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New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIV, Issue 7914, 5 April 1887, Page 4

Strange changes seem to be impending in Russia. That a new state of things, whatever it will exactly be, is alreadycommencing, is certainly evidenced by the telegraphic announcement dated March 30, that " M. de Giers is vainly trying to prevent the expression of hostility to Germany by the MoscowGazette, in -which M. Kafckoff continues to fulminate against that country." It is one more proof that the " Sclavonic party," whose views powerfully appeal to both the national aspirations and prejudices, are becoming virtually masters of the situation. The Government of late has been signally reversing its foreign policy in obedience to the agitation of that party, and now we find that its ablest and most trusted diplomatist has been expostulating, and quite in vain, with the editor of the Moscow Gazette on the tone adopted in his journal It is a novel thing for a Russian newspaper, whether in the right or in the wrong, to practically

set the Government at defiance, and a few months ago any approximation to such a spectacle would have been impossible. But it is hard to say whither the course of events is tending juat now; for there are various parties in the field, and there would seem to be any amount of political and social disorganisation. This is illustrated by the successive attempts of late on the Emoeror's life.

Some time ago such attempts to remove the Czar might be supposed to proceed from the Sclavonic party, to which he once belonged, but which, after acquiring the sceptre, he renounced through fear of the ruling bureaucracy, the power behind the throne in Russia. But it is not doubted that he retains his old sympathies and antipathies, and that he •would be glad to rejoin his former associates, who would now appear to be getting into the ascendant. They could, therefore, have no motive for wishing to remove him. Then there is more than this revolutionary party, and the several ones do not pull together on all points.. All may be said to agree on the great national aspirations about Pansclavism, or the conjunction of all Sclavonic or Sclavic countries, with Russia at the head, and about the acquisition of Constantinople;, and they also desire in common to pull down the present system of Government, but there any agreement between them ceases. That which calls itself in particular the Sclavonic party, includes numbers of the old nobility, whose order has many matters of quarrel with the bureaucracy or ruling circle, and the new nobility it creates. The demand of this party is for a constitutional monarchy, and as it would break up the controlling bureaucracy, which includes a certain foreign element, the movement has found much popular favour. The other revolutionary party "is that of the Nihilists, whose tenets resemble those of the Socialists of France and Germany. Then there are the Republicans pure and simple, who, however, can be scarcely called a party, for they are pretty well limited to young men in the universities and military schools, who. like so many youth in most countries after classical study, are for a period enthusiastic to revive in their own lands the glories of Athens or Rome, and imagine that to establish a republic is the way to do it. And, indeed, the Muscovite youth truly boast that centuries past much of their country was less barbarous than it is today. That in the Middle Ages it contained a republic in the mighty city of Novgorod, with 400,000 inhabitants, which stretched its dominion from Livonia to Siberia. The famous Hanseatic League, that was created to guard the passes of seas and roads in those troubled times from excessive tolls, as well as from open pirates and robbers, had a factory at one side of Europe in London and at the other side in Novgorod. It became a wonderful mart of commerce, and " who can resist God and the great Novgorod 1 " was a Muscovite proverb. But after all, the early Czars, its neighbours, overturned and trampled out its trade and civilisation, and only a few thousand people now dwell within the vast space which was once occupied by the mediaeval city. But, however a Republic might have flourished in Russia four centuries back, nobody arrived at years of discretion, or with any knowledge of human nature, could believe what we now mean by Republican institutions at all possible, where the mass of the people in country and town look up to the Czar as their father, yielding him implicit reverence as head of Church as well as State, and with no intelligent conception yet as to whether he is really an autocrat or only a puppet in the hands of others. That the multitude have still this extreme personal devotion to their sovereign was evidenced at the coronation in Moscow, and it would be hopeless for any Government, in at least this generation, to command the obedience of the masses of the Russian people, unless it had the Czar at its head, or at any rate for its figure-head. The several attempts on the Czar's life have probably proceeded from individual fanaticism, for any party that could be identified with such attempts would only baffle its own object by infuriatiug the bulk of the population. That the Sclavonic party have exerted themselves to excite popular mistrust of the Czar's entourage—to create and generalise the impression that the policy of the men behind the throne is not a sincerely national one—can be plainly gathered from the present attitude of the Government. It would not be a bad thing for Russia if a really constitutional system were substituted for the existing kind of rule, but whether it would contribute to the peace of Europe is another question, for while a Power so ambitious and aggressive as Russia continues to have an irresponsible and despotic form of Government, the outside Sclavs are naturally and visibly repelled, not attracted, by the proposals of Pansclavism.