THE SKETCHER.

Otago Witness, Issue 2664, 5 April 1905, Page 70

THE SKETCHER.

RUSSIANS AND JAPANESE AT HOME.*

(T. P.'s Weekly.)

The two books which lie before me help one in different ways to explain the results of the dreadful war which at this moment is devastating both peoples and shocking the entire world. In the case ot Russia you are everywhere met by the signs of that internal confusion and division which" are almost insurmountable obstacles to the prosecution of a successful war ; while in the case of Japan you are met by a cohesion and enthusiasm, an almost exuberant hopefulness, which, standing like shadows benmd armies and fleets, are more effective than the range of guns or the thickness of armouij plates. Russia is being beaten in the field, you will see, because she is thoroughly disorganised at home. Japan is victorious with her troops because she haJ an organised and a thoroughly sound system of administration at home.

I take up first the book on Russia. It is written by a German journalist who went to Russia, by his own account, with a perfectly open mind, and who certainly seems to have taken pains to find out the views of almost all sorts and conditions of men. I am tempted sometimes to think that our author, Mr Hugo Ganz, was perhaps too much in the society of the Reformers, and that his book would bear a stronger stamp of impartiality if he had associated a little more with the apostles of Reaction. There must be plenty of Reactionaries, even by conviction, in Russia as in other parts of the world. It would be absurd to contend that there is nothing to be said in favour of the Autocracy, especially in a country where only 10 per cent, of the population can read or write. To me, 1 honestly confess, it would appear to be little short of madness to apply to such a population the broad democratic institutions which work so successfully in nations where education is widely diffused, and where the populations have had centuries of training in all the arts of self-govern-ment. Of all superstitions, that which holds that our exact type and system ot government is equally applicable to all times and all races is one of the most absurd ; in fact, no man calling himself rational now lays down any such doctrine. In the case of Russia, with her very widely diffused population, with her helpless and unreliant races, with her centuries under no other system of rule, the road of emancipation lies in the modification of Autocracy. I should be inclined rather to look to its gradual softening and transformation as the best solution of the complex and difficult problem of Russian government. One can make that statement with greater self-confidence because it will be found on a perusal ot the book of Mr Hugo Ganz that many ot the most ardent reformers of Russia arc friends, and not enemies, of the Autocracy. Indeed, nothing has brought tinme to me more forcibly the strength and universality of the movement for administrative reform than the fact that this reform is as ardently advocated by what we would call Conservatives as it is by those who are unmistakably Radicals. ,

11. After he had seen a certain number ot "Liberal and Radical malcontents," Mr Ganz said to his friends and advisers, "You must gain access for me to some prominent Conservative also, one who stands on the basis of the present system, and who honestly, and in good faith, defends it. ... It must be a sincere, reputable, and sensible man, with whom I can discuss the most widely different questions with or without an interpreter.' lur Ganz confessed that he paid his visit tc this aristocrat and Conservative witli some trepidation. He had been hearing nothing but denunciations of the existing system. "Each succeeding interview only strengthened the impression gained from previous ones. Thus by degrees I had formed a very sharply defined image ot Russian conditions ; such an image as is pictured in the mind of the thinking Russian. Was this clear and distinct image now to be dispelled by the lies of this Conservative critic, and was I to lose the chief result of my journey — a confidence in the trustworthiness of the data hitherto accumulated?" Here is how Mr Ganz was received by the man he knew to be both an aristocrat and a Conservative : "What have you heard?" asked the Count. "That Russia is starving while the papers report a surplus in the Treasury?" "That, unfortunately, is true.'' " That our thinking people are in despair?" "Also true." "That a revival of the Reign of Terror is to be feared?" "Equally true." "That all Russian hopes are lost, because only in that way can the present state of things be brought to an end?" "True -again." "That the piesent regime passes all bounds of depravity, and can only be compared to the Pretorian rule in the period of the decline of Rome?" "That understates

the truth."

It was not unnatural that the face ot Mr Hugo Ganz should show some surprise at a denunciation so wholesale from such lips. And thereupon the Conservative and aristocratic interlocutor proceeded to give this interesting explanation of the Conservative point of view with regard to the existing regime. As I have said, it is the passage of the book which ha* brought home most clearly to me the hopelessness of the present system and the universality of the discontent :

" You are, I can see, surprised that I, as a Conservative and State official, should answer in this way ,- but I hope

* (1) "The Downfall of Russia," by Hugo Ganz. (LoncTo-n: Hodder and Stoug-htoii.) (2) "More Queer Things About Japan/ bjf, JDousia-b SJacleu, (London; Tre3ierae>

[ you do not consider 'Conservative' and ' infamous ' synonymous terms. If you ! do not, you wiJl not expect me to approve the regime of Plehve. That is not Conservative regime. It is the regime of hell, founded by a devil at the head of the most important department." 111. And then this Conservative politician gives this somewhat despondent bird'seye view of the condition of Russia : *' If you wish striking evidence of the worth of our Government, you need only notice one thing. . . . We have as many questions as we have classes of population. We have a Finnish question, a Polish, a Jewish, a Enthenian, and a Caucasian question. We have, besides, a peasant question, a labour question, and a sectarian question, and, moreover, a student question also. Wherever you cut into the conglomeration of the Russian population, lengthwise or crosswise, everywhere you strike conflicts, combvstiblcs, and tension. Not a single one of the problems which may exist in organised States in general is solved, but every one has been made burning and dangerous through unskilful, brutal, and even malicious handling." This is hopeless enough ; and yet this speaker is convinced that a change in the spirit of the regime could solve all these difficulties, the magnitude of which has been created by bad management rather than by their intrinsic qualities. For, as he proceeds immediately to point out. other countries have some of those very difficulties in even a more aggravated form. | The Count then proceeded : "Do not j suppose that Russia is of necessity smit- j - ten with such serious problems. Those questions are nowhere simpler than with us. We have no national problems like those of Prussia, for instance, or of Austria-Hungary, which | are complicated by the fact that majori- I ties and minorities are mixed together j almost beyond separation. We have even in Poland hardly any national sentiment regarding which we could not come to a peaceable understanding. Our nationalities live almost entirely distinct, in compact bodies, side by side ; even Finns are politically separate. It would be an easy thing to make them all contented under just maintenance 01 the supremacy of the Czar. But the priestlike intolerance of Pobyednoszev has spread the idea in the world that all diversities of religion and speech must be smoothed out with a hot flatiron, even at the risk of singeing heads. Since then it was considered patriotic to repress men and convictions. . . . Vet 1 cannot conceal my astonishment, your Excellency, that you. a Conservative, have this opinion of that system ot Pobyednoszev. . . . Why is it so illogical? Conservative thought is, beyond all, that of organic development. All violence is revolutionary in its essence, whether it serves reactionary or re\olutionary tendencies. The system of Pobyednoszev is revolutionary and reactionary. . . . We have no one but Plehve *to thank for this war, which may be a catastrophe. He had a finger { in all the manoeuvres of delay which j provoked the Japanese to war, because j he believed that he could no longer pre- j serve himself in any other way than by j diverting public attention from condi- | tions in the interior and by ridding i himself of those who were dissatisfied I

with him into the bargain.

And now comes a statement from the lips of this Conser\ative which startles — ■ even horrifics — me. One of the little remarks which caught my eye in the many miles or copy written after the surrender of Port Arthur was a statement that there were no fewer than 5000 Poles among the garrison there ; and it was added that the men had not proved very satisfactory fighters. I could well believe that, considering how their country is treated. But here is another and even ghastlier explanation both of the presence of the Poles in Port Arthur and of their attitude during the siege. Our Conservative speaker tells us that Plehve wanted to get rid of his political opponents. Here is the infamous method he employed to carry out this programme: The first men who were sent to Asia were the Poles, the Jews, and the Armenians. Among the troops the Poles were five times as largely represented, and the Jews even more so than they should have been according to their censns number. And you must search to discover a Christian among the reserve surgeons. Why is this the case? To get rid of the most important elements of the malcontents for years, or perhaps for ever. Of course, the Poles, the Jews, and the Ruthenians

have the most cause for discontent.

" Your Excellency, no Radical has spoken like this," exclaims Mr Ganz, after listening to this outburst ; and undoubtedly the Conservative's indictment of the present system in Russia is fiercer and more hopeless than anything I have read in this volume. These remarks 1 h ive just quoted, for instance, representing the Government as sending the peopte most oppressed to the shambles in the Far East is a form of wrong so gigantic, so terrible, so shamefully wicked, that one wonders that such things can be.

The worst part of this interview, however, is its final cry of impotence and despair. From the lips of this Conservative, as from the lips of Prince Ukhtomsky the other day in Moscow, conies an open utterance of the fatal and appalling word, '"Revolution," as the probable outcome, and apparently even the one hopeful outlet of the present impossible situation. Punec Ukhtomsky is probably to be reckoned among Liberals, while the politician with whom we are now talking is, as \\j kno^v, a Consen ative. But listen

to his forecast ; it is quite as pessimistic £l,s that of the most violent Radical : Conservatives like myself see with horror that the foundations of the Conservative order of things are tindermined, and that we are approaching exactly the same convulsions that

France experienced after the spontane-

ous downfall of her absolute monarchy. Where, then, is the distinction between this politician and others who, condeming the existing regime, as he does, have more Liberal views? Our Conservative explains the distinction very clearly: We Conservatives do not believe in a Constitution or a Parliament as the only means of salvation. We Russians are anything but ripe for it. We look to the Czar for salvation, and to the

Czar alone. The view of Prince Ukhtomsky is different. "He believes that an able Minister could save the whole situation." I have even seen it hinted that Prince Ukhtomsky aspires to playing the part in the Russian Revolution which Mirabeau played in that of France. But our Conservative will have none of this remedy. " 1 don't believe that for nn instant,'' he replies to Prince Ukhtomsky's view of the possibilities of a great Minister : Under the present circumstances an able and honest Minister cannot remain at Court. There is only one salvation — a Czar who is so educated) to the task of luling that he is not th._ j plaything of a circle of courtiers, like our present good Emperor. And thus, by a process of elimination, we come back to the Czar. He is the end of all the discussions and proposals — the hope of the Liberal and the Conservative alike — the one human being on whose shouldeis rests the fateful, awful, stupendous biuclen of solving the problem of governing justly something like 200 millions of people l"

V. For the fight nearly all the different schools of politics agree in stating is not, so much with the Czar as with the Beaureaucracy. "What drives the Russians to despair," writes Mr Ganz, "and what they feel to be the grossest evil of Lhe country, much more than the domination of a single Czar, is the tyranny of the official caste which forms a State within a State, and has set up a special cod. of official morality quite peculiar to itself." Even if the revolution should come, of which all the persons in this book speak as imminent, it is not against the C?ar that it would be directed : There is only qne revolution that can be really dangerous, says a "prince who has. been an intimate friend) of the Czar, and I will not assert that such a revolution could not break out ••? tho ptsent war should end disastrously. That would be a peasant revolution, 'directed, not against the regime itself, but against all property-owning and *:dui,a+. d persons ; it would begin by all of us being killed and thrown into the

It is even suggested that such a revolution would find support, rather than hostility, among the official hierarchy. "Tha odds," says this same prince, "would be a hundred) to on?, then, that the police would not be acting against this revolution, but secretly would ""be for it, in order to rid themselves quietly and) surely of their real antagonist, the educated classes."

This is one of the many passag.es in the book which suggest to* one the idea that the tremendous ferment- in Russia, of which there is such abundant evidence. is yet weak in being so largely confined to the educated) classes. The masses are dangerously discontented, there is no doubt oi that, and ti bloody revolution is quite among the early possibilities. But it is revolution, and not lefonn, which, the peasant masses would organise. And! the revolution in Russia, as in France, will probably begin by destroying those Girondists who are seeking to find the middle way between> the horrors of the present system and) the abolition of the Autocracy in moderate and constitutional reform. It is, in fact, this dread of a revolution which, for the time being, will destroy everything — including the moderate reformers — and then, perhaps, bring worse reaction than ever, that lies at the foundation of the present activities of the intelligent classes.

Even the appearance of the unhappy ruler gives a strong idea of the hopelessness of his character and his lot in presence of the present critical situation of his country and of his dtynasty. "The only striking and noteworthy thing," writes Mr Ganz, "in the handsome and sympathetic face is the expression of melancholy resignation." My readers may remember that there appeared in a great quarterly recently an article about the Czar which represented him in v.cry unfavourable colours, and endeavoured to make him personally and actively responsible for the worst evils of the existing regime. There is no confirmation of any such unfavourable estimate in the pages of the book before me, and, as has been, seen, Mr Ganz is by no means too favourable a critic of things Russian. "One authority alone," says Mr Ganz, "-expressed doubts as to the good) nature of the Czar, and accused him of designing; and rather petty malevolence."

All others, including Prince Ukhtom,slcy, who had been the companion of the Czar for years, agree in emphasising the extraordinary, almost childlike, lovableness and kindliness of the Emperor, who is said to be actually fascinating in xjer&onal intercourse. This agrees witli the fact which I know from otoe unquestionably trustworthy source, that the Czar is intentionally deaf to everything in the leports of his counsellors likely to disu.uage or cast suspicion upon a 'olleague, while he immediately listens and abks lor details Ttlicn he hears from one of ins Ministeis a favourable word about the action of another*

It is an absolute necessity for him to do good, and it is a constant source of pain

to him that be cannot prevent the great

amount of existing evil. The reports with regard to the intelligence erf the Emperor are also just such, I think, as we all expect. The same authority who is alone in representing Mm as malevolent is also alone in thinking him intelligent. "The others," writes Mr Ganz, "while they jn'aise his goodness of heart, do not conceal the weakness of Ms judgment, which, according to them, 'has certainly something pathological about it. One proof of his want of judgment is his intellectual indolence andi density of observation." "The things," says Mr Uanz, "that people do to him, presuming upon his helplessness, border upon the inconceivable" :

That threatening letters can constantly be smuggled into the Czar's pockets, and even into his bed, without his finally hitting upon the idea ot seizing his body servant by the cravat is very strong proof of his mental inactivity, the more so because he hears himself

ridiculed outside his own door. Suspiciousness, as well as over-confidence, are the characteristics of weak natures. It is nor- surprising, then, to find that irith all his good) nature and desire to be agreeable the Czar has little confidence in even his near advisers. There is a little peculiarity of his which has its significance as a revelation of character: "When a report is mad? to him he sits in shadow ; the man who makes the report sits in the light. Hi tiies to decipher the man's expression und to control him. a thing which is, of course, impossible, since a good Russian is more impenetrable than a Russian ironclad."

One of the staitling things _ about the Csar is his superstition. It is not the •supeistition of a devotee of the Oithodox Church ; that one could understand, and ♦-vcu to a certain extent sympathise with. It is lierecVtary and* übiquitous in Russia, and especially in the Royal Family. r ihc superstitions of the Czar are personal, piid even vulgar, and belong to the sam.3 category as palmistry, soothsaying, ar.d Cliris.ti-.in science. There lives somewhere in the South of Franc-?. I was told the ether day in Pans, a French charlatan of Italian origin who professes hypnotism, cjc-ultism, and all the rest. He is constantly consulted by the Czar. The creatuie's name is Philippe, and I heard that curing one of his visits to Paris the Czar allowed it to be undfßrstood by President I-oubet that he would like this fellow, to leceive the Legion of Honour. That shrewd country attorney was ready to do' much for the ilVistrious guest and powerful ally of his country, but he had to draw the line at the occultist ; and Philippe must indeed be a delightful specimen of the cosmopolitan adventurer : he is Cagliostro lip to date. One of the Things he undertook to do was to suggestion'&s the Czarina so that she should have the male baby which was so long prayed for in order to secure the succession. In order to carry through some of his purposes, Philippe professed to be «be to summon the spirit of Alexander HI. the father of the present Czar ; but Philippe went just a little too far -when he got the spirit, through that or some other monarch, to suggest the name of a particular firm of contractors for the building of a bridge. It is rjot to t? wondered at with such an example before him of the kind of people the Czar is ready to listen to that Mr Ganz should have come to the conclusion that the only people who get round the Czir and' really influence him are '"inconsiderate and crafty pTiple, who 22 n '°fit by his weakness." VIII. Xo man's entourage is completely txr.ci.'rstacd if one does not know something of its female elements. In the suucimdings of the Czar there ar-e apparently two conflicting influences on the female side. The first and more powerful o: these influences is that of the Empress .Mother, '"who even now, suppoited by fie reactionary members of the family, plays the part of the actual Empress, and cruelly moitifi.s the young consort of the Cz-ii-"' :

The Empress Mother is not at all pjpuiar, at least in Libeial circles; .she is held responsible for the fact that her son cannot free himself from the .°vil traditions of his father, who was a strictly upright, but relentless and brutal, despot. The other female influence is. of course, that of the Czarina. Between her and her mother-in-law no love apparently is lost. One of the charges brought against her. as against her aunt, the unfortunate mother of tha present Emperor of G*erm?ny, is that her sympathies are too English. This probably means that, being the daughter of an English mother — Princess Alice, one of the best of women — and having been brought in contact with the free ideas and institutions of England from her childhood, she has but an imperfect sympathy with Russian methods of £r»vemment. Up to a short time ago there was a certain latent rancour agair.st lier because she had not borne a male T>nr to the throne.— "Ore oM friend of the Imperial family," writes Mr Garz, "assured me that there is no mere charming, upright, and affectionate woman living tlvm' this young Hessian princess.'" But the is not happy in her pxaltod 1 position. ''She is intimidated by t!v enemies who surround her, and shows them a lowering face" :

Where she feels herself safe, however, her merry South German nature comes up. and she can even now romp like a little child. It speaks of the innocence of her nature that she is proud of nothing more than her potato salad. For the rest, th/s same authority asserts, she has a mind of her own, and may not always be the most comfortable companion for her husband. IX.

This trick of placing threatening letters in the pockets of the Czar is dwelt upon

again and again in this book. Tt is rather hard to believe either that a trick so despicable or so palpable could be practised ; but Mr Ganz is told tho story so often, and by so many people, that il is difficult not to believe it. "This I know," says Mr Ganz to one" of his informants from sources near the Caai's family, "that the Czar is again finding threatening letters in his coat pockets, under his pillow, and elsewhere.'' Here is the answer : This is an old police trick. It was used to frighten Alexander in, and it almost drove him insane. Naturally, it is only the police that can carry out

such devices, for others could not reach

the Czar's room. Andi this brings one to the question, How far the present stir in Russia is dangerous to the Cziar personally? Ido not think one can form any very definite opinion on this point from the information given to Mr Ganz. The opinions expressed differ, according to the political tendencies of the person spoken to. This informant who has been talking about the threatening letters, for instance, has an emphatic opinion to the contrary. "Has the Czar a-nvthing to fear." asks Mr Ganz, "should the police relax their vigilance?" This is the answer:

Heaven forbid ! The Czar is a sort of deity to the people, and the educated classes know only too well that no man is less responsible for existing conditions than he in whose name these conditions are inflicted upon us. But the Czar is made to believe that every attemyjt to free public opinion from its fettors would lead to popular representation to a Constitution, and finally to the scaffold. X. But, on the other hand, in a different part of his biok. Mr Ganz has to make tho ominous confession : "I find in all Russia not a trace of a dynastic sentiment"' : The loyalty to the House of Hohenzollern in Prussia, to the House of the Hapsburgs in Austria, has no counterpart in Russia. . . . The bond of loyalty between dynasty and people, ■which in the West has assured the safe existence of the royal houses from all revolutionary convulsions, does not exist in Russia. On the contrary, people speak freely in private of a "So'tikoff dynasty," in unmistakable allusion to the well-known first lover of the Empress Catherine. tv,— many murders in the Imperial house are read by the people without excitement. All of which appears to me very ominous. XI. One of the points that must surprise everybody is that the discontent in Russia seems to have increased since the accession of the present Czar. Over every page of this book, as over every line of every telegram that comes from St. Peteisburg, this increased and spreading intensity of the rage for reform is written large. "The restlessness, ' says one of his informants to Mr Ganz. "that you, as a stranger, have noted here is quite abnormal, and is due to the decided wickedness, not to say infamy, of the existing system." "Then," asks Mr Ganz. ''is it stronger than u«ual?" : Incomparably stronger. Xo entertainment, however harmless, no scientific congress, no meeting of any corporation can take place that will not end in a political domonstiation. All the prisons are filled with most worthy people, de-port-itions and banishments increase, yet

other men and -women press onward to

maityrdom. In this respect there is an immense difference between the present spirit in Russia •and the spirit that existed 10 years ago. Ten years ago Nihilism had practically been killed, and anyhow that was a movement which, though intense, was limitedi It did not embrace large masses of the intelligent and professional classes as does the movement of to-day ; at most it was a bond of fanatical martyrs. And it had been civ.shed "by the heavy hand of Alexander 111 and the serpent wiles of Pobyednoszev." But now there is a change, and for that change no man is more responsible than the piesent Czar himself. It is the very excellence of the man, it is his craving for better conditions,- joined to his weakness of character, that has produced results so apparently contradictory as the increase of discontent and hope, and the great severity of the existing regime. The explanation is very simple, and is given, to Mr Ganz by one of his authorities.

With the accession to the thione of the present Czar new hopes were awakened, but now, thanks to the executioners Sipyagtin and Plehve, di sappointment and exasperation have grown to such an extent that the expression of them can no longer be suppressed, and thousands risk life and liberty, no longer able to bear this condition of grinding, inward revolt.

XII. One of the most remarkable passages in this book is the description of the funeral of Mikhailovski, the editor of the mo^t widely-read Russian monthly, Ruskoye Bogtsivo, which is the organ of Ru«si'in Radicalism. At his funeral, one of the first things which struck Mr Ganz was that nearly every one of the Liberal speakeis whom he had met in his diffprent inquiries— to the number of 40 to 5C — were present. There is evidently a sort of freemasonry between the Reformeis of Russia which brings them together on .such occasions, and which enables them to communicate and co-operate with each other with mysterious rapidity and facilitj'. "The loose, but yet effective, organisation of the Opposition in Russia." says Mr Ganz, "had never been so clear to me." The unwritten public opinion I had frequently noted orders every "intellectual" to take part in this mute demonstration against the regime ; and these oidiers are _more readily submitted to

than the legitimate orders. Ido not believe our newspapers in the West

could ever approximately establish this intimate contact which holds day by day among these thousands in a manner mysterious to me. It is as if St. Petersburg were fermented by some medium in which every impulse is progagated with furious speed. Mr Ganz makes his way to the side of the grave where the dead publicist is to find his last resting-place. Already he sees a densely-packed multitude, among them many ladies. It is a curious asstmbly — this gathering of Reformers and

rebels against existing order. It does not draw its ranks from the unlettered masses ; on the contrary, it is mainly composed of "writers, scholais. and professois.' Heie is a significant it-om : "Among them was the author of a book on Siberia, which I had read with honor years a»o. He had alreadiy spent 12 years of his life in exile, and now he was again exposing himself to oppiession by the authorities.'' As time goes on the crowd increases, the weather grows colder ; but the multitude, in spite of th n hours of waiting, show's no sign of diminution or of impatience. There is here something which certainly does one good to read amid all the despair and gloom of this story of present-day Russia, for it shows that there is still in the country that noble spirit of self-saciifiee which will yet redeem andi ransom the soul of Russia. And now let us pass from Russia at home to Japan at home. — T. P. (To be concluded, next week.)