Nothing in the news, however, is so formidable as the
demonstration of opinion by the Peasant Congress. Repre- sentatives of the peasants have come to Moscow from all the provinces of Russia, and while they differ from each other on many points—one being evidently the proper status of the Church—they have all resolved that the land should be given to the peasantry, while a majority is declared to have voted the "expulsion" of the landlords, and the conversion of their mansions into hospitals and schools. The deadly hatred of the large owners bred by serfage, and only suspended by the decree of emancipation, is, in fact, breaking forth. It is believed in many quarters that the Czar can regain the peasantry by decreeing that the land belongs to them ; but the present Government shrinks from extreme action, and will be reluctant to break with the Conservative party, not only in Russia, but throughout Europe. It must be remem. bered that the decree of emancipation, though it ruined so many thousands of the upper class, was supported, like the similar decree in America, by the internal conscience of Christian mankind, which holds that the theft of a man's labour is as immoral as any other robbery.
