The Weekly Journal. — 1904-08-05 (Hartlepool, Cleveland, England)

OUR TATLER.  OLD JONAS AND THE CZAR.  SOLEMN CHAT.  "SANCTITY OF LAW AND ORDER."  Ceaseraing tb.Materials of Seditioae. It is Thin well to be. considered: For the merest wsy to preveat &Mame (it lb. Tines doe bears it) is to take away the Natter if Sew. For it there be Full prepared. it is hard to tell wbeace the apart shall come. that shall set it ea Fire. —" Beton : "Of Seditioas aid Troubles."  Bacon was a wise man, though personally of an ignoble typo. Pope has called him "the wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind," and the adjudication was, I think, just. But we often find wisdom allied with distasteful personal characteristics. Seneca, who preached so lofty contempt of riches, was both rich and miserly. At present, however, lam concerned only with Bacon's brain, and not with his heart, and I hold that his dictum which forms my epigraph is pure practical wisdom.  " MATERIALLB OF SEDITIONS " are many. They include the wills of tyrannical statesmen like M. de Plehve, the Russian Minister of the Interior, whose assassination is still agitating the Czar and his people. Ile was the creator of seditious in all parts of the Russian Empire. When, therefore, we find Bacon advising us to care seditious by taking away the matter of them," are we to assume that he would have approved the murder of M. de Plehve as the removal of " matter " causing sedition.? I suppose not. Yet the people who suffer acutely by reason of cruelly despotic Ministers cannot be expected to preserve as judicial and finely-discriminating a mind as Bacon did in his study. 'Tis a delicate casuistical point, my dear sir and ina4l.lm. Awl now let me tell of a converation that I had with On Czar a few dap after the aaaausisa don of M. de Plebve. His Majesty summoned me by tateprapb, and I was moon at Peterhof and in the palatial eaugesi7. NICHOLAS IL EMBRACED MB  with fervour, permitting a large Imperial tear to drop on the back of my coat. "I am stricken, my Jonas!" his Majesty cried with a quaver in his voice that compelled me to pat him affectionately on the shoulder and mutter something about "sweet are the uses of adversity." Then I got my emotion in hand and stood forth the cold-reason preceptor of monarchs as of yore.  " A ROMANOFF IN TEARS : " I observed, "is a frightening phenomenon. The members of your House have been, like Othello, 'unused to the melting mood,' and I am asking myself, dear Nick, whether this agitation of yours does not bode ill for Russia. You know that I utterly hate Autocracy in a nation claiming to be civilised, and I am bound to say that I should hate you but that I distinguish between the man in himself—so far as he can be known—and tho man born to a terrible heritage. Your tears, my dear Nick, need interpretation. Are they for M. do Plehve or the wretched, condition of millions that renders assassination of your Ministers—there have been several such crimes in the last two years— events that inspire carnival in multitudes?" "I am mourning poor De Plehve," his Majesty replied. "I am sorry," I remarked. "Sorry for what?" the Czar asked; "your words are ambiguous." "I am sorry," I replied acidly, "that the murder of your Minister has excited nothing in you but reprobation of the crime— that the crime has not led you to consider the  MILLIONS OF TEARFUL VICTIMS of the tyranny suggested by M. de Plehve and sanctioned by you. Weep, my dear Nick, for your owl, cruel weakness in sanctioning your Minister's, terrible oppressions or for the misfortune that made you 'Autocrat of All the Russiss.'" " You are not very helpful to me, Jonas," said the Czar; "you seem to forget the fundamental obligation of my otlice—the maintenance of the sanctity of law and order." "I am trying to help you all I can," I rejoined somewhat severely, "but I must ask you to help yourself a little by seeking to clear your brain of cobwebs about  • , -k 1 N• .. , 1 • s• i. A . kti ' f .: \ •. - ~--, „it . •-,'; •,. - . ie • , . i •,,- ''' , , • • ma --I-7 I • i