204 RUSSIA IN EUEOPE. 



before the Russian armies of Turkestan can reach, the Hindu-Kush passes. But 

 the disorganization of the intermediate states hastens the inevitable shock, and 

 sooner or hiter Russia, already bordering on Germany, will reach the frontier of 

 British India. While the general movement of civilisation is from east to west, 

 the development of Russia is from west to east. 



At the same time the nation itself is still far from having occupied the vast 

 spaces politically annexed to the empire, and before all the fertile tracts and 

 commercial or industrial positions are settled many social changes and internal 

 revolutions may take place. But whatever be the vicissitudes of their national 

 life, the various Slav groups must still remain the civilising element in these 

 regions. Although the assimilating influence of the Russian nationality has not 

 kept pace with its political growth, the expansion of the Slavs in the annexed 

 lands is none the less extraordinary. On the European side they cannot displace 

 or absorb the Finns, Swedes, Germans, equally or more civilised than themselves ; 

 on the east and south-east also religion has drawn a line of demarcation between 

 the ruling race and the Tatars, Kalmucks, Kurds, and Turkomans. Still it is 

 through the Russians that these peoples slowly take part in the evolution of 

 modern times, and a rapid " Russification " has already been observed in many 

 parts of the empire. But emigration is the chief means by which the very heart 

 of Asia is becoming Russian. Little Russia has colonised vast tracts, though still 

 far less extensive than those settled by the Great Russians, who are the chief 

 colonising element. With them the migratory movement is hereditary. Their 

 forefathers migrated in the Muscovite forests from clearance to clearance, from 

 steppe to steppe, and their descendants have already invaded Siberia, crossed the 

 slopes of the Caucasus and Altai, followed the course of the Amur to the Pacific 

 seaboard. 



Even beyond the frontiers of the empire travellers are often surprised to meet 

 Great Russian colonies lost amidst peoples of alien blood. For why should the 

 Russian peasant regret the land he forsakes ? And does he not everywhere find 

 still a home in his onward movement across the boundless steppe ? The land and its 

 products have little changed ; the came skies encompass him, the same winds sough 

 through the woodlands surrounding his new abodes. In a few days he can put 

 together an izha such as that he has abandoned ; the fresh clearances will yield the 

 same harvests as of old, and there will at least be a slight hope of enjoying them 

 in greater freedom. But even where everything diflers — climate, soil, vegetation — • 

 he can still adapt himself perfectly to the new surroundings. He can adopt the 

 ways of those with whom he is thrown, and become a Finlander with the Kare- 

 lians, a Yakut with the Turkic tribes of the Lena basin. 



No military operation can strike the heart of so vast a domain, with relatively 

 so few towns, and such thin and scattered communities. Its inert power of resist- 

 ance was shown by the almost nameless disaster that overwhelmed the formidable 

 French invasion of 1812. The empire has no centre, for even Moscow cannot be 

 regarded as such. Doubtless the frontier has its weak points, and especially 

 Poland, where the enemy might inflict serious wounds ; but beyond those points 



