would materially modify the administration of Russia. The Presidents believe
that unless the people are allowed a voice in the administration there will in the near future be an agrarian revolution, in which the landlord class may be swept away ; and they ask, therefore, for a representative body with rights of legislation, for free speech and freedom of the Press, for absolute liberty of conscience, and for an approach to municipal autonomy, the Zemstvos to be, moreover, elected by all classes of the population. They add that the whole people ought to be educated. These proposals, which threaten the autocracy, and affront the reactionaries and the bureau- cracy about equally, will certainly not be accepted at present ; but they indicate that the landlords are seriously alarmed, and that the desire for change is strong in all the non-official classes. They will, moreover, furnish a definite programme in the event of the Government being weakened by further defeats, or by general resistance to new taxation.
