DISTURBED RUSSIA.

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXVII, Issue 5557, 7 April 1905, Page 5

DISTURBED RUSSIA.

PERILS OF THE CZAR. A DANGEROUS STRANGER. BOMBS FOUND IN THE PALACE (Received April 6, IX p.m.) LONDON, April 6. “ Tbo Times ” correspondent at St. Petersburg reports that a stranger, wearing the uniform of a Cossack officer, who attended the Czar’s reception at Tsarskoeselo Palace on Monday, was arrested on suspicion, discrepancies in his accoutrements having attracted attention. On being searched tho stranger was found to he in possession of two small bombs. ST. PETERSBURG, April 5. General Tropoff (Governor-General of St, Petersburg) has made wholesale arrests amongst the intellectual classes in tho Russian capital, on tho pretext of suppressing secret societies. POEIEDONOSTEFF RESIGNS. A PROTEST AGAINST REFORMS. (Received April 6, 10.26 p.m.) ST. PETERSBURG, April 6. M. Pobiodonosteff has resigned tho Procuratorship of the Holy Synod, The resignation is attributed to the Synod having pronounced in favour of certain reforms, and also as a protest against the bureaucracy controlling the Church. The Synod recommends the summoning of an assembly of bishops to elect a patriarch, thus re-establishing the. powerful influence abolished by Peter tbo Great, A EESIARKABLE CAREER. The career of Constantine Pobiedonosteff, now seventy-eight years of age. and for nearly a quarter of a century Procurator of the .Holy Synod of Russia, is one of the romances of modern history. His father was a poor peasant of Kharkoff, but the son was ambitious, and worked his own way. A man of remarkable tenacity of purpose, and of a singularly hard and pitiless nature he has directed the policy of three successive Czars; and he has devoted all his unquestionable ability to the task of subduing the people and reducing them to allsolute servitude under the despotism or Church and Crown. All his life Pobiedonosteff has been inspired by two idealsthe dream of a world-wide Russian Empire and of an Orthodox hierarchy, which should enable the Greek Cnuroh to attain the authority once wielded by tho Popes of Rome. In pursuit of these objects, the Procurator of the Holy bynod Fas suffered no material obstacle to check him, and no considerations ot humanity to divert him from his purpose. Since the days of Torquomada the world has never witnessed any persecution tor religious convictions so merciless fs that organised by Pobiedonosteff against all the heterodox faiths to be found in Russia. The watchword of Pobiedonosteff is not progress, hut reaction, and it was with a perfectly sincere belief in the necessity for crushing the love of light and liberty in Russia that he set about his monstrous task of cruelty and oppression. It is easy to understand how, face to taco with such a' nature as this, the irresolute Czar has quailed before the Procurator of tho Holy Synod, and has lent himsett to be the instrument of a tyranny that has already brought Russia within the very shadow of dissolution and destruction. 1