MODERN HISTORY IN RUSSIA.* IT augurs well for the career
of the future Sovereign of Russia, who has been sharing with so much interest and popularity in the public and social life of our country, that he is known to identify himself very cordially with the Historical Society at St. Petersburg. Russian men of letters were not slow to perceive the new tendency which historical study has taken of late years in various other countries of Europe. Not content with knowing the past from simple annalists who have neither witnessed nor been contempo- rary with the events they narrate, the learned and lettered public have shown an increasing desire to read the very docu- ments themselves from which history is made. The critical spirit and love of precision evidenced by this tendency have never hitherto been exhibited in the field of historical research with the intensity displayed in our day. Witness the countless publications of original documents printed in England by literary and historical societies and by the Crown—the Camden, Chat- ham, Surtees, and other societies—with the long series of volumes issued by the Master of the Rolli. The State Paper Office in its
Diplomatic Correspondence of the English Ambassadors at the Russian Court, 1763- 1796. St. Petersburg Historical Society. 1873. present convenient and accessible condition as a place of study is quite a recent phenomenon. The Reports• of the Deputy Keeper of the Records show what pains are taken to preserve and arrange State documents, while the Royal Commission on historical manu- scripts has opened a new mine, and brought to light important materials for history that have been buried from sight in private libraries like Longleats, Althorpe, and others. Let us remark, by the way, that these reports do little more than indicate the exist- ence and the habitat of the documents. The danger of losing them as ipsissima verba for purposes of history will continue so long as there are no printed copies of them. Mere lists of documents are not lively reading. The public would take more interest in the publications of the Deputy Keeper, if he would give them the details and minute particulars which are to be found in the papers he catalogues. That such a publication would command approval is demonstrated by the success which attended Mr. Carlyle's Life of Cromwell. The materials for a superb series of memoirs that would rival the col- lections of France and Germany are in this ancient, well-preserved country. They wait only for a learned and diligent hand to bring them to the light.
Let us not be ashamed to profit by the example of the Historical Society of St. Petersburg. Russian literature, though still in its youth, has striven ardently to enter the ways of the older civilisa- tion of the West. In the ten volumes of the Society already pub- lished will be found documents of various degrees of interest and importance in Russian, French, German, and English. They have been derived from different sources, public and private, and include letters of the Empress Catherine II. to her friends and Ministers, a letter from Voltaire to her Majesty, memoirs of Pozzo di Borgo, of the English Baron Dimsdale, who inoculated the Empress for small-pox, a memoir of Capo d'Ietria, with many other papers of interest. The last publication of the Society bears directly upon the history of England during the second half of the last century, and is full of copies of documents obtained by permission at the English State Paper Office. They cover the whole reign of Catherine II., and consist of the correspondence during that period, 1762-1796, of the British Ambassadors at St. Petersburg with the Ministers at home. Only the letters of Lord Malmesbury, 1777-82, which have been already published, are omitted.
Here, then, we have the " events which make history "described as the process of manufacture went on, and the writers are men eminent in their several walks of life, keenly sensitive to what was going on around them, and capable of writing well about what they saw and heard. It is as difficult to judge of the quality of a book by extracts, as it is to pronounce on the merits of a picture by a fragment of the drapery or a few of the leaves represented in it. If we can, however, only give a faint idea of this interesting work by quoting a few passages of the first volume, we feel bound to do so.
The first British ambassador accredited to the Empress Catherine II. was the Earl of Buckinghamshire, whose instructions, repeated at length in the Russian collection, enjoined him among other things to conclude a treaty of alliance between the two powers. This is, perhaps, one of the most curious points in all the correspondence, for the negotiations between George III. and the Empress seem to have dragged their slow length along for about thirty years. Both sides demurred to the concessions required. The great catastrophe of the French Revolution, the occupation of Holland by the Republican troops, and the collapse of the old political system of Europe, had all taken place before England signed, in 1795, a treaty of alliance with Russia on the basis which was a subject of discussion in 1762. The value which England attached to the Rumen alliance is strongly expressed in a letter,
dated June 24, 1763, from Lord Halifax to Lord Buckingham- shire :—
" The Crown of England,' he says, looks to no alliance with so
great desire as to that with Russia. It is time to put the incli- nations and designs of your Court to the test; for we begin to be re- flected on both at home and abroad, as if our natural alliances were neglected. A strict union with Russia is deservedly considered as the first and best foundation. When this is once laid, we may proceed upon a wise and regular plan, conformably to our joint interests and for the maintenance of the peace of Europe. Whilst we act in perfect concert and hold the same language, we shall speak with dignity and weight to the several Courts with whom we may be concerned, and there can be no doubt of our being heard with attention. As things now stand. the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Empire of Russia remain more capita mortua in European politics.'"
The Court of St. James's, while negotiating for a Treaty of Alliance with Russia, was endeavouring to obtain the renewal of a Treaty of Commerce that had expired. Sir George Macartney, so well known in connection with his embassy to China, conducted this negotiation, and signed a Treaty without submitting it to the Government at home. Hereupon the Duke of Graftion wrote him a sharp letter of disapproval, in wihich he refuses to ratify the Treaty unless the Envoy can get a supplemen- tary declaration of reciprocity signed by the Russian authorities. The bone of contention was the principle involved in Oliver Cromwell's Navigation Act, which Russia sought to convert to her own advantage by a specific clause which should emancipate Russian navigation from the restraints of the English law. Macartney is roundly scolded for "intro- ducing that Act by name (hitherto always avoided) You were establishing a precedent which in future Treaties other nations may claim, who may be in a situation to make use of it greatly to the disadvantage of this country. It, moreover, seems founded on false reasoning to reserve a right to them to new form their commerce in reciprocity of one Act made in England a century ago."
Sir George is cut to the quick by these reproaches. He gives an account of the difficulties he experiences in his interviews with Count Panin, and with true British pugnacity proposes to escape from embarrassment by energetically constraining the Russian Government. The three despatches he writes on this topic are pictures from the life, and we regret that our space will not allow us to give them entire. It is clear that the young, passionate envoy is writing ab iralo. At an interview with the Russian on one occasion Macartney made, by instructions, a protestation of Great Britain's desire to cultivate the friendship of Russia, and of his own hope that all difficulties to the alliance might be removed. " He stopped me, and said, ' If you speak from yourself, you want to deceive us ; if you speak from home, they want to deceive you.' I was not wanting, my lord, on this occasion, to vindicate the sincerity of His Majesty's Ministers, and in consequence M. Panin made me an apology for his suspicion, which, though conceived in the politest terms, and delivered in the most obliging manner, I shall never be the dupe of." A few days later the cool and wily Russian, assuming anger, replied to Macartney's advances " with a polite but contemptuous air. ' I see, Sir, that we never shall have any treaty of commerce ; as for the treaty of alliance, being a thing of a different nature, we will negotiate that at our leisure, when we find it suitable to our mutual interest, but do not think it possible, when once trade has been laid open to other nations, it can ever after be restrained thrmigh partiality to you. It is high time to put an end to this affair,' he continued, and pro- ceed to cancelling the signature, which I shall do in your presence immediately.' He was going to send to the office for the Treaty, when I entreated him in the most earnest and pathetic manner to delay the execution of so precipitate and violent a measure, at least for a few days." This interview occurred on 21st of January, 1766.
The British Envoy must have forgotten his pathos by the 14th of March following, when he wrote to the Duke of Grafton that the Russians were " swelled with that insolence which is generally the attendant of unmerited good fortune ;" and when he recom- mends " one method of dealing with them which would have more weight than all the eloquence and address of the ablest negotiator in Europe. Suppose that when your Grace gives me orders to annul the signature, you should authorise me to declare that, as for the future, we must carry on our trade without a treaty, His Majesty's intention is, henceforward, to send every year four or five ships-of-war into the Baltic for the protection of our commerce."
We have said enough to show that this work, of which we have seen but a sample, is calculated to throw considerable light on the diplomatic relations between England and Russia. It abounds also in traits of character and descriptive remarks of a very at- tractive kind, and we hope as the later parts come to hand to have the pleasure of introducing them to the notice of our readers.
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