184 THE GROWTH OF RUSSIA 



and achievement is but the guarantee of a far grander future. It 

 would be a congenial task to linger upon great national enterprises 

 begun and fast pushing to completion. Above the quicksands of 

 Turkestan and through the wastes of Siberia to the Eastern Ocean 

 Russia is constructing her solid iron roads. Over the face of her pro- 

 digious European plain she is marking out the paths of the canals on 

 which from sea to sea navies will ride. Siberia, the old-time synonym 

 of desolation and solitude, is inviting the activity of the colonist, 

 whether farmer, miner, or engineer. Korea and the provinces of dor- 

 mant or disintegrating China await their share in the world's life from 

 the electric impulse of her northern brain. That brain is to nerve 

 Asia, long outworn, to a resurrection as from the dead. What the 

 warrior monk Elias uttered long ago receives confirmation every pass- 

 ing year: " The progress of Russia is mysterious and profound. Be- 

 fore she moves she neither betrays her plan nor hesitates nor boasts, 

 but none can hinder lier arriving where she has set her will." 



Not long ago I received a letter from a Bulgarian friend, a leading 

 member of the Sobranie, or Bulgarian Chamber of Deputies. He 

 uses these words: ''In the near or distant future I see onl}" two 

 ]>rominent nations — the United States in the west, and Russia own- 

 ing nearly tbe whole of Asia and exercising a preponderant influence 

 over tiie European continent. The whole of the Balkan peninsula, 

 Asia Minor, Persia, Central Asia are her natural and inevitable in- 

 heritance. Above Asia and Europe I see the White Czar of Holy 

 Russia. Your people need have no concern. The interests of Russia 

 and the United States nowhere conflict. Naturally they are friends 

 and allies. Together they are to regenerate the world." Thus tiie 

 Bulgarian statesman utters his own conviction and the great political 

 credo of the Slav. 



The one necessity and the chief ally of Russia is time. How far 

 the peace manifesto of Nicholas II was prompted by philanthropy or 

 by profound but selfish statecraft it is impossible to know. If phi- 

 lanthropy, that manifesto remains the noblest and most memorable 

 document ever issued b}' a Christian monarch ; if political sagacity, 

 that manifesto is in appreciation of the future the astutest utter- 

 ance ever made by the occupant of a Russian throne. But it is unbe- 

 coming to question the hidden motives of a deed in itself sublime. 

 History will record no more than this : that at the close of a century 

 more crowded with bloodshed and war than any other since time 

 began, Russia through the voice of her autocratic Czar put forth a plea 

 to all mankind in favor of universal brotherhood and peace. 



