The secret Report of General Bobrikoff on the administra- tion
of Finland during the first four years of his Governor- Generalship has been published in the Finland Bulletin of August 17th. The Report deals with the measures for the Russification of the Grand Duchy and the mode and order qf their application, and is throughout governed by the principle that the autocratic power of the Czar is unlimited, the writer
holding that if any definition of Imperial and local Finnish legislation is arrived at, in no case must the Estates be placed in a position to consider any such definition. General Bobrikcrff strongly supported on political as well as strategical grounds the abolition of Finnish regiments, but held that in preference to rendering Finnish recruits liable to serve in Russian regi- ments, it would be better that no military service should be exacted from the Finns in naturd, but that a contribution in money should be levied instead. In this way, he contended, the country would be pacified and the reforms more easily carried out; while his recommendations as to the standardising of rolling stook and other proposals in regard to the railways are interpreted by the Finland Bulletin as preparatory to a forward movement against the Scandinavian peninsula. Setting aside, however, such deductions, enough remains to indicate the determined spirit in which the campaign against Finnish autonomy was undertaken, as well as the stubborn opposition it was likely to encounter.
