The Forrest City times., 1891-08-07
CREED OF HOLY" RUSSIA.
THE RUSSIANS FIRM BELIEF IN
 HIS GOVERNMENT.
''God aad the Cxar'' Are Insepsrabls In the Average Mlnd-Ground Down by Taxes, Half Starved.
 hut Loyal Still.

person who should hesitate between taking up his abode in the United States or in Russia would, by our peo- pie, be regarded as one possessed; if not with devils. at all events, with ex- tremely warped ideas. To our minds, says a writer in the Kansas City Journal America, with its free insti- tutions, represents the closest approach to terrestrial paradise that any sys- tenn of government has so far been able to secure for the people; and in sorting over the nations for the most fitting representative of the other ex- treme, we should, not unlikely. and with a good deal of reason. pick on Russia.
 On the first part of my horseback ride to the Crimea. nothing that came in contact with was more incom- prehensible 10 me than the universal and unquestioned loyalty of the Rus sians to a form of government that, according to our ideas, they ought to hate. Moujiks whose daily fare is black bread and stewed buekwheat, and to whom cucumber pickled in brine is a luxury. are as devoted to the czar of Russia as the most liberty loving citizen of the United States is to the god of freedom.
 The great bughear of the mouiiks lives is the hard necessity of rakug and scraping enough money to pay their taxes. Delinquency in the pay ment of taxes means hogging. In order to escape the knout of the tax gatherer it is often necessary for them to wander far and wide in search of work, leaving their families to till the tiny allotments of land. often quite in- sufficient for their support. The taxes were heavy, ana the burdens grievous. but unless such things were necessary the czar would not require it of them. this was the substance of the answer I always got
 So incomprehensible did this seem to me for awhile, in the face of the terrible hardships of the moujiks' con dition. that 1 used to turn to Sascha. my companion for enlightenment He was an educated young man. could speak four languages and was we'll enough up in geography to ask me whether Brazil was in Africa or South America; and he assured me the moujiks were right. Our czar," he would answer, 'is the best govern ment for us
 The truth gradually dawned upon me aa my stay in the country heightened and the opportunities of talking with all sorts and conditions of people multiplied With the excep- ton of n limited circle in the cities. the Russians are. politically as blind as bats. They are ''loyar' to their pres ent form of government because they don't know anything about any other form.
 True. the moujik lives in tiny sort of republic. in his own village: but the idea that a similar constitution would make a success as a government for the state has never entered his head.
 One evening I engaged in conversa- tion mouiik of more than ordinary intelligence, and endeavored to OK plain the form of government we had in the United States. l pointed out that our government was but an en- larged and improved edition of his own village mir. The moujik was de- lighted at this explanation. and said he had always heard that America was a good friend to Russia"
 This answer explained at once the drift his mind was taking. It was the same drift that Russians mind al- ways takes in matters of comparison between his country and others whether he is an educated person or an illiterate moujik makes not pin difference. The peculiar national van fly of the Russian mind had led the moulik to infer at once that we had been to school to Russia and had built up the United States government in imitation of the rural mir. This was amusing. but 1t was at the same time hopeful.
 Now. then" said l, ''our nation Is big and powerful. like Russia. and our government is big mir in which everybody has n voice. just as you have in your village. Under this sys- tenn We have grown rich enough to buy all Russia if we wanted 1t; our people are a hundred times better fed, better clothed and better housed than the Russians are. Why can't the Russian nation do the same?n
 This was mere experimental talk. and knew from experience what the answer would be.
 That Is all very well for the Americans, he returned. but not for us. For the Russians the czar is best. :"
 A person might as well talk to a block of wood. The moujik has a blind. unreasoning faith in the czar. very neary akin to the faith he has in themiracle working icon at Moscow. to postrate himself before which he makes pilgrimages from the farther est corners of tho empire. God and the czar"-that is the whole political and religious creed of nine-tenths of the Russian people, including even such educated persons as my inter- preter. Sascha and the accomplished lady in the train.
 An Edison Iden.
 Mir. Edison has some singular ideas regarding dress. He says. '.l wear the same thickness of outer garments the