to raise the question of uniting to the Hellenic state either Epirus or Northern Thessaly or Macedonia or Crete. The country that was under the greatest obligation to Russia was Bulgaria. If France or England had at times assisted in the libera- tion of the Roumanians, the Servians, and the Greeks, it was to Russia alone that the Bul- garians were indebted for this deliverance. Immediately after the ''Bulgarian atrocities'^ 50 RUSSIA IN EUROPE of 1875, Russia had hastened to her help. From the condition of simple raias oppressed by Turkey and cruelly treated by the Tcher- kesses and the Bashi-Bazouks, she had caused them to be instantly raised to the dignity of a free people. At San Stefano, she had endeav- ored to unite them into one state, the most powerful of the Balkan peninsula; which would have extended from the Danube to the Black and iEgean Seas; and she accepted only with deepest reluctance the mutilation and dismem- berment that the Treaty of Berlin imposed upon "Great Bulgaria." She gave the restricted principality of Bulgaria at least a constitution when she herself had none. It was the Rus- sian commissioner in Bulgaria, Prince Dondu- kof-Korsakof, who, on February 23, 1879, con- voked at Tirnovo the first "constituency assembly"; it was he who presided at the meeting of the first "legislative assembly," or Sohranie; it was he who espoused the cause of their prince, Alexander of Battenberg; it was 51 RUSSIA IN EUROPE he who organized a Bulgarian army of one hundred thousand men supplied with valiant Russian officers, well equipped, well drilled, and provided with excellent artillery. Neverthe- less, this people and this prince, who owed everything to Russia, began at once to prac- tice a policy in which the advice of the Czar Alexander III. was no longer heeded. They set out to remove the Russians w^ho had port- folios in their ministry and positions in their army. In spite of the Czar, they brought about the revolution of PhiUppopolis in September, 1885, w^hich ended in the union of the Bul- garian principality and the Bulgarian province of East Roumelia, but which provoked a bloody war with Servia, jealous at seeing her neigh- bor's increase of territory. ^Tien Alexander of Battenberg had to renounce his throne, in 1887, it was a prince that posed as a client of Austria and of Germany, Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg, whom the Bulgarians called to rule them. With his Prime Minister, Stambulof, he gov- 52 RUSSIA IN EUROPE erned, — resolutely set against the influence of Russia; he discriminated against her partisans, and surrounded himself with her adversaries. And, thus, the liberation and the organization of Bulgaria, which the Czar had hoped to be able to direct, have gone on independently of him, and, in certain respects, in opposition to him. Sic vos, non vohis! Alexander III.'s resentment against Bulgaria and her prince was very bitter. The somewhat imperious and med- dlesome affection of the early days soon turned into hostihty. When Alexander III. died, in 1894, the rupture was complete between the intractable principality and the powerful empire. Thus all the wars undertaken in Eastern Europe by Russia, from Peter the Great, in 1711, down to Alexander II. in 1877, have ended, except in Asia and on the north coast of the Black Sea, so far as territorial expansion is concerned, in most meagre results. Seven great wars have brought her only a strip of Roumanian territory between the Dneister and 53 RUSSIA IX EUROPE the Pnith. and another Roumanian bit of land in the delta of the Danube. Even this last morsel, acquired in 1829 and restored in 1S56, was won back in 1S77 only at the cost of vehement fault- finding upon the part of the Roumanian people. Russia, whose fleets have twice — at Tchesme in 1770, and at Xavarino, in 1827, — annihilated the naval power of Turkey, have never been able to secure even an island in the .Egean Sea. Thus much for material advantages. As to satisfaction of a moral character, the Russian soldiers have never been able to enter Stamboul, nor to pray in Saint Sophia ; and as to gratitude upon the part of the liberated peoples, we have seen what Alexander 11. and Alexander III. could never have dreamed of. Their successor, the present Emperor, Nicho- las II.. seems to have taken it for granted that in the direction of the Danube, of the Black Sea, and of the .Egean Sea. the destmy of Rus- sia is fixed for a long time to come. In these directions, she has no longer any moral or 54 RUSSIA IN EUROPE material advantages to gain, and the age of sentimental midertakings is also at an end. Unless there should come some European over- turning, the famous "Eastern Question^' will have for Russia only an archaeological interest. All that Nicholas XL is doing seems to indicate that this is his conviction. He shows no inter- est in the party struggles and ministerial crises in the Roumanian and Servian kingdoms; towards the Bulgarians, he shows neither jeal- ous affection nor the irreconcilable rancor of his father. Whenever the Prince and people of Bulgaria have manifested a desire for recon- ciliation with Russia, he has cordially welcomed them; he sent a representative to the orthodox baptism of the Crown Prince Boris, but appar- ently without forming any illusions as to what he might expect of his 'proteges. When the Cretan insurrection occurred, and the war foolishly undertaken by the Greeks against Turkey was declared, he was careful not to assume a leading role, something that his three 55 RUSSIA IN EUROPE predecessors would not have failed to do. On the contrary, he seemed to sink Russia in the "European Concert/' to associate her in all the decisions of the five other great powers, and purely and simply to accept accomplished facts. Also, when the Armenian troubles and massacres took place, he did not attempt to intervene, nor to arrogate to himself, either by land or sea, the role of liberator of this other oppressed people. He has rather favored a temporizing policy, and has discouraged the plans formed by the other powers to send Euro- pean fleets to the very walls of the Seraglio, and to impose by force reforms upon the Sultan Abdul-Hamid. On the other hand, in certain other directions, in that of the Indian Ocean, in that of British India, and in that of the China and Japan Seas, Russia has followed a very formal, a very decided policy. At once very energetic and skillful in this policy, she has, at the same time, acted in entire inde- pendence of the '^European Concert.'' 56 THE SOUTHWARD EXPANSION OF RUSSIA IN ASIA: An Asiatic Power — Wars and Treaties with Persia — A Way to the Indian Ocean — In the Caucasus — Paramount in Persia. If the policy of the present Emperor of the Russias seems to be inspired by other princi- ples than those of his predecessors; if this policy has shown itself to be essentially peace- able and disinterested in Em-ope; if it has shifted its sphere of activity from the West in order to devote all its efforts to Southern and especially to Eastern Asia, — this is, perhaps, due to the impressions made upon the Czar during his extended travels in the years 1890 and 1891, while he was still only the Czaro- vitch Nicholas. He visited Greece, Egypt, British India, French Indo-China, Japan, and China. Then, disembarking at Vladivostock, a powerful Russian naval station on a bay of the 57 RUSSIA IN ASIA Sea of Japan, he returned overland to St. Petersburg, crossing the whole extent of Siberia. The Czarovitch, of course, did not give his impressions a literary form; but one of his travelling companions. Prince Oukhtomski, has published his in two luxm-ious volumes, mag- nificently illustrated by the Russian artist, Karazine.* The opinions of Prince Oukhtomski seem to reveal a new element in Russian policy. For- merly the Russians were indignant over Prince Bismarck's reported observation that ''Russia has nothing to do in the West. Her mission is in Asia; there she represents civilization." Prince Oukhtomski is not far from holding the same opinion as did this envious foe of his country. For a few parcels of territory con- quered with such difficulty in the West, what bloody wars has she not endured? Her efforts to obtain access to the sea have been but half (») Le prince Oukhtomski, Voyage de son Altesse Imperiale le Czarovitch en orient, Paris, 1898. 5S RUSSIA IN ASIA successful. The White Sea, blocked with ice; the Baltic, as much Scandinavian and German as Russian, closed to her on the west by the Sound and the Belts; the Black Sea, only yet half Russian, and closed on the southwest by the Bosphorous and the Dardanelles; and the Mediterranean itself, with England holding Gibraltar, Malta, Cyprus, Egypt, and the Suez Canal, — are these seas, so little available, suffi- cient for the needs of the expansion of the mighty continental empire that Russia is to-day? In Asia, on the contrary, who knows whether by the Euphrates and the Persian Gulf, by Afghanistan and the Indus, she is not going to be able to open her way to the Indian Ocean? Who knows whether, already mistress of the Okhotsk Sea, she will not become mistress also of the Sea of Japan and the Yellow Sea, both opening with broad outlets into the immensity of the Pacific? Now, the importance that in ancient times the Mediterranean had for man- kind, and which the Atlantic possessed from 59 RUSSIA IN ASIA the fifteenth to the nineteenth century, seems to-day to be shifting to the Pacific Ocean. Of all the nations bordering on this truly universal ocean, the Russian Empire is destined to be one of the most powerful. As to territorial conquests, how are those that Russia won in little Europe, where every square mile cost her a battle, to be compared with those which, with infinitely less sacrifice and effort, she has already won, or can yet win, in Asia? Bis- marck spoke in disdain of the mission of Russia in Asia. Prince Oukhtomski speaks of it with pride: ^'The time has come for the Russians to have some definite idea regarding the heritage that the Jenghis Khans and the Tamerlanes have left us. Asia! we have been part of it at all times; we have lived its life and shared its interests; our geographical position irrevocably destines us to be the head of the rudimentary powers of the East.^' From the thirteenth to the fifteenth century, Russia was a province of the Mongol Empire. 60 RUSSIA IN ASIA Everything that constituted that Mongol Em- pire, however, is perhaps destined to become only a province of Russia. The capital will simply be transferred from Karakorum or from the shores of the Amur to the banks of the Neva. Asiatic in their mixture of races, Asiatic in their history, conquered in the thirteenth cen- tury, conquering since the sixteenth, the Rus- sians possess to a higher degree than either the French or the Anglo-Saxons an understanding of things Asiatic. They have all the right that is possible to supplant "those colonies of the Germanic and the Latin races that are taking unwilUng Asia under their tutelage. '^ More- over, the true successor in Asia of the old-time czars or khans of the Finnish race is not the Bogdy-Khan who rules at Pekin, but '' the White Czar who reigns at St. Petersburg.'' In one of the pagodas of Canton are to be seen, as Prince Oukhtomski assures us, four colossal figures, called "the kings of the four cardinal points,'' and Prince Oukhtomski felt confident 61 RUSSIA IN ASIA that it was to "the King of the North" that the people rendered the greatest homage. 'Laying aside these dreams of the future, let us see what, up to the present time, has been actually accomplished to bring about their realization. The efforts of the Russians throughout their history as an Asiatic power are connected with one or the other of two great movements: her southward expansion towards Persia and British India, and her eastward expansion in the regions bordering on China, Corea, and Japan. In 1554, during the reign of Ivan the Ter- rible, the Russians gained a foothold on the Caspian Sea by the conquest of the czarate of Astrakhan and of the lower Volga. Towards the close of his life, Peter the Great waged war on Persia, captured Derbend on the Caspian, and occupied the provinces of Daghestan, Shirvan, Ghilan, and Mazandaran, and the cities of Rasht and Astrabad. The unhealthy character of these regions made them "the 62 RUSSIA IN ASIA cemetery of Russian armies/' and the suc- cessors of the great Czar had to abandon them. A war undertaken by Catherine II., also in the last years of her reign, ended in the same result, and her son, Paul I., recalled the troops. In the region of the Caucasus, the Russians had gained a foothold, between the years 1774-1784, by the acquisition of the Kuban as far as the Terek, and, strangely enough, it was not on the northern slope of the moim- tains, but upon the southern that they were to begin the conquest of this Caucasus. In 1783, the King, or Czar, of Georgia, Heraclius, declared himself to be the vassal of Catherine II. in order that he might have her assistance against the Persians and the Ottomans. In 1799, his son, George XII. ,^ formally ceded his state to Paul I., although his son, David, continued to govern until 1803, when the (0 Dubrovine, Georges XII., dernier tsar de Georgie, et V annexation a la RiLssie (in Russian), St. Petersburg, 1897. 63 RUSSIA IN ASIA annexation was consummated. This acquis- sition brought Russia into coUision with the Persians and the Ottomans on one hand, and, on another, with the independent tribes of the Caucasus. By the Treaty of Guhstan, ^^'''' in 1813, Persia ceded to Russia Daghestan, Shirvan, and Shusha, and renounced all claims upon Georgia and other territories of the Caucasus. Another war broke out in 1826, which was terminated by the Treaty of Turk- manshai, February 22, 1828, by which Persia surrendered her two Armenian provinces, ^ Nakhitchevan and Erivan. The same year, in the Treaty of Adrianople, Turkey gave over to Russia the fortresses and districts of Anapa, Poti, and Akhalzikh, and all rights (bitterly contested by the inhabitants) over Imeritia, Mingrelia, and Abkhasia. Then began, in the new possessions, the task of pacifying the wild mountaineers of these (i) Lord Curzon, Persia and the Persian Question, London, 1892. 64 RUSSIA IN ASIA regions, and also the Tcherkesses, or Cir- ^ cassians, of the northern slope. The Circas- sians and the AbkhasAi, roused to fanaticism by the soldier priest, the Imam Shamyl, held out against the Russians for nearly thirty years. In 1844, Russia had in the Caucasus two hundred thousand soldiers, commanded by her best generals. The capture of Vedeni, in 1858, and the surrender of Shamyl, a year later, assured the pacification of the Caucasus. The increase of territory that Russia made at the expense of Turkey, in 1878, by the Treaties of San Stefano and Berlin, included the dis- tricts of Kars, Ardahan, and Olty, and the port of Batum, and fixed the boundary line between Turkey and Russia as it has since remained. Since the Treaty of 1828, Persia under the Shahs, Fet-Aly-Khan, Mohammed, Nasr-ed- Din, and Muzafer-ed-Din, has fallen almost entirely under Russian influence. In 1837-38, the Shah Mohammed, with an army com- manded by Russian officers, besieged Herat, 65 RUSSIA IN ASIA defended by Afghans under the leadership of Enghsh officers. In 1856, the Shah Nars- ed-Din,, at the suggestion of Russia, besieged and captured Herat; but the Enghsh com- pelled hun to abandon his prize, by making a descent on the Persian Gulf, where they captured the port of Bushire and the island of Karrack, which they have kept. In 1841, Persia ceded to Russia the Caspian port of Ashurada, near Astrabad; in 1881, Askabad was given to the same power, and, in 1885, Serakhs, — all three places very important strategic points on the eastern frontier. Persia has also agreed to the building of Russian railroads that are to pass through her territory and terminate on the Persian Gulf. The present year, she has negotiated a loan of twenty-two million five hundred thousand rubles through the agency of the '^bank of Persia,'' estab- lished under Russian auspices. This loan is payable in seventy-five years, and the interest is secured by all the customs revenues of the 66 RUSSIA IN ASIA kingdom, save those of the Persian Gulf. The Shah has bound himself not to seek further loans of any other European power, and has thereby placed himself financially in the hands of Russia. It is thus that Russia, by her diplomacy, by her banks, and by her railroads, making Persia her political and commercial vassal, has succeeded in furthering her scheme of expansion towards the Persian Gulf and the shores of the Indian Ocean. 67 FURTHER CONQUESTS. Expansion Towards India — Napoleon— The Con- quest OF THE Khans — In Afghanistan — The "Key of the Indies" — In Touch with India — Abyssinia — British Over-Confidence. Towards British India Russian expansion was to seek still other channels. The con- quests in the Caucasus, which we have been reviewing, opened the way along the western and southern sides of the Caspian Sea. But for a long time the Russians had been endeavor- ing to turn the sea from its northern side. In the reign of the Empress Anna Ivanovna, hordes of Kirghiz, whose camping grounds lay to the east of the Ural River, submitted to Russia (1734). Her sway was then extended into Turkestan, that expanse of steppes and oases watered by the Jaxartes (Sir-Daria) and the Oxus (Amu-Daria), that empty into the Aral Sea, a region that is bounded on the west by the Caspian Sea, on the south by 68 FURTHER CONQUESTS Persia and Afghanistan, on the east by the Chinese Empire, and on the north by Siberia. Here was located ancient Djagatai, the debris of former Mongol Empires. ^ When the Russians saw these vast plains spread out before them, they at first thought (i) Subsequently it was broken up into numerous states, the principal ones being the khanate of Kho- kand, with its chief cities Turkistan, Tashkend, Tchim- kend, and Khodjend on the upper Jaxartes, or Sir- Daria; the khanate of Balkh (ancient Bactria), and the khanate of Samarkand, fallen into dependency upon the khanate of Bokhara, on the upper Oxus, or Amu-Daria; the khanate of Khiva on the lower Oxus; and on the Kashgar and Yarkand Rivers emptying into Lake Lob-Nor, and the Hi flowing into Lake Balkash, knanates (Kashgar, Yarkand, and Kuldja). that belonged to China. Outside of the districts inhabited by a settled people are the deserts of sand over which wander nomadic tribes. To the north of the Jaxartes, are the Kirghiz, divided into several hordes, and the Turkomans, or Turkmens, on the east of the Caspian Sea. — Consult Krahmer, Russland in Asien, vol. i.; Transkaspianund seine Eisenbahn, vol. ii.; Mittel-Asien, Leipzig, 1898-99. Makcheef, Coup d'oeil historique sur le Turkestan et la marche progressive des Russes (in Russian), St. Petersburg, 1890. Albrecht, Russisches Central- Asien, Hamburg, 1896. H. Mozer, A travers V Asie centrale, Paris, 1885. 69 FURTHER CONQUESTS that they were near British India, and that an entrance to that rich peninsula would be as easy to them as it had been to so many Asiatic conquerors that had gone forth from the steppes of Turkestan or the valleys of Afghanistan. From this conviction was born the first schemes that the Russians entertained for the conquest of Hindustan. Even Peter the Great thought of it. In 1717; he sent against Khiva an expedition under Peter B6kovitch that perished on the way. A cer- tain A. M. de Saint Genie proposed a plan for the conquest of Hindustan to Catherine II. in 1791; but the most celebrated of all these projects was the one that Paul I. sub- mitted to Napoleon Bonaparte, then first Consul of the French Republic, whose ally against England he had become. The plan was to place two armies in the field. General Knorring, with the Cossacks of the Don and other Russian troops, was to march by Khiva and Bokhara to the upper Indus, while thirty- 70 FURTHER CONQUESTS five thousand French and thirty-five thousand Fiussians, that Paul L, inspired by chivalric generosity, proposed placing under the com- mand of Massena, the conqueror of the Russians at the battle of Ziirich, were to unite at Astra- bad on the southern shore of the Caspian Sea. Thence they were to make their way by Herat and Kandahar to the upper Indus to join forces with the other army. Then, altogether, French, Russians, Persians, Turcomans, and Afghans, they would pour down into India, proclaiming to the princes and the people of the peninsula the fall of English tyranny and their independence. '^ All the treasures of India were to be their recompense.'^ The execution of this plan was even begun. The Cossacks of the Don, under their ataman, Orlof-Denissof, were already across the Volga, when the news of the death of Paul I. recalled them to their camps. 1 {}) General Batorski, Projets d' expedition dans Vln- doustan sous Napoloen, Paul I., et Alexandre I. (in Rus- 71 FURTHER CONQUESTS The visionary character of this scheme has been demonstrated, during the present century, by the difficulties that the Russian armies have had to encounter in winning their way over a very small fraction of the immense journey marked out in 1800. At the cost of enormous effort, the oases of Turkestan, which in the mind of Paul I. were to be simply halting places in the long march, have had to be con- quered one by one; one by one, deep valleys and rocky bluffs, defended by war-like tribes, have had to be captured and held. To-day, even with these avenues of approach secured, the goal seems as far off as it did to the optis- mistic imagination of the Czar Paul I. In sian), St. Petersburg, 1886. H. S. Edwards, Russian Projects against India. On the Russian Expedition in Turkestan, see Hugo Stumin, Rapports, Khiva (trans- lated from the German), Paris, 1874; A. N. Kouropat- kine (at present Russian Minister of War), Turcomania and the Turcomans (translated into English from the Russian by Robert Mitchell) ; Skobelef , Rapports sur les campagnes de 1879-1881 (English translation, London, 1881); Marvin, Russian Campaigns among the Tekke- TuTcomans (from Russian official sources). 72 FURTHER CONQUESTS 1839, Nicholas I., wishing to punish the Khan of Khiva, who was capturing Russian mer- chants and pillaging Russian caravans, des- patched a body of troops commanded by General Perovski. The severe winters of the steppes and the deep snow compelled him, when half way to his destination, to return. Nevertheless, the Khan, intimidated by this demonstration, liberated the Russian prisoners (1840), and in 1842 consented to acknowledge the over-lordship of Russia. Two years later, the eastern Kirghiz also submitted. In order to protect these new subjects against the Khan of Khokand it was necessary to wage war with the latter. From 1860 to 1864, the leaders of the Russian troops, Perovski, Kolpakovski, Verevkine, Tchernai'eff, captured the fortresses of Ak-Mesjed, Turkestan, Aulie- Ata, Tchimkend, and finally, Tashkend, a city of one hundred thousand souls, and the commercial emporium of that region. The Emir of Bokhara attempted to intervene, 73 FURTHER CONQUESTS and had a ^^holy war'' preached by the fanat- ical Mollahs; but he was conquered in the battle of Irjar (1S66), and promised to pay a war indemnity. However far the Russians might still be from the frontier of India, England was never- theless disturbed at their success. The official journals of St. Petersburg amused themselves with pacific declarations, announcing that there was no intention of conquering Bokhara; but the Czar organized the territories, already submissive, into 'Hhe general government of Turkestan,'' and General Kaufmann was placed in control. The Emir of Bokhara, having refused to deliver the war indemnity that he had promised, was defeated at Zera- Bulak, and was compelled to sign the treaty of 1868, by which he ceded to the Russians the khanates of Samarkand and Zerafshan; recognized a Russian protectorate, and paid an indemnity of two million rubles. The khanate of Khokand became, likewise, a vassal state. 74 FURTHER CONQUESTS The Khan of Khiva continued to pillage caravans, and to hold in slavery Russian merchants. In 1873, three bodies of troops were sent against him; one coming from the shores of the Caspian Sea under General Mark- ozof, the second from Orenburg imder General Verevkine, the third from Tashkend under Governor-General Kaufman. The first, after a difficult march through the burning sands of the desert, was compelled to fall back. The other two entered Khiva almost without striking a blow. The Khan was obliged to acknowledge himself the vassal of "the White Czar,^' to cede all that part of his territory situated on the right bank of the Oxus : to grant the Russians the rights of navigation and commerce, and to submit to a war indemnity that exhausted his finances. The Khans that had yielded to the Russians were now the objects of the scorn and hatred of the more fanatical among their Mohammedan subjects. These did not cease to rise in revolt against them. The Khan 75 FURTHER CONQUESTS of Khokand preferred to surrender his terri- tories to Russia; and they were formed into the new province of Ferghana, in 1875. The same year, the Khan of Khiva offered to surren- der his in exchange for a pension. The Russians did not wish to annex either this khanate or that of Bokhara, less through fear of EngUsh protests than because the existence of two vassal Khans would allow them to conceal the better their political plans. They maintain them on their thrones by paying them a pension. To-day, the Khan of Bokhara is captain of a regiment of Terek Cossacks, and the Khan of Khiva is lieutenant-general of the Orenburg Cossacks. In 1851, the Russians had obtained from China some commercial advantages in the Kuldja province. Twenty years afterwards a Mohammedan adventurer, Yakub-Khan, seized the Chinese khanates of Kashgar and Yarkand, and incited a Mohammedan rebellion in Kuldja. The Russians entered the province, giving 76 FURTHER CONQUESTS China to understand that they would remain there until order was reestabhshed (1871). They would gladly have annexed it; but Chinese troops had been despatched; and, after years of marching, they arrived in Kashgar (where Yakub had been assassinated in 1877), and upon the Kuldja frontier. The Russians first thought of resisting the troops and holding the province; but the territory in dispute did not seem worth the risk of a war with China. By the St. Petersburg Treaty of 1881, they gave back Kuldja, except one district on the river Hi, and renounced their military position in Kashgar in exchange for certain commercial advantages. To complete the conquest of Turkestan, it remained for them to subdue the nomadic Turcomans (Tekke-Turcomans). This was the the object of the brilliant campaigns directed by Skobelef, who carried by assault the fortress of Geok-Tepe on January 24, 1881, with a loss to the enemy of eight thousand men. Then 77 FURTHER CONQUESTS he took Askhabad, which was afterwards ceded by Persia.^ The agreement with Persia and the conquest of Turkestan brought Russia's power to the frontier of Afghanistan, which the Enghsh regard as the protecting wall of their Indian Empire. At every forward movement of the Russians, they protested or endeavored to secure guarantees against a new advance or tried to gain for themselves some new strategic point that would strengthen their position. They were not always successful. After the first siege of Herat by the Persians, in 1840, the English made the conquest of Kabul. Their army was driven out by an insurrection, and totally annihilated while retreating (1841). If, to save their honor, they afterwards recap- (0 Colonel Mallesson, The Russo- Afghan Question, 1864. Sir Henry Rawlinson, Later Phases of the Cen- tral Asia Question, 1875. Kouropatkine, Les confines anglo-russes (translated from the Russian by G. le Marchand), Paris, 1879. P. Lessar, La Russie et V Angleterre en Asie Centrale, Paris. Marvin, The Rus- sians at Merv and Herat, etc. 78 FURTHER CONQUESTS tured Kabul, prudence led them to abandon it as quickly as possible (1842). After the annexation or subjection of the khanates by the Russians, the English again made their way into Kabul, and left there a resident repre- sentative, Cavagnari; but a popular uprising, in 1879, brought about the murder of Cavagnari and eighty-seven of his retinue. The expedi- tion sent to avenge this insult was led by General Roberts, ^ since then Field Marshal Lord Roberts, Commander in Chief of the English Army. This expedition, however, brought about as little definite result as did the former intervention in Afghanistan. In 1881, the English had gained from the Russians the assurance that they had no intention of annexing the city of Merv, a very important strategic point; but in 1884, the notables of that city presented themselves to the Russian Commander at Askhabad, and (0 Lord Roberts has published a work, Forty-one Years in India. 79 FURTHER CONQUESTS made declaration that they accepted the lord- ship of 'Hhe White Czar/' The English made complaint to the cabinet at St. Petersburg. They were answered that the action of the people of Merv had been a surprise to the Russians themselves; but that they believed that they would have committed a great mistake by rejecting a submission that was so entirely voluntary. The English had secured the appointment of an Anglo-Russian commission for settling the disputed boundaries, which was to decide whether Penjdeh, another very important point, belonged to their client, the Emir of Afghanistan, or to the Turcoman subjects of Russia. The English commissioners, presided over by General Lumsden, w^ere the first to arrive at the place of meeting. They began by fortifying Herat and inciting the Afghans to seize Penjdeh. Seeing this, the chief Russian commissioner, General Komarof, at the head of a strong Russian force, occupied the Zulfikar Pass, and made ready to march 80 FURTHER CONQUESTS upon Penjdeh. While on the waj^ thither, he was attacked by the Afghans at Kushk. He slew five hundred of their men, captured two of their flags and all their artillery (March 30, 1885). Then the English commissioners withdrew, charging Komarof with having been the aggressor. Great Britain was much irritated. Gladstone, who had the Egyptian Soudan and the Upper Burmah wars on his hands, called upon Parliament for subsidies. The belief was general that a war was about to ensue between ' ' the whale and the elephant. ^ ' Then England calmed down, and accepted the explan- ation of the Russians, that the fight at Kushk was the result of a ^' mistake.^' In 1885 and 1887, she agreed to the Russian occupation of Merv, Penjdeh, Kushk, and the Zulfikar Pass. The Russians were now within one hundred and twenty kilometres of Herat, known for so long a time as the ^^key of the Indies. ' ' The question of the settlement of ..the bound- 81 ^ ^-^.v FURTHER CONQUESTS aries was scarcely disposed of, when another question presented itself in the settlement of the boundaries of the Pamirs. These form a plateau of from four to five thousand metres in latitude, known as ' ' the roof of the world, ' ' with a rigorous climate and sparse population. This plateau conmiands both Afghanistan and Cashmere, those two ramparts of India and Chinese Turkestan. It v\'as broken up into pettykhanates, over which the Khan of Bokhara, the vassal of the Russians, and the Emir of Afghanistan, the client of the English, laid claim to sovereignty. Neither of them had recognized until then the value of the territory. An ''expedition for study, '^ accompanied by six hundred Russian soldiers, made its appear- ance in Pamir in the summer of 1891, and aroused, by its presence there, the protests of the English. At the approach of winter, the Russians withdrew; but they again appeared the following summer, in larger numbers, under the command of Colonel Yanof . They claimed 82 FURTHER CONQUESTS that they were insulted by the Afghans, for which they inflicted upon them the bloody defeat of Somatash (July 12)^ after which they fell back and took up their position at Kalabery on the Oxus. This clash of arms was succeeded by a diplomatic controversy. It was not until 1895, after a keen discussion between the two great powers, each contending for its own client, that they reached an agreement. The disputed region was divided between Bokhara and Afghanistan, the former receiving the little khanates of Shugnan and Roschan, and the latter the khanate of Wakhan, a narrow strip of territory, from twenty to thirty kilo- metres wide, which now forms * ' a buffer state' ' between the two great empires of Russia and Great Britain. Even after this agreement, Russia found a pretext in 1899 for occupying the district of Sirikul, which belongs to Chinese Pamir, and which commands the source of the Kashgar and Yarkand Rivers (March, 1889). Great Britain having occupied in Arabia 83 FURTHER CONQUESTS the island of Perim in the imamate of Muscat, in order to control the outlet of the Red Sea, and to establish a coaling station in her maritime route, Russia, in 1899, also endeavored to obtain from the Imam the grant of a coaling station on his coast. From this arose new complaints and strenuous opposition on the part of England. Russia also established her- self, under color of orthodox proselytism, at a point quite as annoying to British interests, on the coast, and at the very capital of Menelik, Emperor of Abyssinia. A first attempt in this direction was made in 1889 by a Russian adventm^er, calling himself Achinof, ''the free Cossack. '^ He took possession of the dismantled fort of Sugallo on the territory of the French colony of Obock. The former ^^anommda of Sugallo" drove him away, and the Russian government disavowed his action. The mission of Lieutenant Machkof (1889- 1892), and the so-called ''scientific mission '' of Captain Leontief in 1894, thanks to the 84 FURTHER CONQUESTS ready assistance of the French authorities, succeeded much better. Thus was Russian influence, in close harmony with French influ- ence, estabHshed ahnost upon the British Nile. In 1898, the Russian Colonel, Artamonof, with some Abyssinain troops, endeavored to meet Major Marchand,who was moving upon Fashoda, and to reinforce him on the great river. L The English alternate between doubting and believing that these expansive movements of Russia by way of the Caucasus, by way of Turkestan, and by way of the Pamirs, are all directed towards one goal, the very one that the Czar Paul proposed to the first Consul Bonaparte in 1800; Alexander I. to the Emperor Napoleon (1807); and General Duhamel to Nicholas I. (1855), and the ardent Skobelef to his government. To many intelligent English- men, the goal of so much effort can be no other than the conquest of India. Now that the frontier of the Russian Pamir is not more than twenty or thirty kilometres from the kingdom 85 FURTHER CONQUESTS of Cashmere, and now that Kushk, the ter- minus of the Turkestan railroad system, is only one hundred and twenty kilometres from Herat, the problem of invading India is infi- nitely more easy than it was in the time of Bonaparte and Paul I. Why have the Rus- sians spent so much money and blood in the conquest of the impoverished and barbarous nations of those sandy deserts and almost inac- cessible mountains, if they did not have before them, as a recompense for their sacrifices, what Paul I. called ''all the riches of the Indies." A recent historian of Russian expansion,^ Alexis Kjause, reviewing all the hardships endured by Russia and the thankless task that she has assumed, adds, "On its own account, the conquest of Central Asia is worthless. It is not done in ignorance, but by carefully thought-out design, as part of a programme, (}) Alexia Krause, Russia in Asia, a Record and a Study, London and New York, 1899. 86 FURTHER CONQUESTS the execution of which its possession will assist. The capture of the khanates was attempted, not as a pathway towards the coveted Persian Gulf, but as a road which would lead to the Panjab and all that is beyond. And now that preliminary steps have been com- pleted, the serious undertaking is about to be begun." J •James MacGahan, one of the best informed men on Eastern affairs, wrote from the shores of the Oxus in 1876: ''The Russians are steadily advancing towards India, and they will, sooner or later, acquire a position in Central Asia which will enable them to threaten it. Should England be engaged in a European war, then, indeed, Russia will probably strike a blow at England's Indian power.'' Other Englishmen pretend to believe that the hypothesis of a conquest of India ''is too preposterous to be entertained. It would involve the most terrible and lingering war the world has ever seen. On the day that a Rus- 87 FURTHER CONQUESTS sian army leaves Balkh or Herat for Kandahar, well may the British commander exclaim: *Now hath the Lord delivered them into my hand!' " It is thus that Lord Cm-zon, the present Gov- ernor-General of India, expresses himself. It seems, however, that he is but assuming a tone of assured certainty to conceal his deep anxiety. This plan of conquest that he considers ^Hoo preposterous to be entertained," has been dis- cussed by other, and very competent persons, who do not reach conclusions so optimistic as regards Great Britain.^ Perhaps, however, the Russians are at present pressing so closely towards the frontier of British India in order to have at their disposal a means of intimida- tion, or even of coercion, for use in those very frequent occasions in which Great Britain sets herself in stubborn opposition to Russia's plans in other parts of the world. For, at the (0 Maximilian Graf Yorck von Wartenburg, Das Vordringen der Russischen Macht in Asien, Berlin, 1900. 88 FURTHER CONQUESTS present moment, the Czar Nicholas II. seems much more interested in expansion in the Far East than in any movement towards the south of Asia. 89 THE EXPANSION OF RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST.' The Opening of Siberia — Value of Siberia — Chinese Wars — Settlements on the Pacific — Chinese Cessions — Vladivostock — Russian In- fluence AT Pekin. The eastward expansion of Russia tiirough the solitudes of Siberia and among its barbar- ous tribes began about the close of the six- teenth century, immediately after the conquest of the Tartar czarates of Kazan and Astrakhan. It was betv/een the years 1579 and 1584 that the Cossack, Irmak Timofevitch, fleeing from the punishment of the law and the wrath of the Czar, Ivan the Terrible, with a handful of brigands like himself, Russians, Cossacks, Tar- tars, German and Polish prisoners of war, to (1) Krahmer, Russland in Asien, vol. iii. Sibirien und die grosse sibirische Eisenbahn, vol. iv. Russland in Ost- Asien, Leipzig, 1897, 1898. Legros, La Siberie, Paris, 1899. 90 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST the number of six hundred and fifty men, crossed the Ural, traversed the immense, untrodden forests of the Tobol, defeated the Tartar Khan, Kutchum, took Sibir, his capital, and subjected to tribute the tribes of the Irtysh and the Obi. When Irmak Timo- fevitch was drowned in the Irtysh, dragged to the bottom of the river by the weight of the cuirass given him by the Czar, Russia made a hero, and the Orthodox Church a saint, of the old outlaw. Along the pathways that he had marked out, there soon followed a stream of '^good fellows" of every description, gold- seekers, fur-hunters, and peasants fleeing the estates of their feudal lords in search of gov- ernment lands that they might cultivate as freemen. Hither also flocked religious dissent- ers, persecuted by the Orthodox Church, who found a shelter in the immensity of the Siberian forest, retreats concealed from all mankind. Into this same wilderness escaped the German, Polish, and Swedish prisoners of war of Peter I. 91 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST — WW— ——»——^— »——»—— —^■1—»—r—ii^— ■■-■II — ^^»»-»i— »»»»^>— ^— and of Catherine II. Then^ in long, wretched troops came in chains or in fetters the unhappy serfs deported by their masters, often bearing the marks of cruel beating and mutilation; their sides scarred by the knout, and nostrils or tongue cut by the executioner; strewing the highways with their corpses. This barbarous feature of the old Russian penal code came to an end at the close of the last century, and it is known that the present Czar, Nicholas II., has suppressed deportation into Siberia for common law crimes in order to purify that colony of a reproach like to that against which the English colonies of Australia long protested. The rapidity with which colonization of every kind was spread over the millions of kilometers which the immensity of Siberia measures, is shown by the dates of the fomiding of the prin- cipal towns: Tobolsk on the Tobol in 1587; Tomsk on the Toms, a branch of the Obi, in 1604; Yeniseisk on the Yenisei in 1619; Ya- koutsk in 1632; Atchinsk in 1642; Nertchinsk 92 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST on the Shilka, a branch of the Amur, in 1654; Okhotsk on the sea of the same name in 1638. Siberia, even to om* own times, has been valuable mainly on accomit of its inmiense extent and the liberty that free immigrants have foimd there. It may be divided into three divisions: in the north, the toundray marshy in summer, a mass of ice in winter; in the centre, the tdigay or forest, dear to the hunter; in the south, the cultivated region, of an area thrice that of all France. Even this last division, except in the districts where the ''black earth'' is found, is not characterized by a fertility that redeems the severity of a climate, extreme in its summer heat as in its winter cold. In the seventeenth century a belief was current that the region about the Amur was, on the contrary, of great fertility, a belief which experience has shown to be ill-founded. It was, therefore, in this direction that the most venturesome Cossacks and the most energetic settlers hastened. They were not disturbed by 93 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST the fact that the country belonged to the Chinese Emperor. In 1649, a young officer named Khabarof, imdertook to descend the still unexplored river, building forts at the jimction of the tributaries, conquering rebel- lious tribes of natives, and fighting troops of Manchurian horsemen (1649-1652). In 1658, Pachkof, governor of Yeniseik, founded Nert- chinsk on the Shilka, a branch of the Amur. Five years later Albasin was founded. This was a fortress with ramparts of wood, and in its vicinity there arose many Russian villages. Finally, the Chinese, irritated at seeing these adventurers assume rulership over them, several tunes attacked Albasin with armies of from fif- teen to twenty thousand men; but were invari- ably repulsed. Upon receiving tidings of these events, the court at Moscow sent envoys to that of Pekin with a letter written in Latin and in Russian. After long deliberation at Nertchinsk a treaty was signed in that city, in 1689, in accordance with the terms of which 94 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST the heroic fort of Albasin was to be razed; and the frontier between the two empires was definitely fixed as it continued to be observed by both countries down to the treaties of 1858. On their side, the Russians renounced further forcible encroachment and settlement on Chi- nese territory; but they did not renounce their efforts to gain a foothold by commerce, reli- gious mission work, and diplomacy in the Middle Kingdom, and even in Pekin itself. The Rus- sians that had been made prisoners at Albasin, or in battles at other places, had been taken to the capital of the empire. Some of them had established themselves there as artisans or merchants; others formed the Russian guard of the "Son of Heaven.'^ At Moscow it was known that these men were well treated at Pekin, but that they had neither church nor priest of their religion. Peter the Great resolved to send an embassy to Pekin to secure satisfac- tory concessions on this point. This, indeed, was the object of a mission entrusted to Eberhard 95 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST Ysbrand, who reached Pekin in 1693, and there obtained what the Czar wished. In 1721, Tsmailof was despatched to the Chinese capital to secure from the Emperor Kanghi the privi- lege of establishing there a permanent Russian legation. He gave the Bodgy-Khan a letter from the Czar and left M. de Lange as chargt d'affaires; but the latter ahnost immediately after Tsmailof's departure was dismissed by the Chinese court. In 1727, a treaty that secured greater commercial privileges for the Russians was signed at Kiakhta. In 1806, Golovine, another envoy, was sent to Pekin with a view to obtaining the free navigation of the Amur River. This mission failed; never- theless the position of Russia in the Asiatic East was continually growing stronger. In 1807, they had annexed the peninsula of Kam- tchatka. In 1847, Count Nicholas Muravief, who was to win the surname of Amourski, became governor of Eastern Siberia, and set himself to develop and strengthen the colony. 96 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST He perceived that it would have no future if possession was not secured of the chief river and the richest province of the region, that is, of the Amur and of Manchuria. The river was still so incompletely known that the Grand Chancellor Nesselrode declared to the Emperor Nicholas that its outlet was inaccessible. In 1848, a Cossack expedition, under Vaganof, perished without the escape of a single person to tell the tale. Two years afterwards Captain Nevelskoi discovered that Saghalin is really an island, separated from the mainland by the channel or strait of Tartary, and, in the course of his exploration, came upon the mouth of the Amur, entered it in a small boat, and planted the Russian flag on its banks; proclaiming to the natives that the country belonged to the ''White Czar" at St. Petersburg. The Grand Chancellor was terrified at NevelskoV's audacity; he already saw hunself at war with China; he insisted that the daring captain's action be dis- countenanced, but the Emperor replied: ''When 97 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST Russia's flag has been raised anywhere it should not be taken down." On his part, Governor Muravief endeavored to persuade the local mandarins that the best thing to do was to leave the Russians alone. The Chinese demanded that negotiations be entered upon with their Emperor; Muravief thought that Pekin was too far away for that and that Chinese diplomacy was too slow. He continued to act, therefore, as if the country was already a Russian province, and strengthened his posi- tion by building along the river the forts Alexandrovsk, Mikhai'lovsk, and Nicolaievsk, — all of these, baptismal names of the royal family. Petropavlosk, on the southeast coast of Kam- tchatka, had been established in 1740. Other fortresses arose at the junction of the several principal tributaries of the Amur River. ^'The Amur will be the death of you,'' said the Emperor Nicholas jestingly to Muravief. During the Crimean War the Anglo-French fleet blockaded the Russian Pacific coast, and 98 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST destroyed a part of the military establishments and of the infant marine. This blockade, by threatening to starve out the colony, only hastened a decision upon the part of Muravief, who had need of Manchuria to furnish food for his colonists. Its annexation was already an accomplished fact, when, in 1857, Admiral Putiatin dropped anchor in the Gulf of Pechili and proposed to the Chinese Emperor, in con- sideration of Russia's armed intervention in the Taiping rebellion, the cession of Manchuria. China's only reply was a vigorous protest against Russian encroaclmient. War seemed inmainent between the two empires. Fortu- nately for Russia, just at that time came the Anglo-French expedition and the march of the alliqg upon Pekin. The Russians profited by this event to complete the annexation of the coveted territory. The Czar sent a fleet into the Chinese waters, and the Celestials did not relish having a third European power to deal with. By the Treaties of Aigun and Tientsin 99 LofC. RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST in 1858, they granted to Russia the entire left bank of the Amur, the entire territory between that river and the ocean as well as its tributary stream, the Ossuri, the bay on which there was, in time, to rise the fortress of Vladivostock, with its prophetic name (Dominator of the East). These newly acquired lands formed two provinces, the Amur Province and the Maritime Province. By the Treaty of Pekin, in 1860, China ceded to Russia the region adjacent to the lakes Balkash and Issik-kul; the boundary line between Manchuria and Siberia was re- adjusted, and the Russians were granted the right to trade in all parts of the empire. Fifteen years more, and Russia obtained from Japan the abandonment of the latter's rights over Saghalin in exchange for the North Kurile Isles. For nearly thirty years the boundary between China and Russia remained as agreed upon in the treaties of 1858 and 1860. But already the commercial and political activity of the Russians was overstepping it. They had estab- 100 RUSSIA IN THE FAR EAST lished themselves in large numbers in the cities of Chinese Manchuria, — in Kiakhta, Mukden, Kirin, and Tsitsihar, the residence of the mandarin-governor. The navigation of the Ossuri and the Sungari Rivers fell wholly into their hands. The steamships of the Amur Company put Russia in rapid communication with Japan and San Francisco. ''Scientific Missions'^ traversed China in all directions. At Pekin the Russian colony acquired a con- tinually greater importance and the ambas- sador of the Czar wielded more influence at court than the representatives of any other European power. His open handed liberality won him the favor of the courtiers, the man- darins, and the generals. In all the sea and river ports, the colonies of Russian merchants multiplied, and these seemed to live on better terms with the native population than the traders of other foreign nations. On the arrival of the Czarovitch, in 1891, he was honored with a series of royal entertainments. 101 COREA. The China-Japan War — Interference of Russia- Conflict With Japanese Interests — Russia's Gain. China and Japan, '^The Middle Kingdom/' and "The Land of the Rising Sun/' the Bogdy- Khan and the Mikado, had disputed with each other for a long time, the protectorate of the kingdom of Corea. War broke out between the two empires in the July of 1894. The Japanese troops, drilled and equipped in the European manner, were everywhere victorious. Their warships, built in the best shipyards of Europe, sank the Chinese vessels. The Japan- ese occupied all Corea, stormed and captured Port Arthur, conquered a part of Chinese Manchuria, captured Wei-hai-Wei, threatened Pekin, and finally imposed upon China the Treaty of Shimonosaki, April 17, 1895. China 102 COREA was compelled to renounce all her claims with respect to Corea; to give to her conquerors the Island of Formosa, the Pescadores, the pen- insula of Liao-tung, with Port Arthur and Talien-Wan, to open five new ports, including Pekin, to their commerce; to grant them the right to open manufacturing establishments in the empire; and to pay a war indemnity of seven hundred and fiftj^ miUions.^ The success of the Japanese had been so rapid that all the European powers were sur- prised at this sudden revelation of such a military and naval strength in the hands of the Mikado. England, at first hostile and malevolent, hastened to show more friendly feelings for the conqueror; the United States concluded a commercial treaty with the Jap- anese government: and all the plans that Russia had formed for supremacy in the Far I, {}) Vladimir, The China-Japan War, compiled from Japanese, Chinese, and Foreign Sources, London, Samp- son Low, 1896. 103 COREA East were threatened with failure. She could I not allow either Wei-hai-Wei or the peninsula of Liao-tung, with the harbors that she had so long coveted, to remain in the hands of the Japanese. Should she do so, she would see ! herself relegated to the ports of Siberia and 1 Northern Manchuria, closed by ice for a part of the year, and her hope of unfolding her colors : in the seas of the Far East taken from her. She could not permit that the influence of triumphant Japan should be substituted at Pekin for her own influence, already dating back a century or more. It was necessary, at any cost, even should it mean war, to pre- vent the provisions of the Shimonosaki Treaty being carried out. She was successful in enlisting the cooperation of two states which, although antagonistic to each other, had reasons for keeping the good-will of Russia. These three powers: — Russia, France and Ger- many, — formed what might be called "A Triple AUiance of the Far East." They for- 104 COREA warded to the court at Tokyo some "friendly advice" regarding the giving up of claims that might bring about a general conflagration. It was hard for Japan to renoimce the Liao- tung peninsula, with its harbors of Port Arthur, Talien-Wan, and Wei-hai-Wei, that had been conquered at the price of its blood, and by such brilliant victories; but the Japanese armies were on the Chinese mainland; the three powers were masters of the sea; and thus the island empire was left almost without defence. The three protesting powers had the advantage. Russia, in the deliberations over the revision of the treaty, showed such pas- sionate insistence that twice, May 5, and May 8, Admiral Tyrtof made all preparations to meet the Japanese fleet, which probably would have gone to the bottom. By the Treaty of Tokyo, May 8, 1895, Japan agreed to give up the Liao-tung and Wei-hai-Wei; to be satisfied with Formosa and the Pescadores, positions of the utmost importance in the 105 COREA Pacific; and to receive the war indemnity and certain commercial privileges. ^ -f As a matter of fact, Russia had just inflicted upon Japan the treatment that she herself had received from the European powers, after so many splendid victories over the Turks. It was under the pressure of a ^'Euro- pean Concert'^ that Japan lost the most precious fruits of her success against the Chinese, just as the Russian conquerors of the Ottomans had lost theirs. Russia set up against Japan the principle of the integrity of the Chinese Empire in exactly the same way that the powers had imposed upon her the principle of the preservation of the Turkish Empire. The Treaty of Tokyo in 1895, modified the Treat)^ of Shimonosaki as completely as had the Treaty of Berlin modified that of San Stefano in 1878. And just as Russia, in 1878, has had the mortification of seeing her polit- ical foes, Austria and England, enrich them- selves with the spoils of that very Turkish 106 COREA Empire that they pretended to protect against her covetousness, laying their hands, the one on Bosnia and Herzegovina and the other upon the island of Cyprus; so Japan soon had the mortification of seeing Russia violate, for her own profit, that very principle of the con- tinental integrity of the Chinese Empire that she had set up against Japanese ambition. 107 CHINA. Russian Concessions — Port Arthur — Railways — Loans — Corea — Germany — Great Britain — The United States. England and France, the former in par- ticular, obtained from China numerous import- ant concessions i; but of more value were those that Russia secured. By the convention of June, 1895, China contracted with her, through the intermediary of the Russo-Chinese bank, recently established at St. Petersburg, and under the direction of Count Oukhtomski whose Oriental policy we know, a loan of four hundred million francs at four per cent., pay- able in thirty-six years. On October 25, 1896, this same bank made another agreement (}) R. I. Pinon et J. de Marcillac, La Chine qui s'ouvre Paris, 1900. Pierre Leroy-Beaulieu, La renovation de V Asie: Siberie, Chine, Japon, 'Paris, 1900. Chas. Beres- ford, The Break- Up of China, London and New York, 1899. 108 CHINA with the Pekin government. This agreement, ratified by the Czar, became, on December 26, the Treaty of St. Petersburg. It gave the Eastern Chinese Railroad Company the right to build a road through Chinese Man- churia, making it a branch line of the Rus- sian Trans-Siberian Railroad; to develop coal and other mines in the territory trav- ersed by the road, and to devote itself to all other industrial and commercial enterprises. The stock of the company can be held by Chinese and Russians only, which means that it will fall almost exclusively into the hands of the Russians. A special clause authorized \ the Czar to station in Manchuria both infantry i and cavalry for the protection of the railroad. I This was the disguised annexation of all the part of the vast province that had not already been ceded to Russia in 1858 and 1860. Fur- thermore, China leased to Russia for fifteen years a harbor in the province of Shantung, and finally, Russian warships were given the 109 CHINA privileges of the two harbors of Liao-tung peninsula, Port Arthur and Talien-AVan. March 27, 1898, there was formulated a new agreement between the two countries. Port Arthur and Talien-Wan and all their dependencies were leased to Russia for a term of twenty-five years. With this was granted the privilege of building through the Liao- tung peninsula a railroad from Vladivostock to Port Arthur, which is merely another branch of the Trans-Siberian road. Nor is this all. According to a still more recent agreement, a Russian railroad is to be built from Mukden in Manchuria to Pekin. Another Russian company is to construct a system of Chinese railroads, the three principal lines of which, setting out from Pekin, are to traverse, the first two, the provinces of Shansi and Honan, the third, the province of Hupe and to terminate at Hankow on the Yang- tse-kiang. Against this third railroad, Eng- land made a vigorous protest. In her treaties 110 CHINA with China, she had secured for herself the building of railroads and the commerce of the valley of the Yang-tse, and here the Russians were coming to cut off her railroads, and in the very heart of China to draw off the mer- chandise that she was counting upon to export by sea, and which was now likely to be carried by the Trans-Siberian line. After having secured the defeat at Pekin of the propo- sitions of a Franko-Russian syndicate, she encouraged two Chinese of high rank to apply for a contract to build the debated railroad. They foimd themselves unable to raise the necessary funds, and it was then that Russia, thanks to the energy of Count Oukhtomski, had the franchise transferred to a Franco- Belgian company. Nevertheless, in November, 1897, Russia had neither the ability nor the wish to pre- vent the Germans from landing in the bay of Kiao-chow which she seemed to have re- served for herself, or from securing a lease 111 CHINA of it for ninety-nine years. Neither could she hinder the Enghsh, incensed at the action of the Germans, from obtaining, in April, 1898, a lease of the harbor and bay of Wei- hai-Wei, evacuated by the Japanese. It thus happens that in the Pechili Gulf, from which Pekin receives the greater part of its supplies, three European powers occupy places very near one another; the Russians at Port Arthur and Talien-Wan, the Germans at Kiao-chow, and the English at Wei-hai-Wei. The Pechili Gulf has become another Mediterranean, on whose shores rival Asiatic interests continue the rivalries of Europe. The position of Russia is much the strongest. She commands Pekin, not merely by sea, but by all the overland highways. She alone of the three rival powers in the Pechili Gulf possesses a vast continental base of operations. She fronts China along a boundary line several thousand miles in length; she embraces and pentrates China; and she alone by her railroads, the Trans-Siberian, 112 CHINA the Trans-Manchurian, and the Trans-Chinese, will be able to pour into the very center of China and into its capital a great European army. Recently in the revolution of the pal- ace, which took place in Pekin in September, 1898, it was manifest to what degree the influ- ence of the Russian legation there was pre- ponderant. The young Emperor, Kwang-Su, supported by Japan, and perhaps also by England, endeavored to shake off the tutelage of the Empress-Dowager, Tsu-Hsi, and of the viceroy, Li-Hung-Chang, the friend of the Russians, in order that he might inaugurate an era of reforms. The plot was discovered, the accomplices of the Emperor were exe- cuted or banished, and the Empress-Dowager reassumed full power. In Corea, Russia took the place of China in the long-standing rivalry that the latter had carried on with Japan. At Seoul, in the palace of King Li-hui, it was the Russian faction which, as a conservative party, took the place 113 CHINA of the old Chinese faction in opposition to the Japanese faction, which constitutes the progress- ive party of Corea. Japan and Russia disputed with each other not only political influences, but commercial exploitation. Russia might have employed force, but she feared lest Japan, the Great Britain of the Far East, might throw herself into an alliance with the Great Britain of Europe. Therefore, Russia now openly opposed Japan, and now again craftily manipu- lated her. In spite of the keenness of the con- tention, she had the shrewdness never to push matters to a rupture. In a series of agreements, dated May 14, 1896, February 24, 1897, April 25, 1898, respectively, the two rivals attempted to define the conditions of this sort of condo- minium and to establish an equitable division of commercial advantages, of mail and tele- graph monopoly, and of police force. In this division, however, Russia seemed to secure the lion's share. She gained possession in Corea of a system of telegraph lines which she annexed 114 CHINA to her Siberian lines; she managed to have the financial administration of the kingdom entrusted to Russians, and succeeded in having King Li-hui issue an edict that the future railways of Corea should be of the same gauge as those of Siberia. With France in Tonquin and the region round about; Germany in Kiao-chow; England at Wei-hai-Wei, on the Blue River, and in the pen- insula of Kelimg before Hong-Kong; with Russia throughout all north China; the Japanese in Corea, in Formosa, and the Pescadores, and the United States in the Philippines, — it can be seen that the poUtical problems of the Far East have become as complicated as the hke problems have ever been in Europe or America. 115 THE MEANS AND METHODS OF RUSSIAN EXPANSION. Fruits of Diplomacy — Absolutism of Russian Government — An Enlightened Despotism — Rus- sian Colonists — Race Characteristics — Religion — Population — Franco-Russian Alliance — From the Baltic to the Pacific. We have followed Russia in all the directions that her policy of expansion has carried her. It now remains for us to study the means that she has employed, especially in what con- cerns her expansion in the East. The essential characteristic that distinguishes her Oriental from her Western policy, is that, ^ while nearly all the progress she has made in ; Europe has been either the cause or the result of bloody wars like those of the Czars of Mos- cow against Poland, of Peter the Great against Charles XII., of Catherine II. and Alexander II. against the Ottomans, of Paul I. against the 116 RUSSIAN EXPANSION French Republic, of Alexander I. against Napo- leon, and of Nicholas I. against the Allies in the Crimea, her Oriental expansions have never brought her into war with a power of the first magnitude, not even with China. However beUicose Russia may have shown herself in Europe, in Asia she has exhibited a prudence wholly Oriental. A score of times it has seemed that she was on the brink of a mighty war with Great Britain over the frontiers of India; with China over Albasin, Kuldja, or Man- churia; and with Japan over Liao-tung and Corea. Some sort of an agreement has always come in time to ward off an open rupture, as in 1872, 1885, 1887, and 1895, with Great Britain; and as at Nertchinsk, at Aigun, af Tientsin, and at Pekin with China. In 1871, war with the latter seemed imminent with respect to the Kuldja question, but, rather than proceed to extreme measures, Russia preferred to abandon a part of her conquest. In these agreements, Russia it is found, has 117 RUSSIAN EXPANSION generally the better part of the bargain. She understands how to utilize the amour propre of her adversaries. Thus, she helped the Chi- nese 'Ho save their face/' for example, by inducing them to lease for twenty-five or ninety- nine years what they would obstinately have refused to cede definitely. Thanks to this expedient, it appeared to the Chinese that the dignity and integrity of their empire would remain inviolate. England also has grown accustomed to allowing herself 'Ho save her face,'' and to be put to sleep by the mesmeric passes, energetic, and at the same time, caress- ing of Russian diplomacy. She allows herself to see in the "explanations" brought to Lon- don, the proof that some bold Cossack raid, some thorough lesson administered to her Afghan cHents, is the result of an "error", a "misunderstanding." A company of six hun- dred soldiers is almost always a "scientific expedition." The English minister, in order not to stir up strife, allows himself to yield, 118 RUSSIAN EXPANSION and hands over to his successor the task of disentangUng the knot. This successor is care- ful not to meddle with what he himself was not mixed up in, and what the jingoes and London cockneys have already forgotten; and so what the Russians have skillfully acquired remains permanently in their possession. If the occa- sion demands it. they will declare that they did not intend to conquer Bokhara; but have they proved that they have not made a vassal state of it, something that will be more useful to them than an annexed province? They never intended to advance to Merv; but if the people of Merv of their own accord came to them, would it be a wise policy to reject a " volmitary'^ submission? And thus, slowly, silently, with- out excessive cracking of her whip, Russian supremacy, in her well-oiled car of progress, has been moving on through all Central Asia. Russia is the only European power which has an absolute government. Its autocratic fea- ture, so fiercely assailed upon the accession of 119 RUSSIAN EXPANSION Nicholas I. by the "Constitutionals/' or ''Republicans/' of 1825, and under Alexander II. by the Nihilist conspiracies, seems to have taken on a new life in the estimation of the Russian people, because, according to the expres- sion of Prince Oukhtomski, it is the necessary condition of the greatness of their nation and of her ''supernatural" and providential mis- sion in Asia. If the foimdation of the govern- ment remains autocratic, this autocracy, is at least more sincerely an " enlightened despotism" than was the absolutism of the eighteenth cen- tury, a despotism thoughtful of the economic interests and the well-being of the people, blending its ambitions with the legitimate aspirations of the nation. It has borrowed from the West municipal or provincial self- government, but not the parliamentary, not even the representative regimen. In Russia there is no minister responsible to legislative bodies, where changeable majorities successively displace one another; but ministers having the 120 RUSSIAN EXPANSION confidence of the sovereign continue in office for a long time, in such manner that from 1815 to 1882 Russia had only two ministers of foreign affairs, Nesselrode and Gortchakof, and since the latter date there have been only three, De Giers, Lobanof, and Muravief. How many have been those that have followed one another during these past eighty-five years in France, England, and even the United States! This permanency in office allows continuity of the same political views and constancy in realizing them. No parliament, therefore, no question- ings, no blue or yellow books. A restricted liberty of the press closes with respect the indiscreet lips of reporters and interviewers. Hence secrecy in both planning and executing is possible. There is no need of throwing dust in the eyes of parliaments, of the newspapers, and of the people ; nor is there any need of brag, optimistic proclamations, and of oratorical heroics. Great conquests can be accomplished silently. 121 RUSSIAN EXPANSION This form of government, though it may appear as archaic as the despotism of Nebuchad- nezzar or of the Grand Turk, does not exclude the use of the most modern appUances and scientific methods over which free peoples pride themselves; railroads, telegraphs, telephones, improved cannon and rifles, battleships and cruisers of the latest pattern, a thorough knowl- edge of history, of ethnography, and of all forms of human speech, from those of Finland to those of Kamtchatka. It does not exclude the system of military organization in vigorous operation by the powerful and enlightened nations of France and Germany, nor yet the art of securing from the people the maximum of military power. Russia has a regular army like France and Germany, national militia like Switzerland, and irregular troops like those of the Shah of Persia and the Emperor of China. These irregulars date back to the beginning of Russian expan- sion. The Czars of Moscow had their Cossacks 122 RUSSIAN EXPANSION of the Dnieper, of the Don, of the Volga, and of the Ural, In proportion as conquest succeeded conquest, the soldier class of the subdued peoples were amalgamated with the Russians in the '' Cossack armies'' of the Terek, of the Kuban, of the Caucasus, and of Turkestan. There are to-day Cossacks of the Trans-Baikal, of the Pamirs, and of the Amur. For hundreds and thousands of kilometres, they constitute the grand guard of the regular army, the mobile curtain of light cavalry that will screen its movements, ''free lances," for whose too audacious encroachment and too bold raids, it will be possible to disavow all responsibility. Behind these, like another advance guard, come the merchants, adventurers also, merchant adventurers, as the English of the fifteenth cen- tury said. Behind these, again, sally forth the colonists in search of cheap land, and who, following the course of the rivers and streams, at times venturing into the jungles, found vil- lages over which will soon rise the humble bell- 123 RUSSIAN EXPANSION tower of a church. All these people, Cossacks, officers, and soldiers of the regular army, mer- chants, colonists, and even the tchinovniks, or officials, possess to a degree not met with in any other European nation, the gift of adapta- tion to a new climate and environment, and the gift of assimilating native races or of becoming assimilated with them. The peasant of Euro- pean Russia, very much mixed, especially in the East, with Finnish or Turkish blood and characteristics, does not differ essentially from the Ostiak and the Vogul of Western Siberia. These, in turn, show no marked difference from the Turkish population of Eastern Siberia, such as the Yakuts. From these to the Mongo- lian races, such as the Tunguses, the Buriats, and the Manchus, and from these to the Chinese population, there is scarcely any noticeable transition. There was a time, when from the Dnieper to the Pacific, all obeyed the same master, the Grand Khan, "the Son of Heaven," whose heir to-day is the "White Czar." From 124 RUSSIAN EXPANSION the Dnieper to the Pacific extends the same plain, are found the same chmate and the same soil, barren steppes alternating with fertile mould; the same manner of life, of dwelling, and of dress; the same endurance of extreme cold, excessive heat, privations, fatigue, long journeys, and a half -nomadic existence; and the same tendency to Oriental fatalism, which the orthodox term Christian resignation. And thus, as Elisee Reclus remarks, the Yakuts easily become Russians and the Russians as easily become Yakuts, and both Russians and natives possess the same readiness in acquiring the language of the foreigner. Does not the difference in religion constitute a barrier between them? The Russian peasant with his rudimentary faith, to which, neverthe- less, he holds with all his heart, and even the pope, or parish priest, with his vaguely uncer- tain theology and his ignorance, are free from all intolerance. Any form of the Christian religion, whatever value it may have, although 125 RUSSIAN EXPANSION it clashes with the still less highly developed beliefs of the Mohammedan peoples, makes its way among tribes that are pagan, Shamanist, Fetichist, or vaguely Buddhist. Between the Russians and the pagans there is established a oneness of faith or superstition. There is no question of complicated dogmas devised by the subtle brains of Alexandria or of Byzantium. The untutored Siberians do not fall into con- troversies over the mystery of the Trinity, the twofold nature of the Redeemer, or transub- stantiation. The idea of God is too lofty for these coarse minds, but they all agree in placing on the summit of their Pantheon Saint Nicho- las, the Thaumaturgist, and above liim, beneath him, or equal with him, Christ and the Virgin. Beneath these come saints. Christian or with a physiognomy that may be pagan. Buddhistic, and at times Mohammedan. And all this multi- form worship is in full harmony with the primi- tive cult of springs and of certain venerable trees, with the belief in demons of the forests 126 RUSSIAN EXPANSION and river sprites, and with the custom of wear- ing certain amulets that the orthodox priest, the Shamanist sorcerer, or the Hadji returned from Mecca, may furnish. What more is neces- sary in order to be, in this Ufe, successful on the farm, or in fishing, or in hunting, or in war, and, in the next, to be certain of salvation? The Tunguse, the Buriat, the Vogul, and the Ostiak, who firmly believe in Saint Nicholas, have already become, or are in the process of becoming, Russian. Are not the Tchuvashi, the Mordva, and the Meshtcheraks all children of the same father, that is, subjects of the same Czar? Though they may be Mohamme- dans, do they not still believe in the virtue of certain magical words uttered by the orthodox priest, the efficacy of the holy waters in driving away Cheitan (Satan) and evil Djinns, in the protection that Saint Blaise, the old-time god, Valoss, of the Russians, extends over their flocks, and in the cures wrought in the name of Saint Cosme or in that of Saint Damian, 127 RUSSIAN EXPANSION those heavenly physicians, who cure their adherents without requiring remuneration? Those two scourges, journaHsm and theology, being almost unknown in the Asiatic Empire of the Czar, one can live there in a happy con- fusion of things. Politics does not create any differences among men, and religion scarcely any. There is no time to reflect and subtilize upon the more or less brown or yellow color of the face, the more or less turned-up shape of the nose, the more or less slant of the eyes, or the more or less prominence of the cheeks. In no degree of the social scale is there known the prejudice ''of the skin," so pronounced among the English and Americans, and noticeable, but to much less extent, among the French, Portuguese, and Spanish colonists. Russian colonization is not destructive of aboriginal races; it does not exterminate them, it absorbs them. Marriages, legal or othen\'ise, are fre- quent between the conquerers and the con- quered. Already, in the days of Ivan the 128 RUSSIAN EXPANSION Terrible, Tartar Khans became Russian princes. To her subjects of brown or of saffron com- plexion, of Buddhist or of Mohammedan reli- gion, Russia has always shown more liberality than France has to her Algerian subjects. In Algeria it has become difficult for an Arab or a Berber to rise above the grade of captain, but majors, colonels, and even generals of Turkish or Circassian race, and even of the Mohamme- dan religion, are numerous in the Asiatic armies of the ''White Czar." The Russians of Europe are fully able of themselves to people their Asiatic colonies without having to assimilate the natives, and without the assistance of foreign inmiigration. Russia is fortunate in that her colonies are only a prolongation of her own territories. To become a colonist, there is no ocean to cross, no steamboat fare to pay. The poorest peas- ant, a staff in his hand, an axe at his belt, his boots slung from a cord over his shoulder, can pass from one halting-place to another, imtil 129 RUSSIAN EXPANSION he reaches the ends of the empire. Moreover, the population of Russia, by its own birth rate, increases, in spite of insufficient medical care at childbirth, with a rapidity miknown to any other nation of European blood, excepting, perhaps, the Canadian French. In 1878-79, the subjects of the Czar nmnbered ninety-six millions, in 1899 they reached one hundred and twenty-nine millions, an increase in twenty years of thirty-three millions, a number almost equal to the population of the kingdom of Italy, or an annual increase of about one million six hundred thousand souls, a number that about equals the present population of North Carolina or Alabama. With such a treasury of men to draw from, neither military power nor colonial strength will be lacking. In Siberia, before 1895, the increase of population by immigra- tion alone was only about ninety-two thousand per year. Since the suppression of penal trans- portation, especially since the construction of the Trans-Siberian railroad, immigration has 130 RUSSIAN EXPANSION brought in two hundred thousand annually. The population of Siberia must by this time have reached the figure of seven millions. Of this number at least six millions are Rus- sians. This, however, is one person for each square kilometre of territory, so that neither is there any lack of land. For a long time the Russian sovereign needed two things to enable him to plunge boldly into the depths of Asia. First, he lacked the assur- ance that England or the German powers would not be able to foment on his European frontiers one of those coalitions like those that resulted in the Crimean War or in the revision of the Treaty of San Stefano; secondly, he lacked ''the sinews of war," or, as the English phrase- ology is, ''the Cavalry of Saint George." The alliance with France, outlined at Kronstadt in 1891, proclaimed at Paris in 1896, and at St. Petersburg in 1897, has given the Czar two things that were wanting. It assures the safety of the European frontiers against any effort of 131 RUSSIAN EXPANSION the Triple Alliance. In the Far East, in 1895, we have seen how, at the same time, France and Germany took in hand the interests of Russia against Japanese ambition and British hostility. The Germany of Bismarck attempted to ruin Russia's credit in the Berlin exchange and in the European market. France threw open her market and her credit to Russia, and either in France, or thanks to her, the Czar, within a few years, has been able to borrow several milliards. This has enabled him to strengthen his army, put a powerful navy afloat, consent to large loans to China and Persia, complete his European railroad system, and push forward the work upon the Trans- Caucasus, the Trans-Siberian, the Trans-Man- churian, and the Trans-Chinese railroads. The results of the darings raids through Turkestan, in the direction of the Persian Gulf and of Afghanistan, and towards the Amur and the Japan Sea, are now consolidated by a wholly modern outfit of war and travel. In 132 RUSSIAN EXPANSION Turkestan, the ancient capitals of Tamerlane, the fortresses conquered by the heroism of the Perovskis, the Tchernaiefs and of the Skobe- lefs, all of which called for so much skill and careful manipulation on the part of Russian diplomacy, are to-day railroad stations. There are dining-room stations at Merv, Bokhara, Samarkand, Kokhand, Andijan, Tashkend, etc., and the Russian station of Kushk is only one hundred and twenty kilometres from Herat. The Trans-Siberian railroad, with its mmierous stations, its branch lines to Khabarovsk, Port Arthur, and Pekin, and the annexed systems that penetrate the Chinese Empire, has consoli- dated all that was accomplished by the venture- some explorers of former times, from Irmak or Khabarof to Lieutenant Nevelsko'i of our day. The principal line, six thousand two hundred kilometres long, with its bridges of eight hun- dred metres over the Obi and the Irtysh, of one thousand metres over the Yenisei and the Selenga, with its ferryboat, one hundred metres 133 RUSSIAN EXPANSION long, that ferries the trains across the southern bay of Lake Baikal, permits the transportation of colonists, merchants, regiments, and brings to bear upon the further side of Asia all the power of the Czar who reigns at St. Petersburg. In 1889, the merchants of Nizhni Novgorod, in an address to the Emperor Alexander III., pre- dicted in these terms the brilliant future of the Trans-Siberian: '^It will unite to Europe, through the Russian Empire, four hundred millions of Chinese, and forty-two millions of Japanese. One will be able to go from Europe to Shang-hai by Vladivostock in twenty days instead of the thirty-five which the Canadian route requires, or the forty-five of the Suez route." The distance between Europe and the Far East has been still further shortened by the extension of the Russian railroad to Port Arthur. In the commerce of the world, the Trans-Siberian will work as important a revo- lution as did the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope in the fifteenth century, or the construc- 134 RUSSIAN EXPANSION tion of the Suez Canal in the nineteenth. The poUcy of Russia is to secure the full attain- ment of what she has been striving after for centuries in her onward march through the Siberian wilds, that is, access to seas free from ice, where her fleets of war and commerce may have unhindered course. Russia is striving for this freedom of the sea four hundred years later than Spain, Portugal, France, Eng- land, and Holland. She has lost nothing in having waited so long. Thus far, she has passed through the Baltic, and the Mediter- ranean periods, with a power for expansion unknown to her predecessors. She is about to inaugurate a new era in her history; the oceanic, the world-wide era, is merely beginning for the Slav. 135 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE A PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE: A Psychological study. J. Novicow, Odessa. The psychology of a great nation is difficult to determine. When we have before us an organism composed of tens of millions of men, we may assume in advance that it contains the most varied and diverse elements. You may say of it whatever you please; the most opposite and contrary assertions may be equally true in regard to it. One is, therefore, neces- sarily reduced to certain broad generalizations, which remain in a very large measure superficial. Even approximate precision is impossible in matters of this kind. Errors and subjective irregularities are more likely to arise here than anywhere else. Almost involuntarily, every sociologist, in determining the psychology of his nation, gives more or less the psychology 139 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE of his own individuality. In vain we may employ every effort to arrive at the impartial truth; we can never completely attain such a result. On the other hand, when one under- takes to define the psychology of a foreign nation, he falls into even greater inaccuracies. When we do not belong to a nation, when we have not breathed in its inherent atmos- phere with our ver}^ first breath, we cannot feel as does this nation; and this makes it impossible to talk of it with any intelligence. From still another point of view, it is difficult to define the psychology of a nation, because psychology is, in its very essence, vague and indefinite. "^Hien we think of the American, English, or Russian people, a certain picture, it is true, rises before the mind; but the outlines are so wavering and intangible that it is almost impossible to express this picture in words. The fundamental difference between people is marked far more by their manner of feeling than by their manner of thinking. But how 140 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE are we to define in words this manner of feeling on the part of an individual, and, still more, that of a nation composed of millions of indiv- iduals? But if the psychology of any people in general is difficult to determine, that of the Russian people in particular is very much more so. In the first place, we may ask ourselves, ' ' T\liat is the Russian nation?" It is a imion of Slav populations inhabiting the northeastern part of Europe, a part of the Caucasus, and Siberia. But this branch of the Slav race is fm*ther di\'ided into three great branches; the Great Russians, Little Russians, and TMiite Russians. Some ethnographers and linguists maintain that the Little Russians should not be consid- ered part of the Russian nation, but as an independent Slav nation, just like the Czechs and Poles. And here a new obstacle confronts us. We shall overcome it, however, by limiting ourselves in this essay to speaking of the Great Russians. This will be the more legitimate^ 141 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE since they form much the most numerous and important branch. The Great Russians compose more than two thirds of the Russian nation in general. There are about fifty milhons of them, and they have also the advan- tage in intellectual development. The Great Russian dialect, the Muscovite dialect, is now the literary language of all Russia, the language of Pushkin, of Lermontof, and of Tolstoi. Imagine an instrimient for measuring the intellect and morality of men. Imagine that, with the aid of such an instrument, we had measured the intellect and morality of all the Americans, of all the English, and of all the Russians. I am convinced that we should obtain very similar averages. No one can dispute the fact, however, that at the different epochs of history, some nations may be more advanced than others. But the nations which are most in advance at a certain period may not be so at another. The Italians were much in advance of the English in the fifteenth 142 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE century, which would seem to show that the psychology of a people is not immutable, and can hardly be definitely determined once and for all. Like a living existence, a people is contin- ually changing; so that what we say of it to-day may be no longer true of it to-morrow. Hence a new difficulty arises in determining the psychology of a nation. But the reader will doubtless inquire, ' ' Since you recognize that so many obstacles lie before you, why imdertake this task?'' I do so at the solicitation of the Editor of this volume, and the precise object of these preliminary remarks is to secure the reader's indulgence for the imperfection of my work. If the opinions stated in the following pages are not clear and well defined, if inaccuracies and contradictions appear there, it is for the reason that, in the nature of things, it is impos- sible to trace with geometric precision the outlines of a popular psychology. Life is a continually changing metamorphosis. He who 143 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE speaks of living things must perforce limit him- self to approximations more or less vague, and with little resemblance to algebraic theorems. I. Race and Temperament. The Russian Empire contains more than sixty-five independent racial groups. It is a veritable Tower of Babel. Even with the omission of Siberia and Central Asia, there remain in Russia in Europe, and the Cau- casus alone, forty-six different peoples. In the northwest, the Fins; in the west, the Lithuan- ians and Poles; in the southwest the Rouman- ians; and in the east, on the banks of the Volga, numerous groups of Uralo- Altaic populations: the Tcheremisa, Mordia, Votiaki, and Permians. In the southeast, there are the Tartars in Crimea, and Greeks on the Sea of Azof. Add to this the sporadic groups of Germans and Jews. All these numerous elements have in a great measure commingled. The history of Russia is the reverse, properly speaking 144 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE of that of the United States. While in America there is an Aryan invasion proceeding from east to west, in Russia there is an Aryan inva- sion going from west to east. The centre from which the Slav emigrations set forth seems to have been the region of the Dnieper and Galicia. The upper tributaries of the Dnieper were settled first. The Slavs then reached the Baltic and founded Novgorod the Great. Later (from the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries) they invaded the basin of the Volga, and founded successively Moscow, Nijni-Nov- gorod, Saratof, and many other cities. This movement is still going on. The American ''Far West'' has a counterpart in the ''Far Easf of Siberia. Nearly two hundred and twenty thousand Russian colonists settle there every year. But while the Aryans of America have almost exterminated the autochthonous population of the Redskins, the Russians emi- grants have commingled with the ancient autochthonous populations of eastern Russia. 145 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE The Russian people is thus, in its sum total, a mixture of Slavs and Fins. Given such conditions, it is very difficult to determine the physical and physiological type not only of the Russian people in general/ but also of the Great Russians in particular. Are the latter dark or light? To tell the truth, they are both. According to the researches of ethnographers, we see that the number of Great Russians with dark hair varies, with the different regions, from fifth-one to fifth- seven in a hmidred. These dark shades, furthermore, cover the entire scale from raven black to light brown. The same is true of the eyes as of the hair. Every shade is to be met with among the Russians, with a predominance, however, of grey eyes. If we consider blue and grey'^eyes as belonging in the category of light, and brown eyes as belonging in the category (i) We have already seen that they are divided into three great branches: the Great Russians (about fifty millions), the Little Russians (about twenty millions), and the White Russians (about five millions). 146 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE of dark colored ones, we must confess that, although in a slight degree, light shades rather predominate among the Russians. As to the conformation of the skull (to which is now attributed an importance which is as exaggerated as it is arbitrary), all types thereof are to be found in Russia. We find there the brachycephalic type, the mesaticephalic, and the doUchocephalic. But the archaeological researches of recent years, which have been very accurate, are responsible for a singular discovery, to the effect that in ancient times in Russia the dolichocephalic type predominated, and that in recent times it has been continually decreasing. This remark completely subverts certain modern theories, in accordance with which the number of the dolichocephalic type increases with the greater development of intellect. It may be maintained, however, that the Great Russians are more dolichocephalic than the Slavs of the south, — the Bulgarians and Servians. 147 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE Of what race, then are the Russians? It is very difficult to say. In the first place, there is no longer a single pure race in Europe; but of them all, the Russian nation is certainly composed of the greatest number of races. Into the vast plain which serves as its country have rushed a thousand different peoples. The modern Russians are a most complex mixture, whose constituent elements it is impossible henceforth to distinguish. There is an analogy in this respect, also, between the Russians and the Americans, who are a product of the crossing of all the races of Europe, Asia, Africa, and the new continent. Granted that the race of the Russians is so difficult to determine, it is even more difficult to describe their exterior aspect and their tem- perament. Every type imaginable is to be met with in Russia. The choleric, the lymphatic and the bilious. Apparently, however (this is a personal opinion of the author's, for there are no statistics on this subject), the lymphatic 148 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE type predominates. In general, the Muscovites are very tall, have full forms, soft thick beards, and abundant hair. This Vv^ould probably represent the average type of masculine beauty in the Russian race. The type of feminine beauty consists, also, in a rather lofty stature, and forms which are well rounded but neither slender nor graceful. While I am writing these lines, a type of the Russian woman arises before me. It differs from the American, English, and French woman, but a pencil is needed to draw it and not a pen. II. Genekal Psychology. Moreover, I am in haste to pass on to the psychical factors. The race and its exterior traits are of very slight importance in sociology, and for this reason I do not think it worth while to dwell long upon them. But it will be easily understood that there are quite as many, if not more, difficulties to be met with on the psychological plane than on 149 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE the physiological. If it is not easy to determine what colored eyes predominate in a people (for which direct observation only is required), still less so is it to determine the sort of char- acter. On this subject we shall have to content ourselves with general approximations. Keeping within these limits, we may venture to assert that one of the most prominent traits of the Great Russian character is an inequality of effort. It would seem as if the Russians had modeled themselves on the climate of their country, which offers the greatest extremes of heat and cold.^ It has been known for a long time, that among the Russians, . periods of eager activity are succeeded by periods of an almost insurmomitable apathy. Very often, in Russia, certain individuals are the victims of an intermittent alcoholism. They remain for months, sometimes, without (i) At Yakootsk, in Siberia, thirty-six degrees of heat in summer follow sixty degrees of cold in winter, which makes a range of ninety-six degrees. 150 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE drinking a drop of liquor. Then comes the period of alcohoUsm, and for a long time they are uninterruptedly tipsy from morning till night. For many Russians, too, this is their method of labor. They pass weeks doing nothing; and, then, all at once, they are capable of working thirty-six consecutive hours, and they then get through an enormous amount of work. Naturally, this remark applies rather to the wealthy and cultured, for the laboring classes of both city and country work regularly a fixed number of hours throughout the year. This inequality of effort is the trait among the Russians which will strike the stranger most forcibly. It seems to constitute a char- acteristic, as it were, of the Russian mind. It is in no sense a fatality inherent in the race, as the exponents of certain pseudo-scientific theories maintain. This inequality of effort is the result of historical circumstances, and when these circumstances shall have been modified it will disappear. What I have said 151 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE as to the degree of morality may be repeated of the amomit of energy. This amount is evi- dently present in equal force in every nation, but according to the bent given by historical cir- cumstanceSj one nation may possess more of it at a given moment than another. Until the sixteenth ,, century, the English were known for their indolence and apathy. The Flor- entines who went to England in the fifteenth century found the English positively inert. The great activity of the American people in our own time comes, in great measure, from their realization of the magnitude of the task which lies before them (an entire continent, immense and amazingly fertile, to people and cultivate) and the political facilities which they enjoy. The Russians have a territory more vast and fertile even than that of the Americans and quite as uncultivated. There is, then, no lack of work for them. Un- happily they have not yet had a chance to have free play, from a political point of 152 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE view; hence their state of apathy and dis- couragement. But should there come a more fortunate period in their history, it is quite probable that there would be found no less persistency of effort among the Russians than among the Anglo-Saxons. Even now certain indi- vidual proofs of this may be seen, for ine- quality of effort is very far from being a universal fact among cultivated Russians. If the Russians often experience these periods of apathy, we may at least exhibit in contrast with them some examples of a force of energy, calm and tenacious, which serves to over- come all obstacles. Cases of this may be fre- quently observed among the men, though that is but natural. Per contra, they are much more remarkable when found among the women. For the Russian woman has given some admirable examples of heroism. Strug- gling at times against much greater obstacles than her American sisters, she has succeeded 153 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE in obtaining an important place, notwith- standing, in science, art, and literature. Gen- erally speaking, the intellectual emancipation of the Russian woman, at the present time, seems to us in advance of that of the German, French, Italian, or English woman. The American woman alone, with her high mental culture, seems to us able to bear comparison with the Russian. What is, in our day, the dominant trait of the Russian woman? It is very difficult to say. All traits meet in her. Unquestionably that of a formal sentimentality no longer predominates, as it did at the beginning of the nineteenth century; but it is almost impos- sible to determine just what type of woman is acknowledged to prevail at the present moment in Russia. III. Sentiment. From the point of view of sentiment, we may say that a large amount of good nature 154 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE is very characteristic of the Russian. Of all the peoples of Europe, this is, perhaps, one of the least cruel. I know that such an opinion has almost the air of a paradox. The Russian people have an execrable reputation. The knout, Siberia, the extreme severity of the govern- ment, intolerance, Poland, the sufferings of the Nihilists, the persecution of the unhappy Jews, — all this has given the Russian nation a reputation for imiversal cruelty. In order, therefore, to have my opinion respected, it will be necessary to support it by facts. I shall allege, in the first place, that you never observe among the Russians any popular sport of a brutal character, — such as cock fights, bull fights, or even box- ing, or pugilism. Neither are customs like ''lynch law'' to be met with, which, though justified by the social exigencies of certain times, is nevertheless a very cruel practice. In this summary course of procedure, ^the 155 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE penalty of death is very often inflicted for offences which, in truth, hardly merit so terrible a punishment. Another proof of the gentle nature of the Russian people is the security which reigns, both on the high roads and in the country districts. Within the memory of man, there has not been a region of Great Russia which has been permanently infested with brigands. Night and day, one may traverse the most lonely roads with a sense of perfect security. Crimes are occa- sionally perpetrated, but only in sporadic and individual cases. For centuries, now, there has not been seen in Russia a social condition such as was presented recently by Spain, the Kingdom of Naples, Sicily, Greece, and such as Turkey still presents. The only portion of the Russian Empire where high- way robbery still exists, is in the southern part of the Caucasus; but there it is practiced by the indigenous populations, and more often by the Mussulmans. 156 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE Every one knows the feelings aroused in the lower classes of the Russian population by those who have been judicially convicted. It is pity, with which hardly an atom of hate or resentment is mingled. Finally, we must observe that Russia was the first to suppress the death penalty for offences against the common law. It may be stated, further, that, in many cases, the Russian administration is rather badly run, precisely because of the natural good nature of the nation. The chiefs are sometimes so complacent that they not only cannot make up their minds to dismiss their subordinates, but often do not even have resolution enough to censure them. The public service naturally suffers. It is the same with pensions. The municipal and provincial council boards are extremely lavish with them. Very few people have within them the courage to refuse, categorically, such help when de- manded, even though this may not be abso- 157 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE lutely needed. Numerous abuses proceed from this kindness of character. Whence comes it, then, that the Russians have so great a reputation for cruelty? From several causes. In the first place, we may observe in them the same trait in point of sentiment as in point of mental activity. The Russian is very unequal. If carried away, under certain circumstances, until he is quite beside himself, he may commit the greatest excesses. The Russian is less master of him- self than the Anglo-Saxon. But these very acts of cruelty, which are very uncommon, make the greater impression the rarer they are. The public likes to generalize, and is apt to consider as an habitual trait of char- acter what is for the most part exceptional. I do not mean that there are no cases of cruelty among the Russian people, and that they are better than any others. No; I only wish to say that, as is very commonly believed, they are no worse. 158 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE Aside from the inequality in his character, there are several other causes which lead to a belief in the cruelty of the Russian. In the first place, facts of a political nature. When it is a question of reasons of state, the sentiment of pity seems to vanish. Severe legislation is believed to be necessary, in order to save the state, and thus all pity seems a culpable weakness. If our ancestors, in the Middle Ages and up to within comparatively recent times, had such harsh penal legislation it is not that individually they were any worse than we are; it was only because they believed such legislation indispensable. Russia, having developed more slowly than other nations of the West, preserved longer certain archaic and cruel institutions, like slavery and cor- poral punishment. All the European nations have had, at some time, penal laws as barbar- ous as those of Russia; but they have sooner given them up. The sight of the Russian inflicting very severe punishments, already 159 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE forgotten in the West, is the source of the inference that they were more cruel than the Occidentals. This was not the case; they were only less advanced in point of ideas. They still believed these barbarous punish- ments to be necessary, after the other nations no longer shared in their error. And, then, the Russian government has an execrable reputation; since nearly all the civilized countries have become constitutional, and Russia has not, the line has been drawn, as it were, between the Russian government and the others. The former is in nowise the most cruel, but it is believed to be so. And, then, the Russian government commits one great fault: it judges political offences with closed doors. There may thus naturally be put to their account a whole series of cruelties which they have never committed. I am convinced that the number of individuals sent to Siberia for political crimes, during the whole course of the nineteenth century, does 160 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE not exceed, perhaps, three or four thousand persons.^ But the figures current in pubHc opinion in the West are infinitely larger. Of course these figures are hypothetical. People speak with the greatest fluency of fifty or sixty thousand persons a year. Human imag- ination has no limits ! The political prisons of Russia have every- where an execrable reputation. It is true that here and there revolting cruelties may be found. Political convicts are deprived, unhappily, of all legal protection. Their fate depends upon the personal character of the individual who is in charge of their prison. And among these individuals are to be found some who are monsters. But, generally speak- ing, I believe that political prisoners experience no worse treatment in Russia than in other countries. (i) This is a purely personal opinion, for precisely in consequence of the very mystery with which the Russian government surrounds itself, there is no accu- rate information to be had on this subject. 161 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE If we examine closely certain special cases, we may convince ourselves that the Russian government is no more cruel than any of the others. The reputation for severity of the Emperor Nicholas I. is well known. It was so terrible that a certain English author was amazed to learn that he was an excellent father of a family and was very fond of his children. It seemed to this author as if Nicholas I. were a vampire, thirsting for blood. Let us see the facts. The Emperor Alexander I. died, in 1825, without issue. His younger brother, Constantine, having renounced the throne, it reverted to the third brother, Nicholas. But Constantine's renunciation was not gen- erally known. On the death of Alexander, the oath of allegiance to Constantine was taken by many official bodies in St. Peters- burg. A few superior officers of the guard availed themselves of this circumstance to incite the troops against Nicholas, and to 162 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE make the attempt to suppress autocratic power in Russia. This is what is called the Revolution of December. After Nicholas had subdued them, he caused the officers who had revolted against him to be tried. Five only were condemned to death and exe- cuted. Thus a revolt of the army against their legitimate sovereign (for that was how Nicholas I. regarded it) caused the blood of but five persons to be shed, and this in bar- barous Russia, and by one of her most cruel monarchs. Let us see what was passing in the countries of the West at this same period. I shall not speak of France and the Revolution. Such a comparison would be impossible. There, under a mere suspicion, people were sent to the guillotine. The great poet Andre Chenier was beheaded for sympathizing with the Royalists, and also because he had written some verses against the members of the Na- tional Convention ! But, long after the ' ' Terror, ' ' 163 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE the French government had become no more beneficent. In 1824, four unhappy sergeants were executed in France only because they were members of a secret society. Is it neces- sary to recall the summary military execution by the Austrians in 1848? How many victims then perished! And no vulgar conspirators either, but noble warriors who had fought openly and bared their breasts to the enemy. But of all the European nations, Spain assuredly holds the palm for cruelty. In 1824, seven Free Masons were there executed, simply for having held a meeting! In 1831, a young man was hung for having cried ^'Hurrah for Liberty ! " A woman was hung in Granada for having embroidered a flag with the inscription, ^'Law, Liberty, Equality.^' Such examples might be multiplied. But these which I have just cited are sufficient, it seems to me, to show that the Russian government is far, indeed, from being as cruel as those of Western Europe. Simply because it is autocratic, while the others are 164 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE constitutional, it enjoys a reputation which it does not always merit. What I have just said is to prove what I have already advanced on the subject of the good nature of the Russian people. But, in consequence of the unevenness of character which is one of their dominant traits, this habitual good nature may be transformed at times into very great brutality, as I shall have occasion to point out when I come to speak of politics. Next to their good nature, one of the most universal traits of the Russian people is a large share of melancholy and sadness. The life of the Russian is far from being a very happy one. The country itself is not cheerful. Dur- ing six months of the year, it is shrouded in snow, and, in Summer also, the coloring is rather dull. The great pine forests which occupy all the northern part have a melancholy aspect. But even the caducous species which prevail in 165 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE Russia (the birch, for example,) have not very brilliant tints. Elsewhere the surface of the ground is gently undulating. The country is completely lacking in relief and character. The eye glides, as it were, over infinite spaces which lose themselves on the horizon, and seeing no landmark, one is overcome as with a vague feeling of unrest. History has been even more severe upon the Russian people than nature. Russia has been, during long centuries, exposed to the inroads and predatory incursions of the nomadic tribes of Asia. The last invasion of the Tartars of Crimea into Russia in Europe took place in the second half of the eighteenth century. Up to comparatively recent times, the Russian people have lived under an entire sense of insecurity and constant apprehension. To the invasions of the nomads is added another terrible enemy of the Russian, — fire. Russia has almost no stone, but possesses on the contrary immense forests. Naturally, most of the dwellings there 166 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE have been built of wood. With wood, con- flagrations are inevitable, and this plague destroys fifty million dollars' worth of property every year. Naturally, the country villages suffer most, and as there personal property is rarely insured, it will be seen that it is the poor- est class of the population which is the most cruelly affected. The fact that the Russian people have this constant sensation of international insecurity has been the means of driving it to granting so large a measure of authority to the central government. As the officials have not been slow to abuse this power, the Russian people have been obliged to submit to innumerable vexations. Add to this, serfdom, which was introduced in 1596, and which has been the cause of the most horrible injustice and abuse. In consequence of these and many other cir- cumstances, which it would be impossible for me to set forth here, the Russian people has in truth been one of the most unfortunate upon 167 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE the face of the earth. History has stamped it with a large share of melancholy, combined with a profoimd resignation, and with a fatalism which is manifested in a thousand different ways. The Russian, at times, allows his life to glide along just at it happens, without even making an effort to react against his sad destiny. He seems to be constantly asking himself, ''What is the use?" — to be constantly consoling himself with the reflection that ''such is the inevitable order of things." On the other hand, when he makes up his mind to act, his fatalism causes him to have great faith in his lucky star. The "go ahead" of the Americans has its counterpart in the Russian "avos."i It is said that fatalism conduces to acquies- 0) ''Avos" is an adverb which exists in no other language. It corresponds to the French expression "k la grace de Dieu." More literally it means ''perhaps"! The "Quien sabe" of the Spanish is an analogous expression. "Perhaps it will succeed; let us risk it!" is the complete meaning of the word "avos." 168 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE cence. This is not always true, for that it sometimes provokes to action, we must admit. Together with evidences of an extreme conser- vatism, the Russian people give also at times proofs of an endless spirit of adventure, so to speak. The occupation of Siberia is one of the best examples of this. Single individuals have, during more than three centuries, been in the habit of venturing into this region, and have been stopped only on reaching the polar ice and the waters of the Pacific Ocean. The occupa- tion of the Russian Far East has been much more difficult than that of the American Far West, if only for the reason that the greater part of it was undertaken in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, before the advent of steam and telegraphy. It is true, then, that melancholy and fatalism are characteristic traits of the Russian people, who certainly cannot be ranged among the cheerful nations of the earth. The Russian has also, however, times of mad exuberance, 169 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE when he abandons himself entirely to pleasure. At such times the inequality of his character is apparent in its greatest extent. There may be observed among the Russian people a large element of generosity. The Russians are fond of saying that the national mind is singularly free from all niggardly ele- ments. Exceptions are doubtless in evidence here and there; some are to be found who are very economical, and there are even misers, but that is not the dominant type of the nation. In the inmiense majority of the cases, the Russian is hospitable, and thinks nothing of the expense when it is a question of his own amusement, or that of others. A great many Russians, too, live beyond their means, and are in constant pecuniary embarrassments. And generosity in money affairs is duplicated by a universal generosity in personal relations. The Russian is generally very tolerant in social intercourse. He is lenient in judging the con- duct of others, and easilv overlooks violations 170 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE of morality committed by his associates. Aus- terity has but a small place in his conception of things. Many foreigners, the English above all, are amazed at the tolerance which reigns in Russia with regard to social affairs. Society exercises but a feeble restraint upon the indi- vidual, and permits him to live as seems best to himself. Whether a person goes to church every Sunday or not, is something about which people trouble themselves very little in Russia. One might say that to compensate for their lack of political liberty the Russians allow themselves a very large share of social liberty. Thanks to the good nature and tolerance of the nation, social intercourse is marked by a spirit of great cordiality among the Russians. Among their equals, they call each other by their Christian names, accompanied by that of the father, with a termination which shows the affiliation, as, for example, Alexander Nicolae- vitch (Alexander, son of Nicholas). This cus- tom lends great simplicity to the intercourse 171 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE between individuals, for it is almost invariably used even between people of different hierarch- ical rank. Thus, in society, for instance, between officers and generals, when off duty. The appellations which are used in dealing with the common people are also very caressing: "batiouchka" (httle father), '^goloubtchik'' (little pigeon), etc., etc. In general, a certain democratic equality pervades the intercourse between classes even of a very different social status. There are, however, unfortunate exceptions to this. Many Russians belonging to the former generation have not yet given up the custom of addressing the common people with ^Hhee'^ and "thou,'' though this remnant of former lack of courtesy shows, happily, an increasing tendency to dis- appear. Having discussed their good qualities, I must now indicate some of the defects which are very frequent among the Russians. They are usually very careless, both in their dress, and more par- 172 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE ticularly in their business affairs. They have little of the systematic temperament. They are also very prolix, and have no more idea how to introduce order into a statement of their ideas than into the management of their house- holds. The Russians also have rather an indifferent idea of punctuality^ and do not yet appreciate the value of time, for themselves, nor, imhappily, for others. Neither is their good faith very extraordinary, and in economic relations it is often necessary to take many legal precautions when dealing with them. "Time is money," and '^Honesty is the best policy" are proverbs which have not as yet received a very general application in Russia. It must not be supposed, however, that the level of moralit}^ in business affairs is at all like that to be foimd in Spain. Certainly not ! One may even point out some sufficiently conspicu- ous features of honesty. Thus, private indi- viduals, in making payments, often give rolls of gold wrapped in paper. These are usually 173 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE taken without being opened, and it is verj'- rare that there is any cheating. This is no longer true, however, of cheques. These are carefully verified by the banks, before being paid. IV. Intellect. We pass now to the domain of thought, which is the proper sphere of a national psy- chology. I shall dwell somewhat longer upon this; I shall speak of both philosophy and religion, but only briefly, of course, as com- ports with the limits of this article. Beginning with philosophy, I shall observe, in the first place, that Russia has produced no great original philosophical system, like that of Descartes, of Leibnitz, of Spinoza, or Hegel. Doubtless the absence of the liberty of the press has in a certain measure contributed to this result. A Russian book, in which it was said that Jesus was merely the son of Joseph, a carpenter at Nazareth, would not be suffered to pass by the censor. It will be understood 174 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE that under such conditions as these, it would be somewhat difficult to produce a complete system of philosophy, to state one^s ideas with- out reserve, and with the purpose of saying only what one believed to be true. The fact, however, should be taken into consideration that Descartes, vSpinoza, Leibnitz, and Voltaire wrote at a time when censorship was hardly more tolerant than it is in Russia to-day. In reality, researches which are purely abstract into the domain of psychology or metaphysics, receive a sufficiently wide toleration in the empire of the Czars. Besides, if a Russian author were unable to have his philosophical works printed in his own country, there would have been nothing to prevent his having it done in a foreign one. The absence of great philosophical systems may be easily explained, moreover, in other ways. Russian thought began to mature in the second half of the nineteenth century. But at that time the construction of great philo- 175 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE sophical systems had been, so to speak, given up. The last great system of Europe, — ^that of evo- lution, — formulated by Herbert Spencer, is rather a systemization of the sciences, in accord- ance with a general plan, than a philosophical construction in the true acceptation of the term. In any case, whether owing to the influence of obstacles of a political nature, or that the historical era was not propitious, it is still true that Russia has produced no national philo- sophical synthesis. There is, as yet, no system which may be called the purely Russian philoso- phy. It is sufficiently difficult even to discover which of the great systems of Western Europe is really most highly esteemed in Russia, and possesses the greatest nimaber of adherents. Heine said that the real philosophy of Germany was Pantheism. We should be quite at a loss to formulate any such proposition in regard to Russia. Without contrasting doctrines as op- posed to each other, such as Deism and Panthe- 176 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE ism, one would find it very difficult to say whether the Russian mind is more mystical or positivist. A great number of observers, especially foreigners, would incline without hesitation to the theory of mysticism. The Russian mind seems to them to have something about it, the outlines of which are indefinite and not to be distinguished from the mystical. This is the case, above all, in politics, as I shall have occasion to show later. To say, however, that mysticism is the most pro- nounced, or even the wholly predominant trait of the Russian mind, would not be absolutely true. There is in it, also, very strong current not only of realism, but even of positivism. A large number of Russians regard metaphysical and mystical abstractions with a contempt as profound as it is unfeigned. When statistics are taken of the blonds and brunettes among the Russians, it is seen that fifty-one in a hun- dred have dark hair, and forty-nine in a hun- dred have light hair. If statistics of the Rus- 177 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE sian mind could be taken, it would perhaps be found, also, that out of one hundred individu- als forty-nine were mystics, and fifty-one posi- tivists. But, of course, such a table of statis- tics is out of the question. We must turn, then, to the publications and teachings of phi- losophy. Of what has been wTitten we must, of course, notice the different periods. Toward 1840, Russia was in great part Hegelian. Later, toward 1860, there was a violent outbreak of Materialism. Biichner and Moleschott enjoyed there an enormous prestige. A constellation of Russian publicists, with Pisemski at the head, threw themselves with ardor into the Materialistic movement, putting the greatest amount of fervor into undermining the ancient idols. It was, to a certain extent, from this intellectual tendency that Nihilism sprang. When, after the assassination of Alexander II., Nihilism again subsided, it seemed as if Russian thought turned away from great speculations. 178 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE For more than twenty years Russia has seemed to live without a philosophy. Herbert Spen- cer's theory of evolution has gained some adher- ents in Russia, as well as some of the other systems, but without penetrating as deeply into their minds as the Materialism of Biichner and Moleschott. No remarkable original work, consecrated to philosophy, has appeared in recent years, in Russia. Tolstoi, after having written very remarkable novels, has published different articles on religion, in which he has been led to consider certain philosophical questions; but he has done so only in passing, without devoting any great amount of attention to them. What is there in store for the future? After the lull and languor which have fallen upon Russian thought, at the present time, what may be expected to happen? Let me venture an hypothesis which I admit in advance to be a purely personal intuition. It seems to me that Monism will be the future philosophy of Russia. 179 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE This doctrine appears to me to be the one which will be most probably accepted by all other countries, and, I think, it will end by conquering Russia also. If, after the philosophy, I am asked what is the religion of the Russians, I shall be even more at a loss for a reply. It may be said, in the first place, that there are almost as many religions in Russia as there are ethnical groups. In the Baltic provinces and in Finland, Protestantism prevails. Poland is Catholic. In the ancient principality of Lithuania, (the western Russia of the present) the nobility and the upper middle class are Catholics, the peasants in the country districts orthodox.^ In the south there are the Mussul- mans in Crimea, in the east Mussulmans again, on the banks of the Volga. Add to this four (}) You know that this is the name by which that branch of the Christian Church, which in the fifth and sixth centuries separated itself from Rome, is called; the Greek Church of the East, denominated schismatic by the Catholics. 180 WHE RUSSIAN PEOPLE or five million Israelites, scattered throughout the western provinces of the empire, and Protes- tants again on the banks of the Volga, recruits from the German colonies. Officially all great Russians are orthodox. Russia is still unhappily a confessional state in every sense of the word, and suffers the imfortunate consequences thereof. The laws are made to uphold orthodoxy. Above all, the Sovereign and his family must be orthodox. The state protects this form of religion by a set of laws, which practically abolish liberty of conscience in the Empire of the Czars. Reply- ing to a petition which had been addressed to him in favor of toleration by an English society, Mr. Pobedonostzef, the procurator of the Holy Synod,^ replied that religious toleration was the (0 The Russian Church is administered by a superior council of three archbishops nominated by the Emperor. The Emperor has, besides, a delegate in this council, who is the procurator of the Synod. In reality all the power in administrative affairs belongs to the procura- tor. It is said that the Emperor is pope in Russia. If it is meant by that that the Emperor interferes in ISl THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE fundamental rule of the Russian Empire. In making this reply, he was evidently plajdng upon words. It is true that Catholics, Mus- sulmans, and Israelites are authorized to prac- tice their forms of worship in Russia. But any person who tries to convert a member of the Orthodox Church from his faith, even in the interest of another Christian profession, is liable to exile in Siberia. If the conversion be in the interest of a non-Christian religion, it is forced labor for eight or ten years. Tol- eration must be interpreted in a very narrow sense to be understood in the merely passive way in which M. Pobedonostzef understands it. Religious liberty consists in recognizing the dogmatic questions, nothing is more untrue. Never has the Emperor of Russia shown any intention of modifying one iota of the canons of the Church or of the ritual. But, as regards the administration of the Church, this is indisputably in the hands of the Em- peror, The nomination of the bishops cannot be made without his consent. Owing to this power he is able to remove any ecclesiastical dignitary who shows the slightest inclination toward independence. 182 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE sacred and inviolable right of the individual to preach what seems to him to be the truth. Russia is, at the present moment, then, an orthodox confessional state, just as England was formerly an Anglican confessional state. Let us see, now, what position is held in Russia by this orthodoxy, which the government takes under such excessive protection. I do not think it will be paradoxical to affirm that orthodoxy is the religion of a very small number of the Great Russians. This is what I mean. Greek Christianity has been preached in Russia since the tenth century. And not- withstanding the long period which has since elapsed, it may be boldly asserted that it has not yet penetrated into the conscience of the whole Russian people; that is, to no greater degree than has Catholicism into the conscience of some of the Western nations, like the Italians, for example. Out of one thousand Russians, eight or nine himdred (counting the women also) would not know how to recite, even mechani- 183 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE cally, the Nicene creed. If the individuals here referred to were asked in what they beUeved, their reply would be but little sugges- tive of Christianity. Of the one hundred Russians out of the one thousand who might know the Nicene creed, there would be, perhaps, barely ten who would understand its literal meaning, and one, perhaps, who would under- stand its doctrinal meaning. But, three quar- ters of the time, those who thus understand it entirely believe no longer therein. In reality, Christianity is merely a veneer in Russia. It has not as yet penetrated to the consciences of the lower classes, and it is already given up by the upper classes of the nation. Conscientious Christianity is the portion of a very small minority belonging to the middle class and the inferior nobility. But we know how little important is dogma in religion. What man ardently seeks in a faith is, first, a protector and then that special and exalted emotion called religious sentiment. 184 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE The more unhappy a people is, the less they can obtain justice here below, the more do they appeal to Heaven for it. We have said before that the Russian people was but poorly pro- vided in the matter of happiness. They live in a severe climate, which permits of little indolence and little of the dolce far niente. On the other hand, much of Russia is but moderately fertile. The Russian people is no better off with regard to politics. The nation has pr.actically no resource from the arbitrari- ness and exactions of officials, who take both their time and their money. It is natural that this people should feel more than any other the need of having recourse to divine protection. They address themselves to God, to Jesus Christ, to the Virgin, and to the Saints. Hence the great amount of devotion to be observed in Russia, the pilgrimages, the worship of miraculous images, the crowds of people who flock to the churches. On the other hand, adoration is the act 185 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE which satisfies the necessity for religious exal- tation inherent in the human soul. The Rus- sians give themselves up more ardently to exterior forms of worship than do the French, the English, or the Americans. This comes, it seems to me, from the fact that its civiliza- tion being less advanced, the only means of satisfying its emotional needs which it possesses, is religious worship. But these forms of wor- ship have upon them a purely hypnotic effect. The Russian people understand almost nothing of what the priest is saying during Mass. They probably do not know even that the orthodox Mass is a commemoration, symbolical of the sacrifice made by the Son of God to redeem mankind. The Russian priests make every effort to give the parts of the Mass which are read in a totally incomprehensible manner. They are perfectly right in this, for if the words of the service were clearly understood they would appeal directly to the intelligence, and would not produce their intended effect, namely, 186 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE a purely sentimental suggestion. The ortho- dox Mass is singularly ritualistic. It is no liv- ing condition, but is congealed within forms which have endured for centuries. The East- ern Church sustains the principle that what is true cannot change. Thus she modifies in no particular, either her form of worship or her dogmas. Preaching is disappearing more and more in the Russian Church. Sermons are given only on rare occasions. There are two reasons for this. First, because preaching has very little object, when it is asserted beforehand that there is not an iota of anything to change in the traditions of the past. Jesus, on the con- trary, it is true, modified or obliterated that which had been '^said to them of old time,'' by his own ^'I say imto you,'' and it was just to maintain this new doctrine, which had not been said to them of old time, that Jesus preached his sermons. If it had not been for that we would have had no reason for speaking. The second circumstance which has caused 187 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE preaching to be given up by the Russian church is the distrust of the government. The priest who wishes to deUver a sermon must first write it, and then submit it to the approval of his bishop. Then only may he read it in church. But he is forbidden to say anything more than what he has put down in his notes; he may not improvise, or let himself go, imder the inspiration of the moment, and speak freely. One may imagine that, under such circum- stances, very few priests in Russia care to sub- mit to the drudgery of delivering sermons, and when they do decide to do so, the faithful listen to them with the most profound weari- ness. First, because they are generally deliv- ered in a cold, monotonous tone, and because, too, nine-tenths of the time they are utterly meaningless. The absence of liberty has killed the eloquence of the pulpit in Russia. We may make still another observation which will show how little Christianity has entered into the Russian soul. For the nine centuries 188 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE during which they have been Christians, the Russians have not introduced one atom of hfe into orthodoxy. Look at France and CathoU- cism. During the Middle Ages, and in modern times, France has repeatedly been a leader of Catholic thought. The University of Paris has, at different times, possessed the most remark- able theologians of Western Christianity. There has been nothing like this in Russia. There, they have accepted the Byzantine ritual without change. The Russians have confined their pride to interpreting the Greek texts with the most complete and servile literalness. The Russian Church has not, in its nine cen- turies of existence, given to the world either a great theologian, or a great doctor of the faith, or a saint who is at all remarkable or out of the ordinary, or a celebrated missionary, or even a great preacher. The only new element which the genius of the Russian people has introduced into the mummified body of the Orthodox Church is music. There, they have been crea- 189 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE tive, and wonderfully creative. The celebrated musician, Berlioz after hearing Mass sung by the choir of the cathedral in St. Petersburg, cried out, '^I do not know how they sing in Paradise, but it seems to me that it cannot be very much better than this.'' The music of the Russian Church, which developed especially at the close of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth century, forms an entirely original school; it derives inspiration from no other, and its grandem* is at times as wonderful as its originality. The Russian Church allows no instrument to be used in its service; not even the most divine instrument of man's inven- tion, — the organ. The entire Mass is thus sung by choirs composed entirely of men, in which little boys take the soprano and contralto parts. Is the Russian people, then, essentially reli- gious or free thinking? Foreigners would all reply with one voice, ''It is religious; it is even the most religious of the nations of Europe," 190 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE Certainly, to judge by appearances (the only thing by which a stranger can judge, since he must look on the outside only), the Russian people are very religious, for it is prodigal of its proof of devotion. But there are many signs, too, which indicate their complete indif- ference in matters of religion. You must know, first, that in Russia the Church alone holds the records of the civil State, and that she alone can dispense certain sacraments which are of the greatest civil and political , importance. There is no marriage in Russia other than the religious one. Consequently, there is no other way of contracting a legal marriage than by going to church. Baptism is also of enormous importance. It alone can establish the affiliation which transmits heredi- tary rights, civil as well as political. In Russia the citizens are divided into several different social classes (peasants, artisans, merchants, nobles, etc.), whose privileges are far from being equal. There are, besides, the ^'non- 191 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE Christians"^ who are there deprived of a great niunber of rights. Since the certificate of baptism constitutes the sole act of the civil state, its importance may be readily understood. A Russian be- longing to a family which is officially orthodox may be in vain the most liberal thinker in the world; it would be impossible for him to neglect having his child christened, for without that, it would not be considered legitimate. The Russian clergy are not paid by the State. The expense would be beyond its means. There are nearly three hundred and twenty-five thousand parishes in Russia. Now, if each had a single priest, and he were given but five hundred dollars a year, it would neces- sitate imder this head alone an annual expen- diture of one hundred and sixty-two million dollars, which would be about a third of the (i) This name denotes, above all, the unfortunate Israelites, who, in these recent years of reaction have been reduced to mediaeval being considered almost Pariahs. 192 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE ordinary Russian budget. For their support the priests in the country have had assigned to them two sources of revenue : a plot of ground, which they may cultivate on their own account, and sometimes with their own hands, and the traffic in sacraments. The priest seeks, naturally, the greatest amomit of profit pos- sible. He sometimes exacts for christenings, and particularly for marriages, fees which the peasants are not always able to pay. Bargaining begins. There are cases where young people are not able to be married for weeks and months, because they are unable to pay the sum demanded by the priest for the religious ceremony. It will be understood that such circumstances result in sufficiently unpleasant relations between the pastor and his flock. And, notwithstanding these exac- tions, the Russian priest remains generally very poor, for the reason that the sheep which he may shear have unfortunately but very little wool. The Russian priest is ill-informed 193 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE and rarely of much elevation of characters- he is married, and has many family cares; and by reason of all this, inspires but little respect in the faithful. By some he is detested as one who is continually taking advantage of them, and by others he is little respected on account of an obvious lack of moral supe- riority. The relations between the clergy and the faithful have thus no deep cordiality or sympathy in Russia. Then, too, the churches are usually poor and plain. They are not open until the hour for service, and then are filled with people. The Russian (man or woman) in his hours of moral distress and anguish may not enter a church to collect himself and to pray. There are found none of those corners, isolated and at the same time inspiring, which are to be met with in so many of the edifices of Western Europe. On the other hand, it never occurs to any one to take counsel with the priest in moments of difficulty, because the orthodox 194 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE clergy has so little prestige, and is so little respected. The priests, on their side, never go into the different families to speak words of kindness and consolation. In consequence of this series of circum- stances, the Russian is but moderately in sympathy with his national Church. There are millions of peasants in the country who might pass as utterly indifferent in matters of religion. Nor is the Russian woman more religious than the man. This is no more true of the lower than of the upper classes. It is never in Russia, for example, as it often is in France or Italy, where the husbands may be free thinkers, and the wives very devout, and even bigoted. The priest (contrary to what is seen in Catholic countries) obtains no power through the influence of women; in general his influence in society amounts to almost nothing. There may be observed in Russia, even among the common people, the most complete 195 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE irreverence in regard to holy things. The manner in which the peasants speak of the service and the priests borders at times upon the most biting sarcasm and the most absolute indifference. But, nevertheless, a thousand facts bear witness that a deep religious need torments the Russian soul, even to its inmost recesses. This is proved, first, by the multiplying of religious sects. Among the Catholics in France, Austria, and Italy there are no longer heretics or "non-conformists.''^ The last Western sect, Old Catholicism, has exhibited a very moderate amount of vitality. It died out in a few years. German Protestantism, too, seems to be irrev- ocably fixed within the limits established at (0 There is another source of Russian non-confor- mity, and that is, the ''Old Believers," or rather, the "Old Ritualists." In the seventeenth century the patriarch Nicon caused the text of the liturgical books which had been altered by the copyists, to be revised and corrected. Numerous persons would not adopt the corrections, and separated themselves from the oflBLcial church under the name of the "Old Believers." 196 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE TTiiTMniT^nm the time of the Reformation. No breath of anything new has come to break through them. The Orthodox Church in Russia, as a theo- logical and dogmatic institution, is utterly dead. It confines itself to its forms of worship and the ritual. We might say that it was supported in a certain measure by right of succession, being preserved for economic and political reasons. The portion of the Russian population which has the deepest religious needs finds nothing to satisfy them in the established Church, which has been for cen- turies congealed within cold and hieratic forms. The aspirations of the Russian people, then, in matters of religion, rise far beyond the established Church, and are often in hos- tility to it. When the priest of a village is too eager for gain, when his conduct proves a source of scandal, when revolt and indig- nation are excited against him, peasants then separate from their pastor and throw them- selves into the sects of non-conformists, as 197 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE happened in England at the time of the Refor- mation. Some one appears^ and begins to preach new doctrines based upon his own private interpretation of the Holy Scriptures. It is thus that innumerable sects have been formed in Russia. It would take too long to enumerate them here. They have all taken as a foundation the Old and New Testaments; but later, in the course of their development, they have reached the greatest extremes. Some have returned to the forms of the prim- itive Church, and have no clergy. Others have become reconciled to Protestantism. Others still, by the strangest aberrations, have ended in practices which are monstrous and unnatural.^ Whatever may be the aberrations of these sects, the intensity of their religious life is very great. One finds, too, among their ad- herents all the admirable qualities of the (0 Those, for example, of the "Skoptzi," a sect which is founded on a literal interpretation of the twelfth verse in the nineteenth chapter of Saint Matthew's Gospel, 198 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE neophyte; an extraordinary sense of honesty, unlimited devotion, and a spirit of sacrifice amounting to martyrdom. A number of Russian sectarians has recently arrived in America. They are the ^'Doukhobory" (wrest- lers with the spirit). They have preferred to leave their country rather than submit to the military service, which they believe contrary to the teachings of the Bible. The Russian non-conformists are the honor and glory of their country. If anything could show the depth of power, of seriousness, of nobility, and of perseverence which exists in the Russian people, it would be these wonder- ful men. Unhappily the present government, misled by an immoderate love of external and bureaucratic symmetry, far from under- standing that the non-conformists are the salt of the Russian earth, persecutes them in a thousand ways, which are sometimes as cruel as they are ineffectual. Thus, after maintaining that the Russian 199 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE people is one of the most indifferent in matters of religion, I proceed to make exactly the opposite assertion. And this contradiction does not spring from my own mind; it is in the facts themselves. Among an immense people like the Russians, all kinds are to be met with; sceptics as well as apostles, full of faith and enthusiasm. V. Politics. From religion to politics the transition is not so abrupt in Russia as in the countries which are non-confessional. As the United States of America is preeminently the repre- sentative of the republican form of government, Russia is the recognized representative, so to speak, of the autocratic. Thus, the political writers of almost every country have founded upon this fact a series of far-fetched opinions, and have built thereon veritable sociological romances. They have advanced the phenom- enon of heredity, of the innate inclination 200 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE of the race, and a thousand other factors, equally imaginary, to prove that the Russian people have been moved to absolute mon- archy ad eternum. They have piled demon- stration upon demonstration to show that the only form of government conceivable by the Russian mind is autocracy, and that any other people in the world might pass from absolute monarchy to more liberal institutions. The Russian people, however, can never do so, as they allege, because of a certain peculiar mentality of their own. This assertion will not survive for a moment an examination of the facts, if one take the trouble to look at these closely and will not? content himself with indulging in mere in- vective. In the first place, autocracy is relatively a recent fact in Russia. The ancient Russian populations lived under the administrative of the clan. They then passed under the government of the city. The political authority 201 THE RUSSIAN POEPLE of a certain region was concentrated in a cen- tral town (oppidum), which was usually fortified. The organization of the Russian city was republican. A popular assembly (the ''veche"), whose conferences were rather tumultuous, gave a general approval to the measures which were proposed to it by a kind of senate. The Russian ''veche^' recalls, in many ways, the primitive assemblies of the Roman people in the Forum. In the ninth century Norman adventurers tempted their fortimes in Russia, as they had preivousl}' done in England, France, and Italy. One of these Scandinavian bands, commanded by a chief named Rurik, founded the first monarchy in Russia. The monarchial prin- ciple is, then, a foreign importation into the country. All the supposed predispositions of the Russian ''race'' for this form of gov- ernment are thus purely imaginary. Rurik, after having installed himself at Novgorod (which was, in his time, a republic with quite 202 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE a flourishing trade), pursued his conquests. He descended as far as the Lower Dnieper, and made for himself a vast Empire. That is to say, he levied tribute upon different Russian cities. In accordance with the Ger- manic conception of that time, government was not looked upon as a public office, but as a matter of private ownership. Thus, the descendants of Rurik divided up their father's possessions as the sons of Louis le Debonnaire divided up the Empire of Charlemagne. The princes of the house of Rurik received as their share different cities, and each created for himself a sort of kingdom. But the primitive organization of the Russian city was not de- stroyed by the Norman invasion. Some of the towns succeeded in driving out the descend- ants of Rurik, and restored the republican form of government. Novgorod retained this form until 1480, Pskof imtil 1509. Others of the cities kept their princes, but without conceding to them absolute power. 203 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE The relations established between the prince and his people are not accurately known to us. Thus, in spite of the presence of the princes of the house of Rurik, the popular assemblies (the "veche'') continued to exist in many of the cities. We hear of these assemblies where the prince appeared and decisions were made in common. In other places the '^veche'' disappeared very early. It is probable, then, that the relations between the prince and his subjects were not very clearly or distinctly determined. It appears, also, that the most diverse conditions prevailed in the different cities, and that very often everything depended upon the personal qualities of the reigning prince. The princes of the house of Rurik disputed the heritage of the founder of their dynasty, just as the Carlo vingians disputed the heritage of Charlemagne. Even as Charles the Bald reestablished, at a certain time, the unity of the Western Empire, so did several of the 204 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE Russian princes reunite a number of prin- cipalities, and attempt to restore the unity of the Empire of Rurik. But this attempt was neither a very determined nor a very perma- nent one, and was, moreover, never crowned with very lasting success. The only thing established in a settled and permanent man- ner was the supremacy of the city of Ejef. The prince who reigned there was considered the head of the family of Rurik, and, as such, exercised a sort of hegemony, something after the fashion of an honorary presidency. He held the title of Grand Prince. The actual authority of the Grand Prince over the other principalities amounted to practically nothing, but his moral authority, if we may so express it, did not fail to be sought after by the Russian princes, who, for a long time, disputed the sov- ereignty of Kief and the title of Grand Prince, which accompanied it. The dynasty which reigned at Moskow ended later by appropriating this title to itself in an exclusive manner. 205 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE Such was the situation in Russia in the twelfth century. She offered the spectacle of a series of almost independent principalities, with institutions which were badly administered but in no sense autocratic. The advent of the Mongols occurred, and modified this state of affairs. The descendants of Rurik never completely lost the idea of the imity of their Empire. They considered themselves members of one body, and felt themselves different from both the Asiatic tribes of the East, who were usually nomadic, and the settled populations of the West (Poles, Lithuanians, Germans, and Swedes) . Thus, upon the arrival of the Mongols, the princes of the house of Rm'ik joined together to withstand them. They made but a feeble resistance, however, in consequence of the complete absence of any unanimity in their institutions. The Russian principalities knew not how to defend themselves, and all fell under the domination of the Tartars. The Republics 206 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE of Novgorod and Pskof alone succeeded in pre- serving their independence. The Mongols did not suppress the Russian principalities, but contented themselves with levying tribute upon them. But, none the less, the Mongol yoke was a very heavy one, because very despotic. Security disappeared forever for the people of Russia. Delegates from the Mongol Khan were continually coming to demand the payment of new taxes. The least resistance brought down upon them expedi- tions which made a merciless use at every point of fire and the sword. And, further, bands of Mongol marauders constantly overran the coun- try, and conducted forays on their own account. A universal law of sociology receives its con- firmation in the history of Russia. And this law is, that the power accorded to the central government is the direct result of the political insecurity of a country. When the Russian populations were oppressed by the Mongols, they sought, naturally, the 207 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE protection of their reigning princes. To them they looked to put an end to the incursions of the bands of marauders. The power of the princes would natui'ally increase from this very fact, for they must be furnished with, the means of protecting the people, that is, they must have a stronger army. Among all the Russian princes, those of Moscow (in consequence of circmnstances which it would take too long to explain here) were found to best understand the protection of their subjects. Their reputation as faithful protec- tors spread throughout the whole of Russia, and secured for them both prestige and author- ity- In the same way that the Germanic princes contended with one another over the territories in the heart of the Germanic Empire, the Russian princes waged war over those in the heart of the Empire of the Mongols. The princes of Moscow were aided by a series of fortunate circiunstances. They made numer- 208 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE ous conquests, aggrandized their state by dis- possessing other princes of the house of Rurik, and became the most powerful in Russia. Their ambition increased with their power. They assumed the title of Grand Princes, and claimed again that moral hegemony which formerly belonged to the sovereignty of Kief. The princes of Moscow had difficulties also with their Mongol suzerains, and, as soon as they felt themselves sufficiently powerful, entered into conflict with them. They engaged in a number of battles, and in some were vic- torious. The Russian people now began to foresee a possibility of ridding themselves of the Mongols by the hand of the princes of Moscow. They saw clearly that without a concentration of all the political power of the Russian people the removal of the Mongol yoke was impossible. They saw, too, that their safety lay in the unlimited power of the Grand Prince who reigned at Moscow. Thus, naturally, anything 209 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE which increased his authority was looked upon as beneficial, while all that tended to weaken it was considered injurious, and therefore sub- versive. Thus was the idea of autocracy implanted in Great Russia. It was not, as has been too repeatedly asserted, the result of an idiosyn- crasy of the Russian ^^race." It was, quite simply, the result of certain historical circum- stances. The law that political concentration is the direct result of insecurity of frontier may be demonstrated reversely by England, the exact opposite of Russia as to political insti- tutions. The one is the most constitutional nation in Europe, the other the most auto- cratic. But England is, too, the country which is best protected by nature; Russia is the least so. Complete security for Russian territory was obtained only in 1881, after the defeat of the Tekke-Turcomans. Thus, only for nine- teen years have the Russians enjoyed the invio- lability of their political frontier, which is a 210 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE natural possession of the English, thanks to their insular position. Liberty was early estab- lished in Great Britain for the reason that there has never been an}'- necessity for conceding great military power to the king. The same may be said of the United States of America. It is their isolated situation, beyond the reach of Em'opean aggression, which has had a large share in enabling them to assume that admir- able political decentralization and that personal liberty, which have contributed, in such large measure, to their prosperity. France is another proof of what I am saying. Her continental situation offers less security than that of Eng- land; thus, her organization has necessarily remained for a longer time autocratic. The present situation in Russia is, so to speak, diametrically opposed to what it was in the past. After living for centuries imder the shadow of continual Asiatic invasions, it is Russia herself who now menaces her barbarous neighbors on her eastern frontiers. Russia 211 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE enjoys to-day an external security greater than that of ahnost any other European power. In case of a general war, Austria, Germany, and Italy might have to fight on two sides of their borders, Russia on but one. Russia cannot be surrounded. For this reason, and, thanks to the vast extent of her territory, she is, so to speak, unconquerable. Since Russia now enjoys a security greater than that of her neighbors, extreme concen- tration of power is no longer necessary. It would seem as if the principle of autocracy must lose much of its prestige in the eyes of the cultured classes. And it is so to a certain extent. But in human affairs the suhlata causa, tollitur effectus is not to be instantaneously applied. After an institution has lost its ^'raison d'etre," it may still, through force of tradition and inertia, retain much of its power. Such is the present situation in Russia. There are already many persons in the country who appreciate the great advantage of popular 212 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE representation, and look eagerly for its coming. But it is well to recognize that a large number of Russians still persist, eternally as it were, in political conceptions of a totally different kind. We are not speaking of the state officials, who are afraid of losing their places, should popular control be established. These individ- uals are out of the discussion. They oppose the establishment of a parliament, not as a matter of principle (for in their inner con- sciences they recognize its advantages), but from the promptings of a purely selfish interest. The high officials who are in this category are, it is true, verj^ influential, but I am of the opinion that their desires would not prevail, were it not that a large number of individuals among the upper class cling to autocracy on principle, and not from any personal advantages to be derived therefrom. Every society nourishes within its breast some individuals with antisocial tendencies. It is these persons who conscientiously put their 213 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE own interests above those of their country. But these individuals cannot be continuously the most powerful in the nation, for if this were so, the forces impelling toward dissolution would preponderate over the forces contrib- uting to cohesion, and society would be dissolved. We must thus recognize that if the autocratic principle still survives in Russia, it is because a large nimiber of R,ussians consider it bene- ficial for their country as a whole. The sources whence this idea proceeds are many, but they are the result, one and all, of historical circimistances. The Russian mind has followed the same course of evolution as that of other countries. There may be observed here, to a certain extent, two of the three states of Auguste Comte, the theological phase and the meta- physical phase. This is what has happened. While the other nations of Western Europe had already received the positive phase, toward the 214 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE end oi the eighteenth century, Russia has not, as yet, even in our day, attained to this. And, again, this does not proceed in any way from an innate quaUty of the Russian race, but from circumstances purely material and social. Rus- sia is very poor, and its population is widely scattered. For this reason, as well as many others, w^hich I caimot now enumerate, educa- tion has spread very slowly. The number of those who are illiterate reaches the scandalous figure of seventy-eight out of a hundred. The higher education is much less widespread than the primary. Briefly, the positive method of reasoning is sufficiently rare in Russia, as yet, and the theological and metaphysical methods reign paramount. A large number of Russians are still imbued with a great deal of mysticism, and, above all, alas, with much intellectual indefiniteness. Their faculty for analysis is very feeble. They have, as yet, but a poor idea of how to class social phenomena, and to give them those clear outlines which are char- 215 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE acteristic of the science of positivism. The Russians bring into the State the ideas of the family, and make of them an ideal which is pohtically hazy and incapable of realization. This ideal may be formulated thus: a sovereign, father of his subjects, governing well in conse- quence of his affection for them, and, in conse- quence of a consciousness of his duty as an autocratic ruler, towering above all the rest. The Russian mystics have a profound contempt for a parliament. They call this a low and vulgar institution, where takes place a series of compromises and bargaining between the different interests at stake. Now this sort of transaction is degrading. A goverimient lowers itself when it condescends to such maneuvers. The Russian mystics affirm that a government, really worthy of the name, should consider the interest of the mass of the people. Only an autocrat can accomplish this mission, because he alone has no need to enter into a compromise with any one. Bargaining and the do ut des 216 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE offer no temptation to him. He can accom- plish the good of all without sacrificing the interest of one class to that of another. Natm'ally, when the mind of the mystic rises to such dizzy heights, he loses all sense of reality. The ultimate result of such vagaries can but be an entire weakening of the society in which they are produced. It is enough, indeed, to place, for one moment, our foot upon the solid rock of positive facts, to witness the immediate disappearance of all such mirages. The sovereign cannot accomplish everything by himself. He must delegate his powers to an immense staff of officials. How is it possible for him to control their actions, so as to be assured that they conform to his benevolent and paternal designs? It is evident that the con- trol of some of the officials by others is abso- lutely ineffectual. For control of any kind to be effective it must be exercised by disinter- ested persons, those outside, by individuals, that is, who are not officials. On the other 217 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE hand, the mystics never take the pains to study accurately natural phenomena. They do not see things as they really are. From the moment when we apply ourselves to the study of nature in a positive spirit, we understand that each little atom in the universe is in a constant dynamic state. It seems to be trying to attract everything to itself. It is just the same with society; each individual is in the dynamic state in regard to his fellow-creatures. He endeavors to compass his own best welfare. It is from the union of such efforts, in opposition, some to the others, that social institutions are born. The Russian mystics make a very great mistake when they imagine that parliamentary com- promises are a proof of moral debasement. They are, on the contrary, but checks and counter checks, by means of which a social equilibrium, that is to say, the greatest possible respect for the rights of the individual is main- tained. M. Pobedonostzef, Procurator of the Holy 218 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE Synod, ^ has recently published a series of articles which have been translated into French under the title of ' ' Questions religieuses, sociales et politiques/'^ In them he gives expression to the opinion that if all the representatives of the people were saints, the parliamentary regime would be the very best kind of all. But as the representatives of the people are usually of a more than doubtful morahty, the parlia- mentary regime is the worst. Here is an excel- lent example of the reasoning of the mystic. How is it that M. Pobedonostzef does not see that the argument may be turned directly against absolute monarchy? If all the officials appointed by the sovereign were perfection itself, absolute monarchy would be the best of all forms of government. Is it possible {}) The Procurator of the Holy Synod (a sort of minister of church worship) is one of the highest digni- taries in the Russian Empire. Furthermore, M. Pobedonostzef possessed great personal influence during the reign of Alexander II., which, in a certain measure, he still retains. (2) Published at Paris by Baudry in 1897. 219 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE that M. Podebonostzef would have us beheve that it is sufficient for an official to be appointed by an absolute sovereign to ensure his being immediately clothed with all the virtues, and that the Holy Spirit would descend upon him, as it descended formerly upon the apostles? Truly, with ideas like these it would be impos- sible to create a positive and realistic political system, for if miracles be admitted, the whole scaffolding of the social science falls as does a castle of cards. Many Russians have minds which are clouded and visionary, and for the reason that monarchy, with its right divine, is more to their liking than the concrete and realistic forms of a parlia- mentary monarchy. Another factor which has contributed toward maintaining the prestige of autocracy in Russia is Panslavism. From the seventeenth century, but partic- ularly since the reign of Peter I., the sciences, letters, philosophy, and art of Western Europe 220 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE have made their way into Russia. These same branches of mental activity existed also, it is true, in the ancient Muscovite Empire, but in a rudimentary form, in sad contrast, indeed, to that which emanated from Europe. Russia was as if hypnotized. She lived for more than a century and a half under the com- plete fascination of the West. It seemed to the Russians that never would they be able, not merely to surpass, but even to equal their models. Naturally, no human being, and no society, can live while constantly sacrificing its personality. In reality, an abdication of this kind must lead, in the long run, either to a species of mental death (in ordinary terms to idiocy) or else the vital forces must react, and come to acknowledge this personality. Now, the Russian people has far too large a share of individuality for the reaction to fail to set in. It occurred in the first half of the nine- teenth century under the name of Panslavism. The too great servility of Russian thought to 221 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE that of the West brought about, by a natural propensity, an excessive reaction of the national pride. The Panslavists maintained that Russia was entirely different from, and superior to, the other nations of Eiu"ope. But when it became necessary to come forth from the clouds and to indicate the positive points in which this difference consisted, the Panslavists fell back principally upon these two facts, communal property and autocracy. In certain regions of Russia, the parish lands are, at specified times, divided among the members of the rural community. The Panslavists proceeded to affirm that individual ownership of land, as was the rule in the other countries of Europe, opens the door to pauperism. It divides society into two great classes, clearly differentiated, the non-owners, devoted to incurable poverty, and the owners, who live by taking advantage of the wretched people. The fundamental principle of such an organization is, then, unjust sovereignty. And, because it is unjust, this 222 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE organization is imperfect and odious. There is nothing of this kind in Russia, say the Pan- slavists. In consequence of the communal divisions, every Russian is necessarily a land owner. A proletariat becomes forever impos- sible. Contrary to that of the West, the funda- mental basis of Russian society is justice. As the Panslavists, at first, could discover no distribution of land among the Western nations, they loudly proclaimed that Russia alone pos- sessed this admirable organization, and that, consequently, she was superior to all the others. It is hardly necessary to state that these arrogant delusions will not for a moment bear the light of criticism. The communal owner- ship of land is not the exclusive privilege of Russia. It is an archaic and imperfect form of landed proprietorship which has existed every- where, at less advanced epochs of social evolu- tion. Furthermore, all Russians do not form part of a rural community. There are thus proletarians in Russia. And finally the mere 223 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE fact of possessing the usufruct of a hectare of poorly cultivated land (and communal land will always be so) will hardly insure the com- forts of life to an entire family. And, in truth, in spite of this far-famed communal ownership, the Russian peasant is the poorest and most miserable of all Europe. But the Panslavists did not perceive all these objections, and proclaimed that communal proprietorship placed the Russian people upon a lofty pedestal of justice and brotherhood. Beside communal ownership, the Panslavists discovered another superiority belonging to Russia. This was, that the States of Western Europe were all founded upon brute force, while Russia alone was not. The States of the West were established by Germanic warrior chiefs who had taken possession of the Roman pro^dnces. The Franks founded the kingdom of France, the Angles that of England, the Visigoths that of Spain, and so on. But Russia was not a part of the Roman Empire; 224 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE she never suffered these great invasions. In the ninth century some Swedish adventurers, it is true, had come into Russia. But Rurik and his companions did not come as conquerors. They were invited by the citizens of Novgorod. Thus, while the States of Western Europe are based upon mihtary conquests, and therefore upon \4olence and brute force, the Russian State is founded upon the free will of its citizens, therefore upon justice, upon a purely noble and fraternal basis. It may be understood that a military chief who had forcibly annexed rebellious populations could not govern except through fear, and in his own interest. This warrior chief never troubled himself about the well-being of his subjects. He looked upon them as a flock, to be shorn to the utmost, as a simple means of procuring for himself the greatest amount of wealth. Such a political foundation for a State being given, there was no possibility of cordial relations being established between 225 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE the sovereign and his subjects. The greatest antagonism must reign between the monarch and his people. It is from this very antag- onism, according to the Panslavists, that parUa- mentary governments have arisen. The populations being too much oppressed revolted. They exacted guarantees from their rulers, and these guarantees were what were called constitutional charters. Quite different was the evolution of Russia, according to the Panslavists. Since the foun- dation of her common law is not brutal and violent conquest, no antagonism can exist between the sovereign and his subjects. The monarchs of Western Europe desired solely their own good and not that of their subjects. But a Russian autocrat who would not care for the good of his people is inconceivable, say the Panslavists. A Russian sovereign who should put his own interests above those of his subjects, would be a contradiction which is in itself quite impossible. 226 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE It is through this kind of argument that the Panslavists have estabhshed, anew, a capital distinction between Russia and the other nations. These other reprobate nations have sovereigns who desire the unhappiness of their subjects, and who consequently cannot love them. Russia, on the contrary, is the righteous nation par excellence. Her sovereign wishes only the welfare of his subjects; he loves them, he is their father. To establish the rights of the citizens against the sovereign is of some use when the sovereign wishes evil to his subjects, but to establish them when he desires their good is useless, and is to little purpose. On the other hand, to prevent the sovereign from compassing the good of his subjects is to desire ill to the nation; it is to create tendencies which are antisocial. Consequently, any attempt having for its object the limiting of the power of the monarch, being antisocial, is criminal and subversive. And, consequently, auto- cracy is the ''Holy Ark'' of the Russian nation; 227 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE it is the institution which differentiates it entirely from the other nations of the West, and which places it anew upon an elevated pedestal of greatness and justice. Thus reason the Panslavists. It is with this as with the division of communal land; it is hardly necessary to demonstrate that their arguments are not founded upon a knowledge of history and social science. In the first place, Rurik was as wholly a warrior chief as Robert Guiscard. The foundation of the Scandinavian domination in Russia is the same as that of the Norman rule in Neustria or at Naples. The princes of Moscow after- wards acquired the other Russian principalities by fire and sword, exactly as the kings of France acquired their possessions. The foun- dation of the Russian State is as much, then, violent and brutal conquest as that of the Western States. And, further, the Russian State is composed of a large number of hetero- geneous ethnical elements, who have not all 228 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE even yet received the right of citizenship. If, then, the sovereign of Russia is the father of his subjects, it is well to recognize that his affection is very unequally bestowed upon his children. Little as the theories of the Panslavists may savor of positivism, they have, in large measure, contributed toward increasing the prestige of the autocratic idea in Russia. Another fact which contributes to the same result is the democratic tendency of the Russian people. Russia is a vast plain, nearly destitute of any beautiful material for building purposes. The castle, the seignioral dwelling, erected upon a hill which is visible from a great distance, built from material capable of resisting the wear of centuries, and exhibiting architectural beauties which are the pride of the district, — this kind of dwelling, it has not been possible to build in Russia. The castles on the banks of the Rhine, even when in ruins, preserve 229 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE still a powerful and picturesque individuality, which renders them celebrated for miles around. The name of the Count of Rheinfels, pronoimced in former times in the presence of a peasant of Nassau, would produce in his mind the idea of a very powerful noble, because the magnificent Castle of Rheinfels, of which this count was the owner, was known and admired throughout the entire region. In England, the seignioral dwellings of some of the nobility are among the most remarkable of the architec- tural monuments of the coimtry, and their owners share in the celebrity of their castles. It has never been, and is not yet, so in Russia. The homes of the boyars were formerly of wood or brick, and ahnost always little remarkable in point of architecture. Then, too, the life of the nobility was not conspicuous, and made but small impression upon the people. On the other hand, the law of primogeniture has never been implanted in Russia. 230 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE No matter how illustrious a family, from the single fact that the title passed to all the male descendants, it might be borne by some indiv- iduals whose condition of fortune was of the most moderate. The title, for the same reason, lost its prestige. It must be said, further, that the source of the Russian nobility is not always of the purest. It originates, for the most part, in administrative or military offices. The lowest of the peasants may enter the service of the State; if he attain a certain grade in the administrative hierarchy, he acquires hereditary nobility. But state officials receive but a moderate amount of esteem, admiration, and sympathy; and for a very good reason. This administrative nobility enjoys but a small amount of prestige. Add, further, that the nobles in Russia had for a long time been in the enjoyment of a privilege as useless as it was odious. They alone had the right to own serfs. They abused this right in a revolting manner, and very 231 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE naturally, therefore, were not much loved or respected by the masses of the people. Thus the Russian nobility had no traits which brought them out in a certain powerful relief from the other classes of society; they had neither prestige nor popularity, and for these reasons the Russian people has become demo- cratic, and upon this democratic sentiment the few attempts in the annals of Russian history to limit absolute power have foundered. They proceeded from a small number of dignitaries in high places and a select number of enlight- ened people. But these chosen ones were not upheld by their immediate associates. The greater part of the governing class have ranged themselves behind the Emperor, and have sus- tained his unlimited power through fear of an oligarchical government vested in a small group of nobles. These are the circumstances, which I have so rapidly outlined, that have moulded the autocratic tendencies, and even now uphold 232 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE them. It may be seen, therefore, that such tendencies are the consequence of historical circumstances, and that they have nothing of the quahties which it is pretended are innate in the Russian ''race." Let us now consider the value of Russia as ^wov ttoXltikov. We are forced to recognize, in truth, that in this respect her value is but of a moderate kind. Apart from the Emperor Peter I., Russia has produced almost no remarkable political personality. The great- er part of her statesmen have been conserva- tives. Very few among them have been in the least progressive, or have had broad minds, together with that wonderful eagle-eyed pene- tration which sees clearly the aspirations and needs of the times, which dares even boldly project itself into the future. The larger num- ber of Russian statesmen have been of a timid spirit, filled with narrow prejudices, forever taken up with an archaic ideal which history in its majestic onward march has already 233 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE thrown aside among the ruins and disregarded possessions of the past. And, further, imitating in this the dull and monotonous plains of their country, Russian statesmen have been of little distinction, and have shown no personality to speak of. And if they have sometimes come out from their framework of mediocrity, it has been, for the most part, alas, through an exag- geration of their tyranny and extravagance. From another point of view, however, it is not to be denied that the Russians possess some very valuable political qualities. One of these is a strong spirit of subordination, which causes them, the greater part of the time, to put the interests of the State above their own. There is barely an example in Russian history where the governor of a province has rebelled against the central authority of the State, and has endeavored to cut out. to form for himself from the general mass a personal domain. Russia has never offered the sad example of the egotistic and anarchical opinions which so 234 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE frequently occur in the history of Poland. The spirit of strict discipline with which the govern- ing classes in Russia are inibued has undoubtedly contributed, in great measure, to establish their dominion over so vast an extent of territory. But to be conquerors is not everything, those that have been conquered must be governed. Now, the Russians have been much less skilful in the latter than in the former task, in conse- quence of some of their good qualities it may be, but, above all, because of one of their great- est defects. Russia has but a faint conception of law and justice. In this she is the exact opposite of the Roman people. It is this main defect which renders Russian domination so odious and insupportable to the people who must submit to it. A thousand circumstances concur to produce this unfortunate result. I have already said that the Russian is usually open-hearted and very generous. Rapacity, sordid avarice, dull and vindictive cruelty, enter but slightly into his character. He is hospit- 235 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE able, not supercilious^ much given to sympathy, and very coiu'teous in his social relations. Because of all this, he coalesces easily with the foreign populations coming under his rule. It is because of these qualities, for example, that the Russians have better understood how to keep their supremacy over their Mussulman subjects in Tm'kestan than the English over theirs of India. But the Russian character is very uneven. And, further, his political concep- tions are, as yet, indefinite, mystical, impreg- nated with paternalism. If under certain cir- cumstances a conflict of interests arises between him and the people under his domination, he breaks out in sudden passion, and indulges in measures of extreme brutality. These measures are, then, all the more surprising to the popula- tion, because they are so accustomed to indul- gence and good nature. Then, when the mo- ment of anger has passed, the Russian unbends, comes to himself again, and without always repealing his imrighteous acts, he allows them 236 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE quietly to fall into desuetude. A regime of this kind is of all orders the most precarious for those governed, and consequently most intoler- able. The populations mider Russian subjec- tion, being never able to foresee from what quar- ter, in the minds of their masters, the wind may blow, live in continual anxiety and con- stant apprehension. Beside the fact that this is in the highest degree disagreeable for the governed, it is, also, in the highest degree con- trary to the true interests of the governors. In fact, with no feeling of security for the morrow, no one dare undertake those business enterprises of a more extended character which are the basis of the material prosperity of a country. The Russian State has been established by violence, by strokes of individual authority. Thence proceeds the illusion that the renewal of these brutal attempts is the Alpha and Omega of political wisdom. Very many Rus- sians, even among the most cultured classes, have an idea that it would be impossible to 237 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE insure general prosperity unless governments were to take, at certain times, measures described in Russia as administrative, that is to say, measures which are illegal. This idea, which is securely anchored in the Russian mind, shows how refractory it still is as to any perception of true justice, and to what extent the Russian is still, after all his efforts at civilization, a ''political animal,'^ and of a very ordinary quality. 1 VI. Present State. After having glanced rapidly over the more or less permanent traits of the Russian nation, I should like, before finishing this hasty sketch, to add a few words upon the situation of the moment. First of all, with reference to economics, Russia is in a fair way to accomplish an impor- tant transformation. She is passing from the purely agricultural stage into the industrial. (i) What is taking place in Finland perfectly sustains my opinion. 238 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE England is the country in which this phase has attained its highest development. Out of one hundred Englishmen seventy-one live in cities and twenty-nine in the country. In Russia the proportion is more than the reverse of this : fifteen persons live in cities and eighty- five in the country districts. But in conse- quence of the strides which manufacturing has made, the population of the cities continues to increase. A working class is beginning to be formed. The '^ bourgeoisie" is growing. These movements are already plainly visible, but they are being brought about slowly. In conse- quence of a thousand impediments produced by bureaucratic centralization, everything in Russia advances at a snail's pace. Things have been set going, however, and, as Russia pos- sesses vast mineral wealth (still very largely unexplored), manufactures cannot fail, sooner or later, to rise to great importance. Another important event in Russian history is the establishment of a network of railways, 239 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE which from this time forward are destined to extend over the entire country. Doubtless the Russian network is still modest, indeed, com- pared to that of America/ but such as it is, it has already produced a fairly immeasurable revolution. Russia was formerly an amorphous country. Some of her regions were practically inaccessible, because of their immense distance from the sea. On the other hand, during a certain number of weeks in the Spring and Autumn, commimication ceased almost entirely. All this is a thing of the past, thanks to the railroads. These transport men and goods at one and the same time. Through this means a constant and continually flowing current of ideas is established between the different parts of Russia, and has reimited them as with an organic bond. In spite of the frightful obstacles which over- (i) There were in Russia, July 1, 1900, fifty-four thousand six hundred kilometres of railroads, and in the United States, January 1, 1899, three hundred thousand six hundred and thirty-six kilometres. 240 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE whelm them, the press and pubUshing trade are making great progress in Russia. Russian editions do not yield much in point of elegance to those of Western Europe. Here is another sign of the times; very expensive publications have begun to have a financial value in Russia. A Leipzig house, combined with another in St. Petersburg, is now publishing an imimense encyclopaedia, after the model of the '^Ency- clopaedia Britannica." More than a million dollars have been invested in this enterprise, which, however, is very profitable. Twenty or thirty years ago, no such thing as this would have been possible. I cannot enlarge upon these matters which are not exactly in line with my subject. I mention them only to show that economic power (which is the foundation of the development of the mind) is increasing in Russia, even though slowly. What is the present tendency of the Russian mind? In order to answer this question we must go back a few years. 241 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE The shameful defeats suffered in the Crimea, in 1854 and 1855, had shown, with the most absolute clearness, how fatal had been the ultra-conservative policy of the Emperor Nich- olas I. A powerful liberal reaction set in under Alexander II. A series of beneficent reforms was the result: the suppression of serfdom, in 1861; the reformation of the courts of justice and the introduction of the jury system, in 1864; provincial self-government for the prov- inces, in 1865, and the suppression of preliminary censure at St. Petersburg and Moscow in the same year. These reforms created a new spirit. Toward 1872, the Russian youth were at the boiling point. They desired to enter upon a sort of crusade to free the peasants from their ignorance. Youthful apostles went abroad over the country, preaching among the workmen in the towns theories that were liberal and more or less subversive. If the Russian government had been endowed, at that time, with even a par- 242 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE tially clear sense of justice, it would have understood that to preach what seems to him the truth is the primordial right of every human creature. On the other hand, if the Russian government had possessed the most elementary principles of sociology, it would have seen at once that the Nihilist apostleship had no sort of chance of amounting to anything serious. Indeed, to modify the political ideas of seventy millions of illiterate men would require an enormous amount of money and immense efforts, protracted for generations. What could be accomplished by some thousands, or rather by some hundreds, of young Nihilists, spread about through the country districts of Russia? Their propaganda would quickly disappear in the vast ocean of ignorance around them, with- out leaving further trace than would a small brook in the Atlantic. The government had only to shut its eyes. The youthful enthusiasts would have been freed from their social illu- sions; and in a very little while they would 243 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE have abandoned their premature attempts. This is just what did happen in many cases. Many young preachers became very quickly disgusted, and gave up their apostleship among the peasants, seeing that it could lead to nothing. Unhappily, the Russian government had no sufficient amount of liberalism, nor of foresight. The reactionists who surrounded the noble and generous Sovereign, the great-hearted Alex- ander II., began to frighten him, and advised measures of merciless severity against the Nihilists. The young persons who were preach- ing in the country districts were arrested, put in prison, subjected to the most rigorous treat- ment, and, in consequence of sentences rendered behind closed doors by special tribimals that offered no guarantee of impartiality and equity, were transported to Siberia. In the face of such persecutions as these the Nihilists resisted. They transformed themselves into a secret society and opposed to the severities of the government, assassinations and outrages even 244 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE more daring. Holding the Emperor Alexander II. responsible for the policy urged upon him by his advisers, they became enraged against him personally, and made repeated attempts to kill him. In the meanwhile, the Turkish War broke out. The Russian arm}^ suffered great privations. Nevertheless, in time, they triumphed, and arrived under the walls of Constantinople. In Februar}^, 1878, Russia was breathlessly await- ing the accomplishment of her destiny and the crowning of her historical mission. For an immense majority of the Russians the war of 1877 had all the effect of a new crusade. A glorious hope had taken supreme possession of their hearts. Every moment the capture of Constantinople was looked for and the end of the Mussulman power on our continent. It would seem as if the inauspicious work, accom- plished in 1453 by Mahomet the Conqueror, were about to be imdone by the hand of Holy Russia. It seemed as if Europe were about to 245 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE enter into possession of that eastern basin of the Mediterranean which had formerly been her most splendid domain. Alas, how cruelly deceived were the Russian people, in maintaining these glorious expecta- tions! Constantinople was not occupied, the Mussulmans were not driven out of Europe, and even the independence of Bulgaria was effected in but a limited and narrow way. Discontent followed these misconceptions. The plots of the Nihilists were renewed, and aroused further exasperation on every side. The more nervous and severe the government appeared, the more did the terrorist party redouble its audacity. Alexander II. was a monarch who was too enlightened, whose heart was too tender, not to feel that the mere civil administration is not everything in the life of a great nation. Toward the beginning of the year 1881, Russia was living in a state of extraordinary tension. Each day a change in the regime was expected. A con- 246 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE stitution was the universal theme; and it was even said that one had been already drawn up, and that it would be promulgated before long. Unhappily the plots of the terrorists did not blow over. The narrow-minded and stupid fanatics who led the movement appeared to be utterly blinded. They neither saw nor heard anything of what was passing aroimd them, and pursued their vengeance against such a Sover- eign as Alexander II. As ill-fortune would have it, the odious crime of the 13th of March, 1881, was successful. This great crime was naturally succeeded by a fiu'ious political reaction, which lasted with- out interruption throughout the reign of Alex- ander III., and bore the acknowledged seal of a narrow Muscovite nationalism and of an ortho- dox clericalism even more narrow still. The institutions of Alexander II. were nearly all revised in the direction of reaction. Self- government in the towns and provinces was limited, the independence of the jury percepti- 247 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE bly restricted. The unfortunate Israelites were deprived of most of their privileges; they were excluded from the municipal councils of the cities; their admittance into the middle and primary schools, and to the committees, was restricted. They were driven out en masse from certain parts of the Empire, in which, thanks to the toleration which reigned under Alexander II., they had been able to establish themselves. The severities of the censorship were redoubled. Many of the most influential journals were sup- pressed. Military law was established in the large Russian to^\Tis which gave privileges to the provincial governors and the prefects of customs which were often abused. While, about 1873, the apostle who went about the coimtry carrying good news to the people was the most striking character in Russian life, under Alexander III., it was the ''careerist" who became the characteristic type. This type, which, in France, Alphonse Daudet has named the ''Struggle for Life," was repre- 248 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE sented by the young official, with no kind of moral aspiration, Tvith no sort of ideal, seeking to obtain, by every imaginable means, the greatest possible number of material advantages. Men of this type multiplied as rapidly as weeds. A leaden gloom fell upon Russian society. People hved, from day to day, in a sad, monoto- nous fashion, without having even a glimpse of anything better. Revolutionary plots grew less frequent, little by little, and finally ceased entirely, at least as far as the public knowledge extended. In any case, there were no more astounding political assassinations. This was one of the singularly happy features of the reign of Alexander HI. Let us hope that the progressive party in Russia has already perceived how odious and foolish and disadvantageous it is to resort to brute force. Alexander III. being now dead, the hopes of the liberals strongly revived. They thought that the reactionary party would, on the acces- 249 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE sion of Nicholas II., be broken up, as had hap- pened after the death of Nicholas I. Nothing of the kind occurred. The men who had sur- rounded Alexander III. remained in power dur- ing the reign of his son, and the greater part of them are in power now. The course of poli- tical opinion did not change. Some reaction- ary measures were still taken. Nationalism in a narrow sense continued to flourish. None of the exceptional measures which had been enacted against the unhappy Israelites were repealed. Thus, apparently, everything is going on since the death of Alexander III., just as it did during his life. But, however, it is not quite that! We are conscious, in spite of everything, that the force of the reaction is blunted. It is not as yet receding; but it is, however, no longer advancing. Russia is at the turning-point. Russian thought has become a stagnant pool. The liberals have not to a marked degree the courage of their convictions, nor do the reactionaries 250 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE dare engage in any too great violence. AVe live from day to day, and no one knows whither one is tending. It seems even as if people were delighted not to go anywhere. Some legislative measm"es of very slight importance have been enacted. But no one seems to have the cour- age to attack the great political problems, ripe for so many years. Life formulates its imperi- ous demands, but the government, in its inabil- ity to act, seems to wish to stop up its ears and close its eyes. Russia continues to linger along in superannuated and nearly vanished institu- tions, hardly worthy of the eighteenth century, and continues to be an archaic state. The breath of no powerful and generous idea seems to animate this country. Not a single man, no great character, no conspicuous personality, appears to captivate the crowd and to vibrate in the hearts. The novel is reduced to a super- ficial impressionism, which paints daily life exactly as it is, without in the least attempting to interpret it. It would seem as if the novel- 251 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE ists are chiefly ambitious to reduce themselves to the level of photographic machines, and to carefully avoid all traces of an independent thought. At this present moment, Russian society seems to be without aspiration, and with no ideal of any kind. There is not a single great question about which intellectual war is waged. The most sacred principles count but sceptics and unbelievers. It would seem as if the chosen few of Russian society (among whom, in other times, such powerful currents of thought have been produced) had lost the fac- ulty of feeling the beating of their own heart. An atmosphere, dull and gray, pervades the whole. There is absolute stagnation. For how long will this state of things last? Ten, twenty, thirty years? Who will be the deliverer? Who will come to drag Russian society from its dull and lifeless state? Alas, no one can answer this question. One event alone has been as a ray of light on 252 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE this dark and gloomy sky, — the circular of the 24th of August, 1898, and the conference at The Hague, which was the result of it. Unhap- pily, neither has this event succeeded in rousing Russian society from its torpor. Many people in Russia expressed themselves on the subject of The Hague conference with a pessimism both scornful and ironical. Furthermore, the noble attempt of the Emperor Nicholas 11. has hardly passed out of the domain of theory. Russia has not disarmed a single regiment; quite the contrary. This year the number of recruits called to active service is greater than last. And Russia has also experienced a recrudes- cence in naval affairs, a more foolish madness even than militarism. The construction of ironclads has been resumed with great ardor. Russia is at present going through one of the dullest and most spiritless periods of her his- tory. The Russian people have, I am sure, too much exuberance of vital power not to react eventually. Some day the nation will resume 253 THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE its forward march. Of that there can be no shadow of doubt. But just now, Russia seems as if motionless, hesitating and irresolute between progress and reaction. 254 ^c .^^ ^ >P^c. cV '^. .-i^' •'' ^--s. <^, ^ o = •^ ■>. •^^ ,0 0, 't^^'^'^UA/'^' ,H -/. c^. ..^^' '^. o. « -^ '^o. ^, -? V A Oj,"^ ' « ^ ' * ^ "^^ ^^ > „:.y?^' ^