RUSSIAN STATESMEN- 1892-1894 39 



and was favorably impressed by his insight, vigor, and 

 courtesy. It was, therefore, a surprise to me when, on be 

 coming a full minister, he bloomed out as a most bitter, 

 cruel, and evidently short-sighted reactionary. The world 

 stood amazed at the murderous cruelties against the Jews 

 at Kishineff, which he might easily have prevented ; and 

 nothing more cruel or short-sighted than his dealings with 

 Finland has been known since Louis XIV revoked the 

 Edict of Nantes. I can only explain his course by suppos 

 ing that he sought to win the favor of the reactionary fac 

 tion which, up to the present time, has controlled the Czar, 

 and thus to fight his way toward the highest power. He 

 made of the most loyal and happy part of the empire the 

 most disloyal and wretched ; he pitted himself against the 

 patriotism, the sense of justice, and all the highest inter 

 ests and sentiments of the Finnish people ; and he met his 

 death at the hands of an avenger, who, in destroying the 

 enemy of his country, has struck a fearful blow at his 

 country s happiness. 



While a thoughtful American must condemn much 

 which he sees in Russia, there is one thing which he cannot 

 but admire and contrast to the disadvantage of his own 

 country ; and this is the fact that Russia sets a high value 

 upon its citizenship. Its value, whatever it may be, is the 

 result of centuries of struggles, of long outpourings of 

 blood and treasure ; and Russians believe that it has been 

 bought at too great a price and is in every way too pre 

 cious to be lavished and hawked about as a thing of no 

 value. On the other hand, when one sees how the citizen 

 ship of the United States, which ought to be a millionf old 

 more precious than that of Russia, is conferred loosely 

 upon tens of thousands of men absolutely unfit to exercise 

 it, whose exercise of it seems, at times, likely to destroy 

 republican government ; when one .sees the power of con 

 ferring it granted to the least respectable class of officials 

 at the behest of ward politicians, without proper safe 

 guards and at times without any regard to the laws ; when 

 one sees it prostituted by men of the most unfit class, 



