CABLEGRAMS.

Colonist, Volume XLIX, Issue 11966, 19 June 1907, Page 3

CABLEGRAMS.

RUSSIAN AFFAIRS. St. Petersburg, June IS. The next Duma will consist of members. The class of suffrage will be extended to^! landlords and the peasant electorate will thus be reduced. Representation of P?}?™' tfee Caucasus, and Siberia will bo reduced by one half. Direct election with a higher property test will be instituted in the larger oitiosj. but such important centres as Kasan, Kharkoff, and Saratoff, will bo dis- 1 enfranchised. ! Sixteen Duma deputies accused of . conspiracy have escaped. While a Russian torpedo boat was dicharging torpedoes at Sevastopol, one struck a cutter in which the Commander-in-chief was cruising, and he narrowly escaped drowning. The officers in the torpedo boat were arrested and charged with attempted mnrder. M. Puriskavitch created a great uproar in the Duma on Saturday, declaring that the Social Democrats ou'iht to be sent to the scaffold. " Received June 18, 11.16 p.m. London, June 18. The Daily News declares that it is rumoured in St. Petersburg that the alleged plot is fiction, and the real cause of the dissolution of the Puma was a fear of offending Germany by making concessions on the language question to Poland, for without the Poles', support, which was withheld in view of the bargain ing, the Government was unable to pass the budget ; thai: finally German influenoe at Court decided M. Stolypin not to yield to reasonable reform. Received June 18, 10.21 p.m. St. Petersburg, June 18. Russia 18 singularly indifferent over the dissolution of the Duma,