The Birmingham age-herald., 1914-01-18
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and demand certain letters Sometimes
instructions are sent to a local post
office to send all letters to the nearest
BLACK Cabinet and the result is that
letters written to friends who live 10
miles away may be sent 200 miles into
another province. and so take days to
deliver. The system of opening is by
steaming. When damage comes to tno
envelopes they are stamped damaged
during transit.
The second work of the Black Cahi-
net is known as "ruibolovlya," that is.
fishing 1t consists In opening Letters
addressed to persons not suspected, this
on the mere chance that they may con-
tain political matter; or reveal anti-gov-
ernmental plots. The "Black Cabinets S"
principle is to open<one out Of a certain
number of letters. The number has va
ried. Car Nicholas | gave the chief
of his BLACK Cabinet" Colonel Kara
muischeff, orders to open all letters. This
system proved too cumbrous Tnder Alex
ander II ''fishing was abandoned; but
it was revived in the next reign when
one in every $50 letters was the RUE
During the first part of the revolutionary
outbreak of l904-6 one letter in every hun
dred was opened. At present. the rule is
one in thousand, This practice has
very little value. The chances are a
thousand to one against any dangerous
letter being opened. as long as it is ad-
dressed to person whom the BLACK
Cabinet does not suspect.
st. Petersburg has the largest "black
cabinet When the central postofiice
was rebuilt a decade back a fine suite
of rooms was provided Here sit the
gendarme officers in charge; and their
subordinates. Letters of specially in
teresting character are sent to the gem
darmery or to the "Qkhrana," the de-
tective center. and there they are pho
tographed, and in most cases sent on.
Post cars on the Siberian railroad are
infested with the BLACK cabinet" Rus
sian railroads. all-round. are rests of
perlustration" and this is so well
known that the European embassies
never use the post even for private let
ters The Siberian mail cars were given
over to the 'black cabinet" during the
revolutions; the reason being that nu-
merous East Siberian reyolutionaries
took refuge in Japan. and Kept up from
there correspondence with their coun-
trymen. Just now a conflict Is raging
over the rights of the "black cabinet
on railroads. Against the BLACK cabi-
net is Minister of Communications
Ruchloff, who is relatively liberal. and
likes to pose as very liberal, Ruchlor
refuses to let the "black cabinet" travel
free In the Siberian mail cars, and he
quotes the law, which gives that right
only to postoffice clerks. Minister of
the Interior Maklakoff replies that the
cabinet members have always Travelled
free on trains. Behind this storm in
a teacup are certain private interests
and in particular there is the zeal OF
Maklakoff to justify his claim to have
made the spy system more efficient
The third and most dangerous sec
tion of the BLACK cabinet" is at work
In foreign countries. The cabinet is
active in every great European capital,
and its work is to watch the CORE
spondence of exiles and of Russians vol
UNFAIRLY resident abroad, who are
nearly all foes of the government I'm
til three years ago little was known of
this. but when Sourtseff made his ia
moue revelations in 1910 it was shown
that at least $50 "black cabinet" men
were engaged in 'perlustration" in for
eign lands. Even comparatively free
London has its "black cabinet" though
it has no relations with the English
postal authorities or with the English
police. In continental countries the
cabinet works, or worked in the past,
more or less together with the local
political police; and it found an excuse
for this by making out that all NAL
contents were advocates of terrorist
methods.
In Berlin and Vienna after the Sourtsef
revelations the police began to treat the
cabinet emissaries coldly, and now the
cabinets must work on their own. In
Paris. before 1910, the cabinet acted hand
in hand with the police. although in help