BEHIND THE ANGLORUSSIAN ENTENTE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 9315, 15 August 1908, Page 2

BEHIND THE ANGLORUSSIAN ENTENTE.

How a Strango Revulsion of Fooling Oame About. .By A RUSSIAN*, in the "Pall Mall Gazette.")

I find .hat to Englishmen in general the meeting of King Edward VII. with Czar Nicholas 11., in the Gulf of Finland, is invested with a less actual and concrete meaning than to the average thinking Russian. For us it is an event of the highest moment and the happiest augury, for which we are grateful to our Czar as betokeuiii*^ closer and moro intimate relations with a nation towards whom great masses of our people have begun to look with confidence and admiration.

Strange as this may seem to you, it is nevertheless true, as I hope to show. Politically speaking,, there are but few points of contact and possible difference between England and Russia — not one-tenth of those discoverable between England and France. Yet, for the whole of the nineteenth century, the two countries have beon in hostile camps, each suspecting the other either of threatening or of thwarting the other's national interests. Russia, by tho average Englishman, wae regarded as a standing menace to India ; England, by the masses of the Russian peoplo, as a heartless, selfish land grabber, wholly

INDIFFERENT TO THE "STTrEDS OF OTHEB COUNTRIES.

During the last throo years, however, a new tone of popular feeling in Russia towards England has revealed itself, which will not only be augmented by the happy agreement in Central Asia, but is highly favourable to a much wider political and commercial entente between the two countries. The latter will thus have for its foundation not merely considerations of political expediency, but a solid basis of genuine good feeling

Tliis change of sentiment on the part of the Russian people, which will unmistakably tend to popularise the Government in its rapprochement with England, lias come about in rather a curious way. It was, strange to say, induced very Largely by the Japanese war. During that struggle the Russians conceived a perfect passion for newspapers, and this was extended to reading of all kinds, or, where illiteracy waa the rulo, scores would listen while one read Tho censorship was off, and an astounding mass of literature penetrated to the remotest corners of the Empire, and covered all classes.

A large amount of this literature dealt with the evolution of England's civil institutions; studios of the British Constitution, expositions cf Magna Charta, the Habeas Corpus Act, pamphlets on the Constitutional sy-stem of Australia, others dealing with England's Co-operative Societies, Trade Unions, Law 6 on Strikes and Lockouts. Even works like translations of MiPon's " Areopagitica " and Mill "On Liberty "have eagerly been brought up and studied, the price varying between three-farthings and sixpence in English coinage. WorKs such as these, together with others on kindred subjects, none of them assailing the monarchial principle, have been flooding Ruse-ia in hundreds of thousands, and providing the people with information undreamt of a few years ago- — information all strongly tending towards kindly and friendly feeling towards England as

A REPOSITORY OF ENLIGHTENED SOCIAL rB.OGP.ESS.

In startling contrast to England's ennobling literary influence has been th c inflammatory doctrinaire Socialism imbibed from Germany — always Russia's evil genius — with its advocacy of lorce in hideous and cowardly forms. The contrast has pointed a moral which has not been lost on the most enlightened thinkers in Russia to-day, both in the Government and among the people. But on the commercial sido the mutual benefit of the two nations from a friendly co-operation may be incalculable. To England, Russia, with its vast latent wealth, may well offer a magnificent compensation for the losses which England's trade is always suffering in the Far East from the inroads of Japan, the United States, and soon possibly, from India, Australia and New Zealand. Russia needs capital, and can offer to English traders a great and fast-increasing market close at hand. Old Russia, with its few wants, has passed away, the new Russia is already a land of rapidly-increas-ing needs. The progress already made tn the self-respect, ambition, and education of the people is clearly visible in th c working classes, the factory hands of Russia, who aro the practical leaders of the masses to-day. These havo already discarded the old national dress for that of self-respecting Western workers, as well as many of their dirty habits, and are demanding sanitary dwellings and leisure for self-improve-ment. And when the moujik masses become infected with the same desires there will come, with the birth of numerous new wants and necessities,

AN INDt'STRIAL UrHEAVAI.

in Russia the like of which can hardly be imagined. Ru«fcia, indeed, is on the way to become one of the great markets of the world. Tho vast silent masses of the poople are changing with a rapidity which can only find its parallel in the world's history in the case of Japan, and their wants will increase with leaps and bounds every year. The Russian people at present number ono hundred and fifty million souls. In another twelve years, at the natural rate of increase, they will exceed two hundred millions. In their wido doj minions nearly overy product of the j earth is to be found. Every kind of metal in paying quantities, many in i European Russia; precious and semi- | precious stones in quantities sufiicient !to vulgarise many gems ; marbles and lithographic stones; fruits in rich profusion ; timber in. fabulous quantity ; cotton and tea; but all are in a state of unproductiveness, because there are no roads and no capital for exploitation. Surely here is a field worth an effort on the part of England, an effort greater and more systematic than any she has made in the past. And I would urge again that if she chooses to do so F.ho will find a far more sympathetic reception than ever before from a people who have just been infused with a wondering admiration for the character and institutions of a nation with regard to which they onco entertained THK DARKEST AND MOST KISTAKSN IGNOI'.A.VCir. The necessity of an effort on England's part, however, is clear enough from the following facts. At present tho bulk of the import trade into Russia is in the hands of England and Germany. Other countries hold only an insignificant share, although the United States has been making remarkable strides of late. Compared with German trade, however, England's shows a falling record. England's exports to Russia aro less than half of Germany's, and only 30 per cent of the former are manufactured goods, while 60 per cent are raw and 20 per cent half finished. On the other hand, 75 per cent of Germany's exports to Russia are manufactured and serai-manu-factured goods • moreover, ehe has, in the last decade, doubled her Russian trade, while England has stood still. This is not as wo Russians would

have it any longer. We have conceived a great and increasing admiration for things English, while for the German we have long entertained a deep-ly-rooted repugnance. But he has displayed minute care in exactly supplying our requirements, while, with the exception of a few firms, you have never attempted to adapt your trade to our country and its people. There have been, I am aware, difficulties in the way, but a new era of better understanding has dawned with th© meeting at Reval. We are learning from you THE SEORET OF CONSTITTTx-OKt-AI. GOVERNMENT and social progress. Why not benefit yourselves by teaching us to develop our great resources? You have the capital; we the land, with its unexhausted wealth. Come and build us railroads, open up our land with roads, establish us blast furnaces, dig car mines, give work and wages to our eager millions, and with them we will buy tho output of your numerous factories. At last there is the hope of a wise and sympathetic union of our interests and respective sources of wealth which promises to enrich us both, while at the same time ensuring, with the co-opera-ticn of our French allies, a long era of peace. But, above all, it is to the England which Russians aro only just beginning to know aright, . England with her noble traditions and institutions, wbo is now approaching us with the hand of friendship, that all of us who love our country, and still honour the Czar, are turning with eager, welcoming eyes, seeing for the first time, inspired by such a communion, a new Russia, based on truth;, freedom, and justice, rising to heights from which she will never fall again.