Hopeful Signs .in Russia.

Nor is it only with regard to the Japanese that the Old Year brought a welcome, although perturbing, revelation that " men my brothers" were further advanced from the ape than we had ventured to hope they were. The Russians also have been giving most reassuring signs of growth. The recent conference of the representatives of the Zemstvos, the slackening of the curb upon the liberties of the Press, the unanimous resolutions of the municipality of Moscow, the declarations of the Minister of the Interior, the discussions in the Imperial Council, all show that the 140,000,000 of those brothers of ours who are Russian are falling into line with the rest of the human family. Here again the results may be the reverse of comfortable for us. A Russian Empire governed by Parliament and Press would be far more likely to come into collision with us than a Russian Empire controlled by an autocrat. But peoples, like individuals, come of age, and although it may be easier to do business with a guardian than with the heir who has just attained his majority, that in no way diminishes the significance of the fact that the most numerous of all the European nations is emerging from tutelage. The New Year will be a crucial time for both the Tsar and his people. May God grant them wisdom to adjust their ancient institutions to the needs of the new time! They have everything to gain by keeping step together. Russia, of all countries, would have most to lose by a violent break with her past.

The Moscow or even the Zemstvo programme

is out of the question, but it is lawful to learn from the enemy, and if the Japanese Constitution were adopted en bloc, it would leave the autocracy with powers practically intact.

The

Russian People.

So much nonsense is written about the Russians that it is well now and then to be reminded by sane and sober travellers what kind of men they are, these brothers of ours, whom so many of our newspapers so malignantly libel. Mr. Moncure D. Conway, an extreme Radical American, was so much under the influence of the Russophobist atmosphere in London that, he tells us in his fascinating autobiography, "There grew in me enough of this superstition to make me feel that there must be something preternatural in Slavic Satan. Simply as a demonologist I must go to Russia." He went in 1869. The moment he reached St. Petersburg he was undeceived. He was charmed with the gentle, happy faces of the people: their amusements were all

artistic, merry, innocent-in every respect superior to those of Germany and England. When he went to Moscow, he says :—

Instead of finding an oppressed people, I found a people enjoying a personal liberty unknown either in England or America -no Sabbatarian laws, no restrictions on freedom of speech, no limitations on any conduct not criminal, and no fictitious crimes made by arbitrary statutes.

When he went into the country he found no squalor, no violence, no painful scenes:—

The Russian peasantry impressed me as the happiest I had seen in any country. And there is nothing better than happiness. They have each their parcel of land untaxed, and perfect freedom. They have their Sunday festivals and dances, no anxieties about their souls, and no politics to divide and excite them. They have their pretty sweethearts and wives. They have no strikes, no ambitions. Ignorant they may be in a bookish sense, but how many bookish people are ignorant of things known to these humble folk, who live amid their fruits and harvests, bees and birds?

The Outlook.

This, it will be noted, refers to the year 1869, before Nihilism had infected the people. The land is no longer untaxed. Nor are the Russians free from strikes. Mr. Conway-who believes so much in the Devil that he cannot believe in God— may think it beneficial not to be anxious about one's soul, but those who hold a more cheerful creed can hardly be expected to agree with him. The hopeful thing about Russia to-day is that the nation is beginning

to be anxious about its soul. It is the usual result of discovering the reality of the soul. To recognise you have a soul, a real live soul for which you are responsible, is the first step. The second is to discover that it is in a very bad way, and stands in very great need of being saved. The Russian people are becoming conscious of their soul, and are naturally dissatisfied with its present condition. There are signs on every hand that the nation is stirring. It is a patient people, the Russian, but it is possible for its Ministers to be so preternaturally stupid as to exhaust even Muscovite patience. The absolutely inconceivable folly of the Bobrikoff policy in Finland, and the total miscalculation of the forces governing the situation in the Far East, appear to have convinced both the Tsar and his subjects that there must be a change. The Russians have already a Constitution in embryo. If the Senate were rejuvenated, the Council of the Empire invigorated by the infusion of a representative element, and the Council of Ministers treated more as a Cabinet, the Tsar and his people would be able to readjust the autocracy to the necessities of modern democracy, with a minimum of smashing of ancient crockery. If more were needed, there is always the Zemski Sobor in

reserve.

The

Tsar's Inadequate Concessions.

It is to be hoped that this reserve may be called up without loss of time. The situation in Russia is distinctly dangerous, and one which is aggravated rather than alleviated by the half measures which are foreshadowed in the Tsar's manifesto of December 26th. There is little to take exception to in the manifesto itself, excepting that it is inadequate to meet the exigencies of the situation. The Tsar and his present Minister of the Interior have apparently realised that it is impossible to revert to the policy of brutal repression which was terminated by the assassination of M. de Plehve. If, therefore, repression of the old style be out of the question, there must be concessions, and concessions to be successful must be adequate. When the representatives of the Zemstvos and the mass of the educated people in Russia, including what we should regard as the country squires, are clamouring to be allowed to assist the autocracy through the agency of representative institutions, the offer of a series of commissions affecting a multitude of questions of subordinate importance is not calculated to improve matters. If the Tsar were to summon a Zemski Sobor, which is a consultative assembly of notables collected from all parts of his dominions, he would do much more to allay the threatening agitation than by the appointment of all the Commissions foreshadowed in his manifesto.

The War
in

the Far East.

In the Far East the opposing armies remain in their burrows in the Sha-ho. All the news of fighting comes from Port Arthur. General Stoessel and his indomitable garrison still held out, although the Japanese smashed all their ironclads by the plunging fire of their shells, charged with high explosives. One alone remained the Sevastopol. It was sent out, heavily crinolined with torpedo nets, into the outer harbour. Night after night, in blinding snowstorm and raging sea, the Japanese torpedo-boats attacked the anchored ship. The Russians fought, as ever, with all the gallantry and stubbornness of their race. They sank one torpedo-boat, but the end was never in doubt. An anchored battleship, no matter how heavily crinolined, must ultimately succumb to the constantly renewed attack of swift and almost invisible assailants, each of which is capable of launching an earthquake at the motionless target from a distance of half a mile. Ten times torpedoes struck the boom or the net, and the Sevastopol began to settle at the head, until she touched bottom. Like all her consorts, she is reported to be completely disabled. Thus perished

the last hope that the Pacific Fleet would have been able to render any assistance to the Baltic Fleet, which is slowly steaming to the seat of war, its bunkers full of English coal, and escorted by a fleet of German colliers.

The Carnage
round

203 Metre Hill.

The details of the fighting by which the Japanese secured possession of the fort on 203 Metre Hill, from which they were able to drop shells upon the ships, are appalling. The Japanese are reported to have lost 20,000 men in twelve days' continuous assaults. The fighting was exceptionally savage. "Never has there been such a fierce assault," wrote General Stoessel, and the reports from other sources show that both parties contested the disputed position with incredible tenacity. The machine guns mowed down the assailants like swathes of grass, and the hand grenades of dynamite wrought terrible havoc. "The hillside," said Commander Mizzenoff, "was literally covered with dead and wounded, the trenches were rivulets of blood, and every visible spot of ground, every boulder, and every rifle was dyed crimson." "The enemy went down in squads and companies, but there were always others coming on and pressing unwaveringly forward. Their bravery was beyond praise." The following incident supplies almost the only touch of humanity in this prolonged death wrestle :

A remarkable incident occurred during the third assault as the Russians, still facing the enemy, retreated. The Japanese standard-bearer, holding his flag aloft, climbed to the pinnacle and fell dead, clutching the colours in his hands. In his tracks another arose with the colours, only to fall instantly with a dozen wounds. Six others followed, and each met with the same fate. At last the Russian officer exclaimed, when the ninth man appeared, "Don't shoot the fellow with the flag. It will be planted anyhow."

Port Arthur was said to have provisions for three months, and its carefully-husbanded ammunition to be sufficient for a still longer period.

Militant Piety-
Russian
and
English.

There is one passage in General Stoessel's despatch describing the repulse of one of the earlier Japanese attacks on 203 Metre Hill which runs thus :-"The help which God sent us on the birthday of our mother the Tsaritsa gave us a further victory "-one of the incidents of which was that our heroes brought their bayonets into use, and the Japanese retired, leaving a heap of their men along the whole front." It will be remembered that the Japanese attributed their earlier successes to the semi-divine virtue of their Sovereign; but the idea of the Almighty remembering. the birthday of “ Our

mother the Tsaritsa," in order to help the heroes to victory, is naïve enough to be English. Nothing that this war has brought out, on either side, comes up to the altogether too dreadful piety of the excellent English sailor, Robert Lyde, one of the heroes of our seafaring folk, who, in 1689, with the aid of a boy, succeeded in overpowering two and making prisoners of five Frenchmen. He seized the ship in which he had been prisoner, and brought her home in triumph. Such an exploit does savour of the miraculous; but the modern gorge rises at the perusal of this worthy's obviously sincere expression of his consciousness of the active co-operation of the Deity in his heroic struggle against the Frenchmen. I have only room for one passage :—

Then it pleased God to put me in mind of my knife in my pocket. And although two of the men had hold of my right arm, yet God Almighty strengthened me so that I put my right hand into my right pocket, drew out my knife, and then cut the man's throat with it that had his back to my breast, and he immediately dropt down and scarce ever stirred after.—(“Arber's English Garland," vol. vii., p. 440.)

Erlungshan Taken.

On Wednesday in Christmas week the Japanese achieved a breach in the line of the inner forts which constitute the real ramparts of Port Arthur. The great fortress of Erlungshan was stormed quite in the old-fashioned way. Seven dynamite mines exploded simultaneously, and made a breach in the defence of the fort, into which the Japanese stormed in overwhelming numbers, under the cover of a tremendous military fire. The most significant fact, as illustrating the excessive enfeeblement of the Russian garrison, was that General Stoessel

could only spare for the defence of this important position a garrison of 500 men. The Japanese admit that this handful of defenders inflicted a loss of 1,000 upon their assailants, and that only one-third of the 500 escaped alive. The force of numbers ultimately prevailed, and the capture of the fort, with forty-three pieces of artillery, was complete.

The Fall of Port Arthur.

On New Year's Day, at nine o'clock at night, General Stoessel surrendered Port Arthur to the Japanese, after sustaining a siege of ten months and a half. So ends the first chapter. The siege began on February 17th, 1904. If the Japanese had rushed the fortress they might have taken it in March. The caution with which they proceeded gave the Russian engineers their opportunity. The countrymen of Todleben, who fortified Sebastopol, have not lost their skill, and before the guns of the besieging armies a great series of redoubts arose

which held the Japanese at bay till the end of the year. General Stoessel did not surrender the fortress until his position had been rendered untenable by the capture of the forts commanding his inner line of defence, until his ammunition was almost exhausted and his gallant garrison reduced almost to their last ration. Even then he only capitulated on condition that he and the remnant of his garrison were allowed to march out with colours flying, drums beating, and all the honours of war. The Japanese must have lost, first and last, well on to a hundred thousand men. They will now be free to concentrate all their forces against General Kuropatkin. The Russians, who have just sanctioned a new naval programme involving the expenditure of £160,000,000, will probably be less disposed than ever to consider terms of peace which, if agreed to before they achieve one victory -and they have already been defeated fourteen times-would reduce them to the rank of a secondclass Power.

The Fate of the Baltic Fleet.

The fall of Port Arthur had long been expected, but it would appear that the Russians are now threatened with a new disaster. The Japanese, having destroyed or put out of action the whole of the Russian Pacific Fleet, have withdrawn their fleet from Port Arthur, and have despatched a small but powerful fighting fleet, consisting of two ironclads, three cruisers, and several torpedo-boats, to attack Admiral Rodjestvensky as soon as his fleet comes to the neighbourhood of the Straits of Malacca. Of course, if the Russian Baltic Fleet were concentrated it would be far more than a match for the Japanese squadron, but it is not concentrated; and a capable, resolute, and alert commander might find it possible to inflict disastrous injury upon the leading ships of the long line before the others could be summoned to the rescue. The Russians at home are undecided as to whether to recall Admiral Rodjestvensky, and are promising to send out a third squadron on January 28th. Indecision is the most fatal of all vices in the manoeuvring of fleets.

Voilà l'Ennemi.

The New Year brings with it Anti-Germanism. certain clearly-defined duties, one of the first of which is the extirpation of the pestilent school of public writers who, being impelled thereto by the Devil, lose no opportunity of exciting hatred and distrust of Germany and the Germans in the mind of the British public. We see going on before our eyes the painstaking manufacture of a Devil. The editors of the Spectator, the National Review and the

Fortnightly, aided by an indiscreet but fervent disciple in the person of Mr. Arnold White, have dedicated their pens and their journals to the truly infernal task of convincing the nation. that the Germans are potential cut-throats who can only be restrained by cold steel from seizing London and looting the Empire. It is, unfortunately, quite true that the Germans have a corresponding set of journalistic rascals who are just as diligent in equip ping Britannia with horns, hoofs and tail as Mr. St. Loe Strachey, Mr. Maxse, and Mr. Courtney's team are in supplying the same appendages to Germania. It is devils' work, this transforming of honest brother peoples into Satans! The German Chancellor, Von Bülow, has shown the instinct of true statesmanship in protesting against this cultus of national hatred. It is time our British statesmen followed suit. Of course they will be called pro-German; but a statesman who is afraid of being called names is a lost soul.

International Arbitration.

The New Year ought to see concluded and ratified Arbitration treaties between all the powers who met at the Hague. There is no reason why the work should not be done on a comprehensive scale. What I proposed in the last days of the Conference of 1899 was that immediately the Conventions were ratified, England and Russia should issue circulars to all the signatory Powers intimating their readiness to enter into separate treaties, providing for obligatory arbitration in certain categories of disputes, and binding themselves to adopt the provisions of special mediation and of the International Commissions of Inquiry in all other controversies that threatened war. The hateful war in South Africa, which any one of three provisions in the Hague Conventions could have averted if Mr. Chamberlain had not set his face against Arbitration, postponed the execution of this systematic and comprehensive method of procedure. We are now concluding treaties of arbitration piecemeal, and other Powers are doing the same. These treaties are only the shadow of what they ought to be. They merely provide as a rule-for sending twopenny-halfpenny disputes to arbitration. They say nothing about the two most valuable provisions of the Hague Conventions, the clause providing for special mediation, with a pause before the outbreak of hostilities, and the International Commission of Inquiry into questions of fact. However, it is better to advance slowly than to stick in the mud, and half a loaf is better than no bread.

The International
Commission
of
Inquiry.

The Commission that is to inquire into the responsibility of all concerned in the Dogger Bank incident has practically had its work done before it came together. For its appointment secured time, and time allowed the Russians to discover that when they were firing at what they thought were torpedo boats, they actually hit one of their own ships, the Aurora, which was struck six times. The chaplain was killed and others on board were wounded. The Russians, therefore, did themselves as much damage as they inflicted on the Hull fisher boats. The official

admission of this fact goes far to render the meeting of the Commission unnecessary, especially as it is now in evidence that our own fishermen honestly made the same mistake as the Russians, and thought the mission ship was a torpedo-boat. The Commission, however, having been appointed, met on December 20th in Paris. It consisted of four Admirals. Britain and Russia were represented by Sir Lewis Beaumont and Admiral Kasnakoff-who has been replaced by ViceAdmiral Doubassoff-the United States and France by Admiral Davis and Admiral Fournier. These four then agreed to select Admiral von Spaun, of Austria, as the fifth delegate. Sir Edward Fry will be our Admiral's legal assistant, and Baron Taube, with