The Press.
London, England, 1854-12-30 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

some spirited sketches of the different classes
of Russian society, a good. deal of pleasant
gossip about Russian notabilities, and a dozen
pages or so which seem to us to possess real
political importance.
In the latter category, the author's view of
the Csar's true reasons for rushing into war
differs considerably from that which has hitherto
been generally taken in Western Europe. The
Czar, he tells us, went to war neither to ex-
tend the domination of the Greek Church,
nor to satisfy his ambition by demolishing
Turkey and increasing his territory, but solely
to prevent the increase of political discontent
in his own dominions :

The Czar has not, under the vain pretext of religious
protection to the rayahs, and of imaginiu-y laminas to
avenge, undertaken this iniquitous war, with the view of
realising the projects of Peter I. and Catherine 11. ; or of
doing something to illustrate his insignificant reign.
However poWerfal these motives may have seen, they
would not have' enticed to induce him to abdicate the
prudent policy of his predecessors, who sought the
success of their project,* in. Turkey, leas from open
action than suceessive encroachments, ably dissimulated,
aqd to throw himself and his people into this great and
mysterious adreltture. The Czar has abandoned his part
of defender of order, and Of universal pacificator, for a
reason much more serious and more decisive. He could
no longer govern. Absolute master of everything, he
begun to be no longer master of anything. Old age in
approaching showed him not only the decadence of the
war, but that of the principle. Rising like the tide, by a
uniform and inevitable impulsion, the idea of reform beat
against the worn-out theory of old despotism; it pene-
trated even the darkest minds ; every one—even those
nearest the idol—the intimate friends, the instruments,
the valets of the Court—whispered to one another " this
regime has served its time—it must be changed, it is im-
possible to continue it longer." The author of these lines
has heard these very words from the mouth of men who
direct the Administration and police—of statesmen who are
bound up with the system, of those who having been the
active and blind instruments of the past are more directly
menaced with the wrath of the future. A party besides
was formed amongst the nobility. It took fur its motto,
progress. This dread party, discontented and sulky,
criticised everything with bitterness, and stood aloof from
the Government. Possessing energy, connection, spirit,
it made disciples of the rising generation. In a very
secret report of M. Liprandi, on the conspirators of 1840-
50, are these lines The pupils in the colleges have
taken up wild ideas—have adopted the most extravagant
systems. Every word they say, every line they write, ex-
presses their attachment to pernicious doctrines—doc-
trines of which frequently they do not perceive the terrible
consequences." In another document, also kept very secret,
presented to the Commission presided over by General Nabo-
koff,which was charged to make investigations respecting the
said conspiracies, are these lines :—" Blindly abandoning
themselves to Utopian ideas, young men think themselves
called on to reform all social life, and all humanity, and
they are ready to make themselves the apostles and mar-
tyrs of this wretched deception. Everything is to be ex-
pected from such people. Nothing will ever check them,
for, according to their notions, they labour not for them-
selves but for humanity, not for the present, but for the
future."
In Russia the reading of French and German philoso-
phical works is a state crime. Of the different roads that
lead to Siberia that is one of the most certain. Neverthe-
less these books are in every hand : young men read them,
meditate on them, become imbued with them. " I was
very much surprised," said to me M. P Tchikatcheff (the
friend of Humboldt and Arago) "on finding in the hands
of my nephew, a pupil of the Law School at St. Peters-
burg, the works of the French socialist economist Proud-
hon. Having asked him, in a severe tone, how he could
have procured such books, he told me that they came
from one of his fellow-pupils--and he added that all had
them."
Does not, besides, the rapid development of national
slavism, in opposition to that encouraged by the Govern-
ment, the incessant discoveries of conspiracies, the in-
surrections of peasants, the murders of nobles, the deser-
tions of soldiers, the severe surveillance constantly ex-
ercised over certain individuals and certain classes of
society—do not these things indicate the progressive, and
for the Government menacing, development of public in-
telligence? A Russian writer, Iscander, in a remarkable
pamphlet, says:—" Russia appears so tranquil that it is
difficult to believe that anything takes place within her
pale. Few people know what occurs beneath the shroud
with which die Government covers her corpses—there are
there stains of blood and military executions, but the Go-
vernment hypocritically and arrogantly denies that there
are either stains of blood or dead bodies beneath that
shroud !" Another Russian, who has studied his country all
his life, and under every aspect, said to me :—" The precise
moment of the triumph in Russia of what are called revo-
lutionary ideas, cannot be indicated, but it is near at hand.
It will take a new and special form unknown in the rest
of Europe—the Russian form. It will be produced in the
name of a triple unity—political unity, administrative
unity, intellectual unity. To govern, administer, and
think in the Russian way—such will be its formula.
Everybody will agree in destroying a system of govern-
ment condemned by the spirit of the times—an armed
phantom, still capable of inspiring terror, bat powerless
to cause a single fibre to vibrate in the human soul.
There will afterwards be great conflicts ;—men of ad-
vanced ideas will want to establish new institutions—part
of the old Russian party will want to return to old Russia,
the Russia of the Isane--and the people will take in hand

12447

the idea of Robespierre, and cut offheade if these events
should not arrive in the lifetime of Nicholas they will
make an explosion at his death. His successor will have
to encounter difficulties he cannot vanqaish. He must
come to a compromise or fall. He will be Louis XV. or
Louis XVI. according to cireunistauces."
The Government has had these terrible prospects before
it night and day ; it has seen the flood rise ; and though it
is master of all material forces of seven hundred leagues
in space, and of more than sixty million souls, it has felt
itself too weak to check it.. A power more formidable than
its own, that of time, acted in a spirit contrary to its
spirit. Progress advanced hour by hour. It was neces-
sary at wpm oust to tutu away *tendon from it. And so
the Czar opened the flood-gates of war.
Such was the fatality, the cause, and the object of the
war of 1853. The Czar did not make a coup de the, but a
cusp desespoir !
The author describ situatiol
MI
nobililfsin &sett 11,4 p xtetwe.
The, Vre stysr t tb ject th 4 s Ml' the
,
Czar, and are execrated by the serfs on account
of their scandalous tyranny and oppression ;
whilst at the sametviate .t4cy are discontented.
with themselves at being so much inferior to
the aristocracies of Western Europe. In the
break up which loe ft,utielpopia in the Russian
empire ho predicts duit they will be swept
away :
The middle class, and even the serfs, are advancing
towards emancipation—an emancipation disguised or
public—normal or violent—but inevitable ; the nobility,
on the oontniry, are progressing gradually but fatally
towards a certain decomposition. Menaced from all parts,
they have no present and no future ; condemned to inac-
tion to-day, death will overtake them to-morrow.
He says that the middle class in Russia is
increasing in wealth, intelligence, and in
numbers; but that they aro subjected to the
most odious and ridiculous restrictions. He
notes, however, en passont,that in proportion to
their numbers they commit more crimes than
any other class.
He declares that enlightenment is beginning
to spread amongst the serfs, in spite of the
efforts made to keep them in the darkness of
ignorance and superstition:—
The soldiers who have made war abroad, and who be-
come free after their liberation from service, return to
their native villages ; the foreigners, French and German,
whom the chiefs of great manufactories or agricultural
enterprises employ; the Poles, who, in spite of the
terrible persecutions to which they are subjected, creep
in everywhere, by right of their superior intelligence ; the
young serfs, whom some nobles, in a spirit more liberal
than prudent, send abroad to learn improvements in
manufactures, and who back with them notions
about political rights and individual liberty—all these
elements, put into circulation by the force ofthings, have
succeeded in penetrating the thick covering beneath which
the idea of emancipation was buried. From what the
Russian peasant has been told of the condition of the
Western peasant, of his freedom from the soil and the
noble, of the part he plays and the position be can acquire,
he has learned all the practical part of emancipation.
Already in several parts, especially on the frontiers of
Europe, does the word subject tend to displace that of serf.
There is only one more step to take, one more prejudice
to destroy, to cause emancipation, already partially accom-
plished in public opinion, to become an Irresistible neces-
sity. The day on which it shall be demonstrated to the
the serf that aristocracy is a purely human institution,
maintained by his ignorance alone; that the Czar of
Russia is not the Czar of the globe ; that the other
chiefs of States, emperors, kings, sultans, and pontiffs, aro
not his simple vassals . the day on which lie shall be
taught these truths, as clearly as he is beginning to learn
that he himself is something, that his soul is his own,
that he was not burn for the yoke like the ox and the ass,
that God has not excluded him from His sunshine any
more than any other creature, that be has even the force
of numbers on his side—on that day the Russian peasant
will awaken from his long slumber.
Such are the author's political views ; they
may not be infallible, but they are worthy of
attention.
Turning to that part of the book in which
our author treats of the Czar and certain of
the great personages of his empire, we find,
amidst much that is not new, much that is
very amusing, and not a little that touches on
scandal. He is by no means an admirer of
the Emperor Nicholas. His Majesty, he says,
has " studied rapidly, and as a matter of
" form," literature, mathematics, theology, and
politics ; and he intimates that he knows not
much of any of those subjects. He says that
he " was born a tyrant, has grown a tyrant,
" and will die a tyrant." Ho asserts most
positively that he is afflicted at times with the
mental malady which is hereditary in his
family ; and he most decidedly declares that
his Majesty is by no menus the exemplary
husband which it has been the fashion to con-
sider him in England. In support of this
declaration he mentions facts and even names—
) names which he says are well known to every-

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