Russia’s Expensive Policy.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXVII, Issue 3532, 8 June 1905, Page 2

Russia’s Expensive Policy.

A PEEP INTO HISTORY. ff There are angry denunciations of the rottenness of the body politic, and coverir threats against the dynasty.” SWnns a part of a cable message describing the state of jjopuUr feeling in Russia last week on the new# of the real result of the paval fight Id the waters of the Straits of Korea. Should these wild suggestions be carried into the stern and terrible region of facts the effect on the history wrought by Adtfl.'ral Tocos victory in the Battle of X 3US^ma » already of far-reaching imp ,o ri an . c# * Won id op»?n up illimitable possibilities* It is not a ikw experience in Rusl'l** however, tbfe dread unrest among thi' people. For years past it has. triad* life in the dominions of the Czar too often a burden and sant hundreds’ of thousands of men and women to death, or to worse—the terrible mlof-ptiscm of Siberia. Russia has seen greaft changes. The Czar rules in the cortb dt Asia, Britain in the south; fJwCzAit'tf dominion covers almost thif whole of northern Europe?, Britain is a corner lot on fft# wes( of the Continent. King Edward VII rules over not lest than one hundred nations, ernbfStfing over 400,000,000 inhabitants; the Czar, once known as the Duke or Muscovy, has by sheer weight rolled sixteen European people into one masa> and several more in Asia. Therea deal of ignorance about Russia ? and trie humour of the Russians has be'ef> lo Wcp if »p. When Shakspere wrote of IjAMLET the Dane, an historical ess.7yi st h as pointed out, king, warrior; ai?d father of Hamlet the Prince, as smitulj* * ?*®dd«d Polack on the ice’ —the Russians, it may be said, were not —the iTtajesty °‘ Poland w. 13 that mosfrfeared, t? e which kept in check the drea'dea Turks, and afterwards wa^. to sa\'s Europe from them by a battle under the walls of Vienna.” It is noUci very long ago in our 3s far® hack as the reign of “ Grdod Queen Bess.” In 1862 St. Petersburg* Said # millennial festival of the foundation of the nation. It is true, according to f«# same authority, that in 863 Rorick, a Varangian, had fought and .taken Novgorod, and that three years later Michael, Entpefdf of the ‘East, Sent from Constantinople Greek monks, Papas or Popes, who eVSngshsea some few of his rude followers arid g#ve them an alphabet—not unlike thaf or'iß« Greek?, but with several addition** letters —which they still keep which is called Cyrillian, from CysiC the monk, to this day. Two followers of Rurice conquered -Kiew or.Kief, sad the unioa of this territory with Novgorod is given by some a» tit# origin of the modern Russia v Ole©* a chief who, as usual in forceffl! time#, had stabbed and done away with other chief?, was no sooner securely seat#*? in the Kiew as Governor to the sort of Rurick, whom he put aside, than he sighted for fresh conquests. He fought with the wandering tribes around hint, and imposed his arms from the Baltic to the Crimea. Having heard ao much from the christianising monks of the hlessmgs of learning and peace among the Constantinople Romans ooder their meak Emperor, the philosopher Leo, Oleg determined to attack hint/ 1 He frightened Leo, who offered 1 him peace, good advice . fnd many presents. He took all, hung

his buckler over the gates of Constati* tinop’e, and, while the pious Emperor swore on the four Evangelists to keep his treaty, Oleg swore bis elastic oith by his own great god of thunder, Peroun ; then, reserving Constantinople as a future tit-bit, he turned 4* practice his soldiers upbn ruder tribes, and some time after died, leaving the dispossessed son of Rukick as chief. Here, then, we have the nucleus of Russia certain wandering tribee brought and welded together by force of arms, having overrun .a vastemd barren'country, enabled by combination md discipline to move where they

pleased and annex what they chose; with no literature, no learning but an alphabet of forty-two sound-sigßs and diphthongs imposed by over-learned monks and very hard to acquire,, a people of Tartar race with a passionate love forjtheir chief, whom fhev v cafi«d Tzar, which probably was of tjiefsarae root with the Persian Shah and-, had no connection with the Roman

Caesars. The tide of conquest; - like 'ther tides, ebbs and flows ; 'that of

Russia- was exception to the rule,' blfl Mir tribes increased and stl 11‘planted £ wider foot. Beaten by Danes apa other Tartar tribes, their enemies mined them; and in 12531 AcE*ANifcie Newbki, or Nefski, a gtqat hero', was mad* Grand Prince ( p£ Russia by the Tartars. ' Tani&rl/ne, the Great Tartar, invaded. arx& conquered part of Russia in 1595 a.but dght years after that IvaN, or John, laid the foundations of the, jjressrtt dynasty, introducing gunpowder and firearms into Russia only fifty yeart after they had been used at the battle of Crecy by the French and EngllsK. Henceforward the gradual development of Russia was to be mO'O permanent. The assumption of the title of Czar is ascribed by some historian* to (van 111, undoubtedly a great sow* reign, in the year 1463, and by others to Ivan IV., in 1538. Five years earler than that date Ivan IV, ■siw> named the Terrible, had ascended th»throne. In 1579 he proposed aia alliance by marriage -with Queen Elizabeth, but this offer was net entertained by her Majesty. (To be Continued.)