RECOLLECTIONS OF POBEDONOSTZEFF- 1892-1894 57 



imperial councilors, Loris-Melikoff, believing that the 

 young sovereign would be led by filial reverence to con 

 tinue the liberal policy to which the father had devoted 

 his life, made a speech taking this for granted, and that 

 the majority of those present, including the Emperor, 

 seemed in accord with him ; when suddenly there arose a 

 tall, gaunt, scholarly man, who at first very simply, but 

 finally very eloquently, presented a different view. Ac 

 cording to the chroniclers of the period, Pobedonostzeff 

 told the Emperor that all so-called liberal measures, in 

 cluding the constitution, were a delusion; that, though 

 such things might be suited to Western Europe, they were 

 not suited to Russia; that the constitution of that empire 

 had been, from time immemorial, the will of the autocrat, 

 directed by his own sense of responsibility to the Al 

 mighty; that no other constitution was possible in Russia; 

 that this alone was fitted to the traditions, the laws, the 

 ideas of the hundred and twenty millions of various, 

 races under the Russian scepter; that in other parts of 

 the world constitutional liberty, so called, had already 

 shown itself an absurdity ; that socialism, anarchism, and 

 nihilism, with their plots and bombs, were appearing in 

 all quarters; that murder was plotted against rulers of 

 nations everywhere, the best of presidents having been 

 assassinated in the very country where free institutions 

 were supposed to have taken the most complete hold; that 

 the principle of authority in human government was to be 

 saved ; and that this principle existed as an effective force 

 only in Russia. 



This speech is said to have carried all before it. As its 

 immediate result came the retirement of Loris-Melikoff, 

 followed by his death not long afterward; the entrance 

 of Pobedonostzeff among the most cherished councilors 

 of the Emperor ; the suppression of the constitution ; the 

 discouragement of every liberal tendency; and that fanat 

 ical reaction which has been in full force ever since. 



This was the man whom I especially desired to see and 

 to understand; and therefore it was that I was very glad 



