Chapter X: Section 2: The congress shall have power to enforce this article by (5)

According to the documents of the several periods and the statements of travellers, the rural population of Russia was composed originally of three classes, viz., slaves who were made so by various causes—some prisoners of war, others freemen who had sold themselves as slaves, others insolvent debtors and convicts. One grade higher were the free farm hands who wandered from place to place, wherever they could find work, and then the peasants or small farmers, a distinct class by themselves, who were highest in the social scale, and who were possessors of land and of their personal liberty. But in the eighteenth century these distinctions gradually became obliterated on account of the disproportion between the small number of laborers and the large amount of irreclaimable land, systematized immigration being impossible, and all the classes were rolled into one under the name of “serfs,” who were owned by the great landed proprietors or by the state, and being held as property were bought and sold in families and singly, and were deprived of legal protection by the Government according to the ukazes of October 13, 1675, and June 25, 1682, which sanctioned the practice of selling peasants and the exaction of the payment to the Government of dues on the sales of slaves. Free peasants were often kidnapped from weaker by more powerful proprietors and made serfs, while the same class although nominally free were so valuable to those who possessed their services that they were not allowed to leave their borders, so by this means, and often by reason of debts contracted to the proprietor a large number became practically serfs before serfage was established by law, _i.e._ before the Tsars discharged their obligations to the nobles by bestowing upon them a certain amount of land with a certain number of laborers attached, thus legalizing serfage and the return of fugitive slaves. A small proportion of the nobles who lived on their estates held the peasants as slaves.

Under Peter the Great (1682–1725) and his immediate successor every man was compelled to serve the state, and every proprietor paid the poll tax of his serfs, who were thus reckoned as taxable property, and every unattached laborer was arrested as a vagrant. In 1766, by imperial ukaze, the proprietors or masters had a right to transport unruly serfs to Siberia for life without trial. In 1767 and 1781, it was ordered that those who entered complaints against their masters, should be punished with the knout or sent to the mines, or, what they feared most, made to join the Army as recruits. In extreme cases of the cruelty of proprietors, the authorities interfered by direction of the Tsar, who happened to be informed of it. In 1792, the serfs were bought and sold, and given away as part of the masters’ working capital, in large and small numbers, with and without the land, but they were not allowed to be sold by auction, nor to be offered for sale at the time of the conscriptions. From 1792 to 1861, the estimate of a noble’s fortune was based on the number of serfs he owned.

The Emperor Paul toward the close of the 18th century (1796–1801) desiring to limit the authority of the proprietors, issued an ukaze that the serfs should not be forced to work for their masters more than three days in the week, but many paid no attention to it, and the serfs still had no legal standing in court in order to make a complaint. There were indeed enlightened, humane proprietors who protected those for whom they were responsible from outside interference, and under whose management the life of the serf was much easier than that of agricultural laborers in some countries who are free, but serfage generally, was the reverse of this type. The worst suffering was from the hands of speculators who bought up the land in order to make money in the shortest possible time, and parted with the land and the families on it indiscriminately.

Even among uncivilized tribes the Russian peasant is good natured, easily conciliated, and patient under extreme hardship. He readily adapts himself to circumstances.

In the ordinary relations which existed between the serf and the proprietor the manor land and the communal land were kept separate. From the laborers on the rural commune land or village system,—the rural commune contains five-sixths of the population,—where a share of land was distributed to each serf, labor dues, a certain number of days’ labor per week, were exacted, also, dues consisting of the products of the farm and the spinning wheel, in the case of the absence of the serfs who were at work in the cities or larger towns but retaining, whether they desired it or not, their membership in the commune. A large proportion of the serfs could read and write and were enterprising, self-reliant, and independent.

EMANCIPATION OF THE SERFS.

The Russian proverb, “A story is soon told but a thing is not soon done,” may be consistently applied to their great reform, one of the most interesting events of modern history,—the Emancipation of the Serfs. An effort was made for freedom in 1762, by an insurrection led by a Cossack with a scheme for creating a peasant empire, but he soon met with defeat and his plan failed.

In 1801, Alexander I. attempted to ameliorate the condition of the serfs, and entertained several projects for a general emancipation, and Nicholas encouraged the consideration of the question by permitting six committees to be formed for the purpose. The result was that some thousands of serfs were emancipated, the custom of giving grants of land with peasants was abolished, a number of the worst masters were removed from their estates, and some, convicted of murder, were sent to Siberia. Yet, when a general emancipation was really inaugurated, the leading organs of the press acknowledged indebtedness to the Crimean War for opening the eyes of the country to the dark side of their political and social organization. It produced an intellectual movement and a moral revival which led to gigantic results. Their foes in the Crimea, said a Russian writer of the time, whose manuscript was widely circulated but never printed, were “British statesmen,” “the crowned conspirator of France,” “treacherous Austria,” and “Western Europe generally.” Militia regiments were everywhere raised throughout the country, and many landed proprietors spent large sums in equipping volunteer corps, but unscrupulous members of the commissary department enriched themselves at the expense of these patriotic efforts, and the deficiency of the country in regard to the resources necessary for a prolonged conflict, were soon manifest. “Another year of war,” wrote an eye witness in 1855, “and the whole of Southern Russia will be ruined.”

In this conflict it was the aim of the Tsar Nicholas to realize the grand idea of Catherine II., consort of Peter III. who succeeded to his throne, of driving the Turks out of Europe, but the Allies were victorious, and even the despised Turks made a successful stand on the line of the Danube, and when he, the “Iron Tsar,” the sworn enemy of liberalism, died in a soldier’s humble quarters in the Crimea, the system he created,—which through the sacrifice of the intelligence of the people to the increase of military power proved the chief cause it was claimed of the national disasters,—died with him, and as soon as peace had been concluded Alexander II. accepting the responsibility of the dying words of Nicholas, “my successor may do as he pleases, but I cannot change,” began a reign by which the public administration of affairs was to be improved, in the words of his manifesto “by the combined efforts of the Government and the people,” not secretly by the Administration as had been the custom in making slight changes.

In March, 1856, soon after the close of the Crimean War Alexander II. addressed to the Marshals of the Noblesse of Moscow the following words:—

“For the removal of certain unfounded reports I consider it necessary to declare to you that I have not at present the intention of annihilating serfage, but, certainly, as you yourselves know, the existing manner of possessing serfs cannot remain unchanged. It is better to abolish serfage from above, than to await the time when it will begin to abolish itself from below. I request you, gentlemen, to consider how this can be put into execution, and to submit my words to the noblesse for their consideration.”

These enunciations were received with indifference, and further action was indefinitely postponed, to the great disappointment of the Tsar, who at once instituted a committee called “Chief Committee of Peasant Affairs,” composed of high officers of the state, and great land owners, among them the Grand Duke Constantine, who should privately work for these ends, and who would make a study of the subject for six months, and on the assumption that the Lithuanian provinces where the serfs were in a miserable condition desired it, “The Rescript of Nazimof” was prepared, empowering the proprietors to form committees for the study of this project with a view to definite results in effecting the gradual abolition of serfage, and four days later a circular was sent by direction of the Tsar, to the Governors and Marshals of Noblesse all over Russia, informing them of the action relative to the Lithuanian Provinces, and a copy of the rescript was furnished them in case they were disposed to follow suit. This circular produced an immense sensation. Its meaning was unmistakable, and convincing to loyal subjects of the Tsar, for a few weeks later he made public announcement of his wish that, with the help of God, and the co-operation of the Noblesse, the great work would be accomplished. The public press most enthusiastically sustained this liberal movement for the amelioration of the condition of so large a proportion of the population and welcomed the dawn of a glorious epoch for the nation in which this obstacle to moral progress, a relic of barbarism, should be removed, and Russia be placed on equality with the nations of the West, and with these advocates were joined a majority of the noblesse, among whom were numerous educated young enthusiasts, while some still clung to serfage as an indispensable source of revenue not to be obtained except under the rigid rule of the master, and a part of the land was to be let go to the peasants. These considerations formed an adverse current which was felt throughout the country, but no open opposition to the will of the Tsar was allowed to manifest itself, because of its utter futility. Still, when in 1857, it became evident that the emancipation of the serfs was really at hand the prospect raised terrible forebodings in the minds of masters, stewards, and employers of serfs. By law, it appeared that the peasants would receive the land which they occupied on sufferance, comprising half of the entire arable land of some estates, but no pasturage, and it was feared that the emancipated peasants would be content to live by the cultivation of their own land, and would not consent on any terms to work for their former masters.

During the year 1858, committees were formed for the purposes of emancipation in every province where serfage existed, the projects which they proposed being always subject to revision and approval or rejection by the Government. The fundamental principles of the movement were intended to accomplish the work of emancipation by allowing the serfs to remain for a time on the land subject to the authority of the proprietors, and during this time they should become possessors, by many payments or by labor, of their houses and gardens, and have the temporary use of a certain quantity of land sufficient for their own support, and their taxes to the proprietors and the State. The limit of this transition period does not seem to have been prescribed. The next move was the appointment of an “Elaboration Commission,” composed of officials and landed proprietors named by the Tsar, which formulated a new plan, approved by the Tsar, in which the idea of gradual emancipation was eliminated, and its place was supplied by a general law for the complete abolition of the authority of the proprietor over the serf. Thus the serfs were to be transformed into small proprietors of a commune or village, possessing a house and garden and a section of communal land. The serf was to be declared personally free, and a price was to be fixed by Government for the rent of the land. As to the amount, that was limited to the land actually enjoyed by the peasants. Before the project became a law, deputies from the Provincial Committees were summoned to St. Petersburg for consultation in matters of detail before the commission, but this was a mere formality and added nothing to the influence of the Provincial Committees, or to future results. The autocratic power remained supreme. In the opinion of the Tsar, “The autocratic power created serfage, and the autocratic power ought to abolish it.”

In 1861, as the time drew nearer there was great excitement all over Russia. An actor in one of the St. Petersburg theatres shouted from the stage,—“Let us proclaim throughout all Russia that the time has come for tearing up evil by the roots!” And the audience responded with frantic demonstrations of enthusiasm. Speech was free, open, and unrestrained by police or press censors, and public attention was absorbed by the great practical issues of the day. The Crimean war had shown the necessity of constructing railroads, improving roads, and steamboat communication on the rivers, of developing the natural resources, and had taught them the lesson that even an efficient army could not be produced from an ignorant population. Accordingly in current speech and in the public press different methods of education were discussed, and reforms in all the branches of the civil service, and as a result of all this they expected an increase of military power and the consequent respect of Western nations.

For the furtherance of these reforming projects, for the reason that twenty millions of the people, one third of the population, were in a state of bondage, precedence was given to the question of the condition of the serfs. There were 100,247 landed proprietors, and of these more than 41,000 were possessors of less than twenty-one male serfs. A proprietor who was owner of 500 serfs was not considered very rich, and there were only 3,803 of these. There were a few whose possessions were enormous. One of the nobles possessed more than 150,000 male serfs, more than 300,000 souls; the latter estimate naturally including females, though the Russians have a popular saying that “Women have no souls at all, but only a vapor.” Another noble owned more than half a million of acres of land, another extensive mines, but there were few very rich families. By far the greater part of the territory belonged to the state, and one-half of the rural population were state peasants whose condition differed from the other serfs in that they had more land and more liberty, and their position was not so precarious.

Agriculture and the industries languished for the lack of free labor, and upon the nation’s honor was the stigma of slavery.

The emancipation law which was signed February 19, 1861, Old Style, or March 3d as we reckon time, liberated twenty millions of serfs. The manifesto with which the peasantry is said to have been disappointed, was read in all the churches and contained these fundamental principles, to wit:—

“1. That the serfs should at once receive the civil rights of the free rural classes, and that the authority of the proprietors should be replaced by communal self-government.

2. That the rural communes should as far as possible retain the land they actually held, and should in return pay to the proprietor certain yearly dues in money or labor.

3. That the Government should by means of credit, assist the communes to redeem these dues, or, in other words, to purchase the lands ceded to them in usufruct.”

The domestic serfs should continue to serve their masters two years, and thereafter they should be completely free, but would have no claim on the land. The disappointment in the minds of the peasants was in the disposition of the land. Many desired that all the land should be given to the Communes, making the emancipation in accordance with traditional right and their material advantage, instead of which they were still to pay dues on land they believed to be their own by right. The Noblesse were well pleased with the manifesto.

After a delay of three months, “Arbiters of the Peace” were appointed, to regulate the future relations between the proprietors and peasantry and in the interval cases of insubordination were frequent, and even riots, when order was preserved by the calling out of the troops. The “Arbiters of the Peace” when organized restored order and regulated the land question, issued charters, etc. between the proprietors and serfs, legalizing the new agreements, with or without their consent. In this reconstruction many differences were to be reconciled owing to the distrust of the freed serfs, but gradually they came to know the situation better and to help in the progress of the work, which has advanced slowly but surely, notwithstanding the complaints in some instances of the Noblesse, through the wonderful tact of the conscientious “Arbiters of the Peace.”

The law relating to the dues was as follows:—The dues were capitalised at six per cent and the Government paid at once to the proprietors four-fifths of the whole sum. The peasants were to pay to the proprietor the remaining fifth, either at once or in installments, and to the Government six per cent, for forty-nine years, on the sum advanced. This arrangement was willingly acceded to by the proprietors but the peasants were so backward in their payments, that in most cases their fifth had to be remitted.

Of this gigantic, though gradual, reform the Tsar Alexander II. is acknowledged by all to be the chief and most energetic and judicious promoter. He was ably assisted by his brother the Grand Duke Constantine and the Grand Duchess Helena, a German Princess, aided by the Noblesse and the landed proprietors, who when assured that emancipation was inevitable joined enthusiastically in its execution, and also by the peasantry of the better sort as soon as they comprehended the advantages of the law which gave them back their original status in the social scale, and made them once more personally free.

AFTER EMANCIPATION.

It was so-called freedom in 1861, but they had to serve as they had done for two years longer, for the law had a provision enjoining them to obey and work as hard as of old until some new arrangement should be made. On appealing to the authorities the field work was executed, after a fashion, but the harvest suffered for a few years, until the peasants began to realize the burden of the taxes they were obliged to pay on the land, as well as support themselves, and consented to work in the fields of their former owners for a moderate compensation, taking advantage of the scarcity of labor, and taking their leave on a word or two too much from their employers, who are dependent upon them. Previous to emancipation it was said that the Russians had little or no practical acquaintance with pauperism, but now some became fugitives, and made it a permanent condition of life, wandering through the cities and villages as professing pilgrims or beggars, and were supported by the alms giving of the merchants, the public generally and the monasteries.

THE RURAL COMMUNES.

The government of the Rural Commune or Mir, as established by the Act of Emancipation, is by a Village Assembly and a Village Elder, but the Elder’s authority is limited by the heads of households, all having a common responsibility and paying a fixed sum into the common treasury; even the time of planting, mowing and harvesting, being regulated by the Assembly, and all the households are equally responsible for the taxes and dues. The consent of the Assembly must be obtained if a peasant desires to work in the larger towns, for his liabilities must be made secure.

Every year the Village has to pay a certain sum into the Imperial Treasury, according to the number of male peasants; each Village distributing the land, according to its own judgment, with taxes and dues in proportion to the land, sometimes according to the working power of the families, which may change every few years, males and females alike working on the land.

In the meetings of the assemblies the majority rules, and is decided by a Court of the members, composed of heads of households of both sexes, standing in groups out of doors.

The office of Village Elder is sometimes elective, at others he is appointed by the landed proprietor. The office is not sought for, the duties being troublesome and annoying, and the pay small. In the allotment of the land the number of shares of which may or may not be of advantage, according to the peculiar circumstances of each, the decision of the Commune is accepted without demur. Some of these divisions take place annually, others at irregular intervals. The system compels the peasant to possess land whether he or she desires it or not. Every peasant, by the simple fact of his birth, possesses an inalienable right to a share of the land.

All that is necessary for their existence, their houses, land, agricultural implements etc., are exempt from sequestration, and cannot be taken for debt. The peasants on the land belonging to the state, have no masters, but are not allowed to change their official domicile. They pay taxes and dues. Many of them have left the villages and have amassed fortunes in the cities, still retaining their hold on the land by paying the taxes. The remaining land belongs to rich nobles, who rarely visit their estates, and the condition of the peasants is much the same as that of the state peasants, while others live on their estates.

Now, forty-three of the forty-nine years have passed, and in January, 1904, the Tsar Nicholas II. grandson of Alexander II., in response to calls for legislation relative to a new draft of the present code, with complaints of arbitrary conduct by the administrative machinery from the highest assemblies to the local committees, stipulates that changes on three points shall be reserved from discussion, namely, that the peasant class must remain entirely separate, legally, from the other classes; that the Commune is to remain untouched by legislation, and that the peasant lands are to remain inalienable. The autocratic power still remains supreme. March 3, 1904, for the first time since the Emancipation of the serfs the anniversary was officially observed throughout the empire as a general holiday and with special services in the churches. Thousands stood in the open air, uncovered, in the great central market of St. Petersburg chanting a Te Deum.

DEATH OF ALEXANDER II.

I was returning to my room in Paris, late one Sunday night in March, 1881, having passed an agreeable evening, first dining at my old classmate’s, E. D. Boit’s, then listening to some music and meeting some pleasant people at the house of another artist Mr. G. P. A. Healy, and last calling with Wad Longfellow upon the Kings, when I heard a newsman on the boulevard crying out something exciting though I could not catch what it was. I bought his extra, “le Soir,” took it to my room, and found that the news was nothing less than this time the successful assassination on the 13th of the Emperor of Russia.

It made quite an impression upon me as I thought it over, not only because I had met the Tsar two or three times, but also from the interest I felt he had taken in the cause of the Union during our civil war; that he among the crowned heads of the world had been, if not our only, at least our out-spoken friend and sympathizer.

How much in common there was both in the life and death of Alexander II. and Abraham Lincoln! Each of these men in his own land had been the originator and bold champion of a plan of emancipation, and each of them had at length fallen by the hand of an assassin!

Prince Kropotkin in 1899, gave to the _Atlantic Monthly_ the following account of the death of the Tsar:—

“A bomb was thrown under the Tsar’s iron-clad carriage. Several Circassians of the escort were wounded. Rysakoff, who flung the bomb, was arrested on the spot. Then, although the coachman of the Tsar earnestly advised him not to get out, saying that he could drive him still in the slightly damaged carriage, he stepped out. He felt that his military dignity required him to see the wounded Circassians, to condole with them, as he had done with the wounded during the Turkish war, when a mad storming of Plevna, doomed to end in terrible disaster, was made on the day of his fête.

He approached Rysakoff and asked him something, and as he passed close by another young man, Grinevetsky, the latter threw his bomb at their feet, between himself and Alexander II., so that both of them should be killed by the terrible engine. They lived but a few hours.

There Alexander II. lay upon the snow, profusely bleeding, abandoned by every one of his followers! All had disappeared. It was cadets, returning from the parade, who lifted the bleeding Tsar from the snow, and put him in a sledge, covering his shivering body with a cadet mantle, and his bare head with a cadet cap. And it was one of the Terrorists, Emelianoff, with a bomb wrapped in a paper under his arm, who, at the risk of being arrested on the spot and hanged, rushed with the cadets to help the wounded man! Human nature is full of these contrasts.”

It was at the canal bridge near the Nevski Prospect that the bomb which shattered the body of the Tsar below the waist was thrown, and he died within an hour at his rooms in the Winter Palace. It is said that these rooms and their contents have never been disturbed in the least since the murdered Tsar left them for his drive. The hands of the clock on the mantel still point to 33 minutes past 3, the moment the Tsar expired.

MONUMENT AT MOSCOW.

August 28, 1898, a monument to Tsar Alexander II. was unveiled at Moscow. His grandson, the present Tsar, Nicholas II. issued a ukase referring to the event and eulogizing the deeds of the deceased, notably the liberation of the peasants from bondage, which earned him the title of “The Deliverer,” in the mouth of a grateful people. The closing words were as follows:—

MEDALS MADE HEREDITARY.

“Wishing to seal more firmly the memory of this historical deed, we
have resolved to make hereditary the wearing and possession of the
medals he conferred upon his co-operators, as a sign of his gracious
acknowledgment of their labors.”

The Tsar also sent to M. Constantin Pobiedonostseff, Procurator General of the Holy Synod, the decoration of the Order of St. Andrew, together with an imperial rescript reminding him that he, of all the close co-operators with the deceased monarch, alone remained in possession of the chiefship of the administrative department then intrusted to him.

The monument was unveiled by Emperor Nicholas II. at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, in the presence of the Czarina, the Queen of the Hellenes, the Cabinet, the German and Austrian Ambassadors, deputations from all the land and naval forces of Russia and the Austrian Uhlans Regiment.

The entire audience knelt while the clergy recited a prayer in memory of the deceased.

At the moment of the unveiling the troops presented arms, and a salute of 320 guns was fired. Then the troops, with the Emperor at the head, marched past the monument amid the enthusiastic cheers of the people.

ODESSA, 1899.
]

CHAPTER TENTH.
EUROPE AND AMERICA IN 1870. DEMETRIUS GOUBAREFF. RUSSIA AND THE UNITED
STATES.

“Peace—but the ships of steel increase,
And statesmen watch, perplexed:
What is the thing we folk term ‘peace’?
Where will the war be next?”
—_Edwin L. Sabin._

IN LONDON, PARIS AND NICE.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.

The ideas I give of Europe contained in the following sketch written in London in April, 1870, came to me from a residence of two years there, during which time I had been constantly watching events, and had been thrown with many of the leading statesmen and financiers of the United States.

What I pretended to know of the Eastern question, I learned from the journey I made the previous autumn through Russia, Turkey and Egypt, with General Banks. It then struck me that it would be well to open the eyes of the American people to what was passing there as impartially as possible, as thus far the English accounts had been one-sided. I may appear to favor Russia too strongly, but the boat in which we made the journey from Odessa to Egypt, and then through the Suez Canal, was filled with Russian representatives, persons representing almost all the Russian interests, and they spoke to us, being Americans, most freely on these subjects, and in such a way that we were much impressed with the high ambitions of that empire. It would have been difficult to have made the journey under more favorable auspices.

The picture I drew of the future of the United States was very strong, but the more one lives away from America, the more he appreciates her greatness, and the position she must surely hold among the nations of the world, and I thought it good to put the plain facts and statistics before Europeans as well as Americans.

This paper, which I offered to the press, did not appear originally in the form of a contribution, as the war suddenly broke out between France and Prussia before this was accomplished, but I had copies of it printed in a pamphlet for private circulation, and in that way it was quite generally read and discussed.

I was of the opinion that neither Americans nor Europeans were sufficiently alive to the position which the United States was destined soon to hold among the nations of the world, and that they ought to be diligently preparing themselves for it.

Having faith that the Great Republic will not only remain undivided, but increase in territory, population and strength, it logically follows that she must later be the controlling power. In her, humanity, commingled together and then reorganized, will practically carry out the idea of self-government, and such a government, if successful, will be irresistible.

“EUROPE AND AMERICA IN 1870.”

“Wars and rumors of wars must be, it would seem, for many years to
come the staple of talk in Europe. Nor is this remarkable, so many
different nationalities and languages, so much intelligence and
energy, and so many shades of ambition being concentrated in a small
space of territory. Thus far in the history of the Old World those in
power have generally sought by arms or state craft to strengthen the
country in whose destiny they were interested. Constant wars have been
the result.

The principles of international interest, of working in harmony to
develop the resources of the globe, of which perhaps the best exponent
is trade and the necessary concomitant peace, have been unfortunately
considered beneath the dignity of those who by birth, by fortune, or
by talent, have been able to hold leading positions. Happily this is
being changed. The great discoveries of the last fifty years have
given the world such an impulse as it never received before. The
comparative ease of making money and of possessing it in safety, has
caused persons to look after their own interest more than that of
those who chanced to be their rulers. But the process of change is
slow, and emperors and kings are still able to make wars even in
opposition to the will of their subjects. Wars are still not only a
possibility, but a probability, and every one is on the lookout for
them. When there is lack of other business, the cabinets of Europe
will turn their attention to the always vexed question of the balance
of power.

When newspaper editors are in want of interesting matter to fill their
sheets, they can ever bring out a glowing statement of the Eastern
question, or dilate upon the relations existing between France and
Prussia.

The map of Europe never ceases to be an entertaining study, and so a
slight review of the present state of affairs there, as seen and
judged by the disinterested traveller, may perhaps offer some points
of interest to those who are unable to make the journey themselves.

No one nation in Europe, today, seems to have a preponderating
influence over the others.

ENGLAND AND FRANCE.

England and France for a long time the most powerful have not, during
the last ten years, been making any international progress, and if
they have not by this been actually losing their influence, they have
remained in a state of inaction, while others have made great advances
to equal or eclipse them. Nor is there to be seen in them any prospect
of changing their policy.

England is so much occupied with domestic questions, especially those
relating to Ireland, that she can give little time or thought to
anything else, unless of very great import.

In France the holding the various discordant elements in check, and
forming out of them a strong and popular government, is absorbing all
the talent of her statesmen. The aggressive enterprises that the
existing government, or rather that its head, has lately undertaken,
have been so fruitless and so doubtfully indorsed by the people, that
it is not probable anything of the kind will again be tried unless
upon an almost certainty of success.

PRUSSIA.

Prussia may with a certain show of reason consider herself the leader,
but her, so to speak, inland position, and the consequent difficulty
of her having great naval or commercial power, prevent her from taking
that place to which her arms and politics might entitle her. Besides
this her relations with both Northern and Southern Germany are in a
preparatory state, and the uncertainty of her future movements, and of
how they will be accepted, is a present point of weakness. She is
recognized to be the strongest German nation, but the smaller
independencies, certain though they may be of becoming eventually
absorbed, are tenacious of preserving their individuality as long as
possible. They hesitate about siding with or against Prussia, and as
she cannot well now press the question, matters are more or less at a
standstill.

AUSTRIA.

Austria cannot, since the Peace of Prague, be regarded as a
first-class power of Europe; she must regain her lost strength first,
and for some time to come she will best attempt this by solidifying
her relations with Hungary, and by infusing more advanced principles
of government into the authorities at Vienna.

SPAIN.

In Spain, affairs are still holding their uneasy course, and the world
looks on astonished at the way the country is taking care of itself;
so many forms of government proposed by so many different candidates
that, in reality, there is next to none whatever, but, to balance
this, a fair amount of contentment among the people. Not knowing what
they wish, the Spaniards drift on very well with what they have.

ITALY.

In Italy, economy is so necessary to preserve the country, that no
thought can be given to any foreign ventures, while at Rome all other
questions are dropped, so long as the Ecumenical Council is sitting
there in state.

DENMARK, NORWAY AND SWEDEN.

Denmark, Norway and Sweden, are engaged in discussing topics of much
local interest, and which may perhaps, result in the unity of the
three nations, but they will have little influence upon the general
march of events in Europe.

RUSSIA.

Russia remains, as the last great nation to be discussed, and here, on
the stepping stone between Eastern and Western ideas and
civilizations, can be found the germs of those movements which if not
immediately forthcoming, will, when they burst forth, startle the
world with their grandeur, and essentially change the features of the
map of Europe.

The Russian Empire as it exists today,—the Russia of Alexander II. and
Gortschakoff,—the country which has emancipated twenty million serfs
and offered an equal trial by jury to all its citizens, this nation,
which, day by day is increasing its territory and influence at home,
and which during a civil war in the other hemisphere extended a kindly
though many will say a not disinterested hand to the party which
represented progressive principles, the Russian Empire, the friend of
the American Republic, has many qualities which might justly entitle
it to leadership, but the strange mixture of European and Asiatic
elements in that country, so great in extent and so ambitious of
progress, as interpreted by it, is the cause of a confusion of ideas,
and prevents that unanimity of action which is necessary to insure the
respect and obedience of others.

Moreover, although the spirit of the people is extremely democratic,
the policy of the government is autocratic, and in the latter part of
this century it is impossible for any but a government founded on
popular principles and supported by the people themselves, to command
the esteem and the envy of the masses in other portions of the
civilized world, and thus to give them laws. The seeds of dominion are
there, but it will take time for them to ripen and bear their fruit.

THE EQUIPOISE OF POWER.

From this slight review of the position of the European nations in
1870, one cannot help being impressed with the equipoise of power, and
concluding that this itself is a strong guarantee of peace, but, in
reality the peace is not well founded, and cannot be abiding. It is an
armed peace, and as such, may cause the people deep anxiety. Several
millions of men in Europe, today, are wearing the dress and drawing
the pay of soldiers, and all for nothing. Disarming is continually
talked of, but is not being begun, nor will it be, as long as the
nations are mutually afraid of each other. The pursuits of industry
and commerce, which would develop with increasing force if peace were
secure for ten or twenty years, are now, to a great extent, held in
check. Capitalists are afraid of embarking in great enterprises, as
they know not what may take place before they will be completed.
Thousands of laborers, able-bodied and intelligent, through fear of
being drawn into military service are leaving the lands of their birth
and emigrating to distant shores, there to seek their fortunes: a
great gain to the countries which receive them, but a more than
proportionate loss to those they leave, as their places cannot be
filled.

One should not seriously wish for war, except in the most extreme
cases, and where the prospect of the good to follow seems more than to
compensate for the immediate evil.

LOOKING INTO THE FUTURE.

Without admitting this to be the case now, but believing that the
present peace cannot, from the press of circumstances last many years,
let us look a little into the future, and try to divine where it will
be first broken, and what will be the results. It is to the East of
Europe we must turn our thoughts, and here it seems as if great events
would soon be in motion. The problem to be solved is the dismemberment
of the Ottoman Empire, and the consequent independence of one nation,
and the increase in power of several others.

The actors in the drama will be Turkey, Russia, Egypt, Greece, and
perhaps the Slavonic portions of Austria, the theatre will be parts of
Europe, Asia, and Africa, and the most interested spectators will be
France, England, and the United States.

THE POSSESSION OF CONSTANTINOPLE.

It must be well borne in mind that the integrity of Turkey has been
guaranteed for many years, if not actually preserved, by the cabinets
of France and England. So many pamphlets and articles have been
written by those representing the interests of those governments on
one side, and so little has been said on the opposite side, that it
has almost become an acknowledged fact that the carrying out of this
idea is necessary for the peace of Europe and of the world. Their
arguments are strong, but will not influence him who visits
Constantinople with an unprejudiced mind. The key to the riddle is the
possession of that city. England and France know that they themselves
cannot obtain it, and this being the case, they are determined to do
all in their power to prevent any other nation from doing so. It is
almost impossible for one who has not been there himself, to form a
fair opinion of what should be the future of that beautiful city of
the East, but once there, the decision is soon reached that it should
no longer belong to the Turks, but to some people, whoever they may
be, who will do justice to the advantages Nature has given it.

Constantinople is so placed that it is one of the keys of the waters
of the world, and as such it ought to be a great commercial centre.
The city, as it now is, renders this impossible, and the Turks,
judging from their antecedents and their present manner of existence,
are incapable of change.

A distinguished statesman of the United States (Gen. N. P. Banks) one
day asked the Turkish minister at Washington, if in his country there
were many persons celebrated for their success in finance or business.

The Minister slowly opened his dark mysterious eyes, and with a
half-amused, half-pitying gaze, replied:—

‘Sir, my countrymen know nothing of affairs, the Turks are warriors.’

In the quiet answer of that Turk, a man who held not only a high
position in his own country, but had also seen the active life in
America, there is a meaning which one cannot well appreciate who has
not been among the people of whom he spoke. They seem to belong to a
different age and world from ours. They know almost nothing of the
wonderful things every day done in this nineteenth century, and, if
they are told, they take but little interest, and are incapable of
comprehending them.

As already stated the city of Constantinople, until radically changed,
does not admit of greatness. Some of the civilizing appliances of this
century judiciously put in movement, would soon change the mysterious
city of the Orient, replete with the souvenirs of Constantine and
Mohammed, into a great commercial mart. The past would be sacrificed
for the future, but the sacrifice would be justifiable. Useless
Romance would drop her fascinating garment, and stand arrayed as the
goddess of Practical Progress.

The question then is, who will begin the work?

The Turks will certainly not; indeed, their opposition to it will be
so strong that it cannot well be undertaken until they see that their
empire is broken, and that their natural refuge is over the water into
Asia, where they belong.

The mover of all this will be a nation which has the most to gain from
the results,—Russia, and fortunately a nation fired with the ambitions
of progress, and with sufficient power to be able to carry them out.
The intelligent men of Russia know that it is needful to the dignity
of the nation, as a sentiment, to its safety militarily, and to its
commercial prosperity, to have all the water rights and privileges in
the Black Sea, and in the straits which connect it with those waters
which are acknowledged to be the common property of mankind. Until
this is brought about their machinery is clogged, and for this the
possession of Constantinople is so important as almost to be a
necessity.

The Russians are already at the work, and the faster it advances the
better. Slowly and steadily since the peace was signed at the end of
the Crimean War, the government at St. Petersburg, deeply humbled
then, is preparing for the struggle which will restore her lost
rights, and give her many additional ones. Day by day, she is
spreading out her net-work of railroads, steamboats, telegraphs, and
post-roads; imperceptibly she is increasing her territory, and this on
principles so judiciously arranged for the conquered, that each fresh
Asiatic horde absorbed, soon becomes as proud of the grandeur of
Russia as if it had always been a part of the empire. Vessels for the
navy and commerce are being built on her northern and southern seas,
and her large inland rivers; her grain-trade is rapidly increasing,
and her rich mines and other resources are being developed. Besides
all this, she has a strong point of safety in the intense feeling of
nationality, daily swelling, which pervades all the Muscovites. In
sentiment the army is a unit, and the entire population of the vast
empire shout wildly on every occasion for the health and prosperity of
the Tsar.

There may be something barbaric in all this, but it is the stuff out
of which national greatness can be made, and it may cause anxiety to
those countries where such a feeling does not exist.

THE COUNTRY OF THE PHARAOHS.

The nation most interested after Russia, in the division of Turkey,
perhaps as much or even more interested, because her own independence
is the prize she can win, is Egypt, that historic land, which, once
the mistress of the world, but today a vassal, has in the future as
fine a destiny as could be desired. The canal lately opened through
the Isthmus of Suez, has done more for Egypt than fifty ordinary years
might have accomplished.

It has turned the thoughts of civilized Europe for more than ten years
upon that country; it has kept their attention interested, and the
result has been more than satisfactory.

Europe has not, in modern days, expected to find much good in the
country of the Pharaohs, but it has found that although matters there
are not what the sanguine might wish, they are still unquestionably in
every point where comparison is possible, very far in advance of
Turkey.

The infusion of Western ideas into the inhabitants of a land who have
been brought up for centuries to despise them, is no easy task, but
this the Vice Roi of Egypt has been attempting, and with fair success.
He appreciates the age in which he lives as any one who has visited
Cairo can plainly see, and he feels his superiority over the Sultan so
strongly, that he is merely waiting for the time to be ripe, to openly
disobey the orders from Constantinople, and assert his independence.
Many thought, and with reason, that at the opening of the Suez Canal
the time for this action had come, but nothing was then done, perhaps
because the armed force of the Khedive was insufficient for the
attempt, or that having accomplished a great commercial success, he
hesitated risking a military failure, or, more probably still, because
the diplomatic complications were such that he could not make an
advantageous alliance.

For what is to be done Egypt should go hand-in-hand with Russia, but
at the present time this is a difficult combination to form.

In constructing the Suez Canal, France has done everything for Egypt,
and the presence of the Empress Eugénie at the opening ceremonies was
the natural culmination of the work.

An alliance between France and Egypt, strong enough to give France a
foothold in the East, and thereby to checkmate the power of England,
but not binding her to make a rupture with the rulers at
Constantinople on the question of Egyptian independence, would be a
fine thing for Napoleon, but would do Ismail little good. A rational
alliance between Russia and Egypt, each country working for itself and
the other, would be desirable enough, but for this it would be
necessary to give France the cold shoulder, and in return receive her
resentment.

Russia, France, and Egypt, cannot now combine together. The results of
the Crimean war are not forgotten at St. Petersburg, and, besides
this, the existing relations between Russia and Prussia on other
European questions are such that the former cannot yet offer France a
friendly hand.

The ambition of Napoleon is boundless, but he knows that the prestige
he would acquire in working out the independence of Egypt, would be
overbalanced by what would fall to the share of the Emperor of Russia.

England, too, could not keep out of the dispute, and although lately
she has been very silent on the Eastern question, at the moment of
action, regardless of what she has done in the past, and of her
half-promises for the future, she would bring great force to bear, and
in such a way as to derive advantage for herself alone.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire and Greece have both something to gain
from the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire, but, in their present
condition, they must move in the wake of others, they cannot lead the
operations. A masterly brain and arm might unite the different
Slavonic elements on the banks of the Danube, part of which now belong
to Turkey, and amalgamate them into the Austrian Empire, but it is
doubtful if this would be a desirable move, for, while it would give
strength in territory and population to Austria, it would tend to
weaken the German element of the country, and this would be fatal if
she wishes to be regarded as the great South-German nation.

The title of Kaiser of Germans, always has and could still give
prestige, but the same title held by one whose empire was in reality
composed of Slavs, would not, but on the contrary aid the government
of Prussia in its plans of German unity, and unity on a more
democratic basis. Austria’s best course, therefore, would be to take
no active part, but to await the results and turn them as best she
could to her advantage.

The Greeks and Turks have never loved each other, and while Greece is
too weak for definite action at first, she could later lend a helping
hand in the movements which would result in restoring to her the
provinces of Thessaly and Epirus, which though under the dominion of
Turkey are Greek in everything but the name. Greece thus regenerated,
might again become quite an important country, and with the commerce
which the Suez Canal opens to her with the Indies, take her place as a
growing maritime nation.

There are no other important moves now apparent in the horizon of
European politics. As mentioned above, the great powers are too much
interested in domestic affairs to be able to give much thought to what
their neighbors are doing.

It has been expected by many that the continued growling heard both
from France and Prussia, would sooner or later end in open rupture and
war, (The Franco-Prussian war broke out three months later, July 19,
1870.) but one who watches the course of events closely can see that
while they both say they are ready, neither of them desires to break
the peace. Neither will be the first to sound the alarm, for they both
know they have almost nothing to gain from the result, for, should the
war come, it would accomplish little but the destruction of the lives
of many thousand soldiers. Whichever side was victorious, the boundary
line between the two nations would be but slightly changed. The
existing line is the natural one, for it is the line of language and
race, and, although war could move it on one side or the other, for a
time, it would soon fall back again to the plane from which it
started. The strength of the two nations is so nearly equal that
neither can absorb portions of the other. The Rhine is a German river,
and neither diplomacy nor war can make it French.

THE NON-INTERVENTION OF THE UNITED STATES.

And now, in conclusion, what position should the Government, or rather
the people of the United States, take in relation to the march of
events in Europe? Are we to hold forever to our established principle
of non-intervention, when we conscientiously believe that judicious
intervention would often advance the cause of progress?

Better at least keep the right of speaking and acting as we please,
but use it sparingly, and never hesitate to give sympathy and moral
aid,—sometimes more helpful than actual assistance,—to the parties in
any struggle which we believe to have justice on their side.

But when we look into the future, and a no very distant future at
that, and consider that at the end of this century we shall be a
nation of one hundred millions, thinking persons can easily see that
the preponderance of strength in our favor will be so overwhelming,
that non-intervention will be a practical impossibility. The weak of
the earth will come to us for protection, and we shall not wish to
throw them off.

What a country it will be in 1900!