THE LATE TSAR

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 45, 18 November 1918, Page 4

THE LATE TSAR

AMBASSADOR'.- FRANK ADVICg REJECTED

Sir George Buchanan, Ambassador at Petrograd, presiding at a dinner of the .British Russia Club at Comiaught Rooms, London, said he was confident that Russia would arise new-born from the ashes of her former, self, and take her rightful place ainoug the free nations of the world.

"I am not going to pronounce a funeral oration on tho fall of the autccrncy," he continued, "for I had no sympathy with 'a political system that constituted an almost ■insuperable barrier to that close understanding between the British and Russian peoples, which it has been my great ambition to bring nbout. If I'had to write the epitaph of the old regime, V should say that it fell self-condemned through its in'ime weakness and incapacity On the other hand, the news of the judicial murder of tho late Emperor has been so misrepresented in kinema films and in sensational accounts of the events which preceded the Revolution that I feel constrained, u> correct the erroneous impressions vrhicA have thus been created about a man whose sufferings, in captivity and whoso tragic death will, if I mistake not, meet with more , pity and symparh at the bat of history than they have evoked hitherto.

"He loved his country, and lie sincerely desired the happiness of his people, but it cannot bo denied that his Government, as. administered by reactionary Ministers with the nctive collaboration of tho secret police, was oppressive. Hβ was not, however, a biood-suclring tyrant, such as the Bolshevists have represented him. nor was he guilty of crimes such ns they have committed in the name of liberty. He has been accused of duplicity, am! though I do not believe that he was false by nature, tho obstinacy with which he clung to his autocratic rights made him unmindful of tho promises given to his people in the October manifesto, many of which ho left unfulfilled.

"When he rejected the German ultimatum the nation was with Mm to a nlnn, mid both at Petrograd and Moscow the people fell on their knees as he read Ihc war manifesto. But when, shortly before the Revolution, I reminded him of this, whmi I besought him> to go to tlie Duma and -win back his/people to his side, when T bogged him not to listen to (hose who were advisin? him to rnnintain reactionary and incompetent' Ministers in power, when I urged him to dismiss I'rotopon* nnd to appoint a Government that would command'the confidence of tho Duma,and the nation, he replied that he never allowed anyone to influence him 'in the choice'of his Ministers. He must consequently boar the responsibility for thoir sins of commission nnd omission. But I must, say tliis: that he always allowed me lo epeak with absolute frankness, and that when oneo hii had pledged his word on any question of foreign policy he never went back on it.

"It is, moreover, absolutely ■ untrue that he ever contemplated n.aking a separate peace with Germany, and up to the very day of his abdication he was determined to stand by his Allies, as when, in the autumn of 19H, lie made that diversion in East Pj-u-rsia which relieved the German nrossnre en Paris at tho cost of Borne 200,000 of his best troop's. "He was always the true friend > and loyal ally of this country, and T know .is a fact that when in the fummer of 1916 an attempt was mado' by the German Emperor to seduce him by arguments bused on mutual dynastic interests, he categorically , refused. Hβ would, moreover, never "have consented to reriuvß back his lost crown from German hands, and this nerhaps accounts for tho fact that the Emneror William never raised a finger to save him. "A new chapter is opening in Russian history. She is passing through the last phase of a crisis on which her whole future life as a nation depends. The news which has reached me of the attack on our Embassy, of the murder of that most gallant of sailors Captain Cromie, whose death we all so deeply deplore, apparently illustrates tho reign of terror which exists there.

"The Bolshevists, who, after adopting as their watchword 'Xo annexations and no contributions,' have conceded several of Russia's frontier provinces and have undertaken to pay an indemnity to Germany of • ,£300,000,000, felt their end approaching, and are playing their last cards, and indulging in an' orgy of massacre and spoliation. The great majority of the Russian people mast not l>3 held responsible. They condemned these crimes, and in her agony Russia wns crying aloud for help. "The Allies must not allow Germany to make" Russia her economic'platform, and to exploit her so as to be able to recuperate her losses ic "Jie war."