THE DISSOLUTION OF THE PUMA. T HE Russian Girondins have fallen.
The moderate majority in the Duma, who have hitherto displayed great self-control, and who, it is well understood, would have furnished a competent Ministry if the Court would have promised them its sincere support, have at length irritated the reactionaries into action which, though legal in form, in practice involves a coup d'etcd. The Czar in his Ukase dissolving the Donna states that the Deputies have "strayed into spheres beyond their competence," and blames them for making inquiries into the acts of local authorities—who, it would seem, are not even to be censured by the representatives of the people—and for "making comments" upon the imperfections of funda- mental laws. Nicholas IL, it is clear, does not even comprehend what representatives are for. There is, how- ever, another story in circulation which is at least more probable than the one shadowed forth in the Ukase. The Duma might have gone on talking with impunity but that the great officers at headquarters discovered that the soldiers were beginning to attend to its talk, and that in consequence there was an increasing readiness to • mutiny against grievances, and to refuse in many cases to • fire upon unarmed "rebels." Even the Cossacks were beginning to think that obedience could be stretched too far, so much so that a special garrison was despatched to the Cossack centre, Taganrog. The same officers per- ceived that the peasants were heping everything from the Puma, and feared that if time were allowed, the recruits, who come in large proportion from among the peasantry, would all show themselves. disaffected. They therefore represented to the Czar that if the autocracy were to be preserved the Duma must be dissolved at once. It is probable, also, though not yet certain, that these repre- sentations were strengthened by the arrival in St. Petersburg of the Grand Duke Vladimir, who had just escaped assassination on his railway journey from Paris, and who is believed to be the most reactionary as well as the most determined of his nephew's immediate circle. The stroke was therefore struck ; the Tauris Palate, where the Duma sat, was occupied by troops ; and the Deputies retired, a few of them to the districts which elected them, but a large proportion to Viborg, in Finland, whence they issued a Pro- clamation which is undoubtedly an open incitement to revolution. They call upon all Russia not only to support the Duma, without which, they say, no legislation can be legal, but to refuse payment of taxes and the regular demands for recruits. The former device is rather futile, for the Russian Government can issue paper to an unlimited extent ; and the latter cannot be carried out unless over the vast extent of Russia unarmed men are prepared to risk encounters with the soldiery. Both, how- ever, signify a call to the people, if they desire freedom, to defy the Czar. The Revolution is, in fact, officially proclaimed.
Whether it can " march " wholly depends—we must say it again, though it is for the hundredth time—upon the temper of the troops, and upon this subject evidence is extraordinarily conflicting. The War Office evidently believes that if some of the barrack grievances of the men are removed, more especially their insufficient supply of food, the soldiers will, in the last resort, declare for the autocracy. -They have good arguments on their side. Among all soldiers the necessity of discipline is admitted, and the severities of discipline are condoned as regrettable but un- avoidable incidents of the military career. And the soldiers are few who can bear to be attacked by mobs, even of their own countrymen, without resorting to the arms which, as they know, will at once ensure their own safety and manifest their own superiority. On the other hand, in Russia the soldiers, with the exception of the Cossacks, are, even in cities, unusually sensitive to the popular hatred, and in the country districts share the strongest feeling of those who are expected to rise in insurrection. They, too, think that the laud belongs to them, and that to shoot down their brothers for claiming the land is definitely an oppression. There is, therefore, serious fear of an agrarian movement:, which may include a great military mutiny, and result either in an effort to change the dynasty, and with it the Court policy, or to re-establish the Duma, which thus re-established by the sword must become a Convention ; or if the barracks, in Marshal AlacMahon's phrase, "fire upon the barracks," in a civil war, the end of which will depend, like the end of all wars, upon the comparative strength of the contending forces and the genius of their leaders, who as yet are hidden from the sight of men. The Russian Araw has no Su voroff, indeed no successful general of any kind, who might bind the soldiers by personal loyalty to himself; and no Cromwell or soldier who could lead a rebel force to victory. That sterility of dominant capacity which is the marked feature of the Russian bureaucracy extends also to its opponents. In any one of the three contingencies the loss to Russia must be fright- ful, for in so vast a country a hostile people cannot be rapidly put down, and unless the revolution can be rapidly put down society must for a lima go utterly to pieces. The landlord cannot be made safe, the Empire as an Empire cannot be made 'mobile, and the Treasury cannot be refilled. The external world *ill not go on lending millions except on ruinous terms, internal commerce must be suspended, and the mere destruction of property which results from universal disorder must destroy, or at least suspend, all the sources of prosperity. The appearance of a man of genius on- either side may, of course, falsify all predictions ; but at present the appearances point to anarchy in the near future ; and. the European world, not only in Russia, but everywhere, is suffering from a general, though, it is to be hoped, temporary, flood of mediocrity. The rocks are covered by the advancing flood, and the mud throws up nothing that is well above the surface.
There remains a contingency which must be considered, if possible, by the light of reason rather than of either panic or prejudice. It is quite clear, as many well- informed persons believe, that if the Revolution shows symptoms of winning, the Romanoffs, like the Bourbons, will summon the foreigner to their aid, and that William II., like his ancestor, may think it his duty to intervene. We cast aside all rumours as to arrangements already made, and rely for an ad interim judgment only upon patent political facts. So far as we can see, if Russian Poland rises the German Emperor not only may, but must intervene. He cannot allow a movement to succeed which might cost him great provinces, even if it did not provoke into action all the revolutionary elements in his own States. The three Powers which partitioned Poland must continue to hold down Poland, or confess themselves defeated by a race which for a hundred years has been taught to see in revolution its only hope of independence. As far as the Vistula, therefore, in the supposed contingency—that is, in the case of the Revolu- tion winning in the struggle—we expect German inter- vention. The really doubtful point is whether the German Emperor will cross the Vistula. The decision will depend upon himself, for his Army will undoubtedly obey his orders, and, indeed, will be in motion before it has time to deliberate whether those orders are acceptable or not ; but his policy is extremely difficult to predict. On the one hand, it must be remembered that the military occupation of Poland is by itself a most serious effort, and one which, owing to tradition as well as other easily visible causes, may produce terrible agitation in France. It may be taken as certain, too, that the opinion of the masses in Germany is not favourable to the Romanolls, and will be greatly outraged by an expenditure of German life and treasure in order to restore their autocracy. William II. understands his epoch, and will not, we are satisfied, feel willing to bring upon himself the hostility of the Liberals throughout Europe. Powerful as he is, and strong as is the discipline of his Army, he has to deal with a vast mass of Socialist opinion, which will undoubtedly be excited past all ordinary means of repression by sympathy with a great, and, on the hypothesis, successful, peasant uprising. The Emperor is not an incautious man, and may well be inclined to limit his action to Poland, or perhaps to Poland and the southern Baltic Provinces. On the other hand, the Emperor William is a near kinsman of the Romanoffs ; he sincerely believes in "the Monarchic principle " ; and the spectacle of an army defeated by peasants, or of a civil war within the ranks, must be to him almost past endurance. It is useless in such circum- stances to predict, but intervention must be regarded as one of the dangerous possibilities resulting from the unrest in Russia, the danger being all the greater because it is most improbable that the Hapsburgs will suffer them- selves to be dragged at the heels of the Hohenzollems into an adventure which can hardly by any possibility benefit themselves. Galicia is not a province which will risk untold misery in order to swell a Polish revolt. The easy- going despotism there has ever since 1849 been found by Poles much more endurable than the scientific rigidity of the Prussian system.
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