UNSETTLED STATE OF RUSSIA.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XIV, Issue 135, 7 June 1879, Page 6

UNSETTLED STATE OF RUSSIA.

The Russian capital is depressed and gloomy owing to the harsh measures which the Government is enforcing. The military are in a constant state of alarm. After 9 o'clock in the evening nobody will be at liberty to show himself in the street without a certificate, upon which must be written and attested the place from which bearer comes from, and where he is going. Every day we hear grenades exploded in the streets. The intentions of the Nihilists are, we believe, to keep the police in a state of constant excitement, and at last tire them out, or lull to sleep with the idea that danger has been exaggerated. They also reckon on harsh measures and arrests, producing discontent among many people who when the time comes for a grand attack on tho 'Government would join the revolutionists.

On the night between Friday and Saturday seditious placards were found stuck up in the vicinity of the theatre, and at corners of the busiest streets, and although the city police and detectives hurried up and tore down the manifestoes they nevertheless appeared, anew as though conjured forth from the walls by enchantment. Passers by stopped to read the bills, and in this one night the police arrested upwards of 150 persons.

Since the attempt on the life, of the Czar troops have been held in readiness day and night. In every regiment two" companies in marching order, equipped with ball cartridge and all other accessories requisite for active operations, are kept constantly under arms, batteries stand ready horsed and mounted in the barrack yards, squadrons of every cavalry regiment stand in constant readiness to mount, and day and night divisions of Cossacks patrol the streets. . l '

Da the 16th a peasant was arrested, in whose pockets were found dispositions for revolutionary troops. According to this document active preparations were to' commence on the night between the 16th and 17th. Instantly the Government ' made most extensive preparations for defence. The Grand Duke , Nicholas, took up his quarters with his entire staff in the offices of the general staff . opposite the Winter Palace. In the riding school of the guards regiments of Hussar Guards were quartered while the barracks of the Pleutoff and Preobrajenski regiV ments were crammed full of troops, and the whole' artillery guard received orders to hold itself in readiness for immediate action. Troops continued several days and nights in the places assigned them, but the revolution did riot break, and probably the whole story of .the intended outbreak was an intentional mystification.

The Kief correspondent of a St. Petersburg journal, gives the following account of the outbreak among political prisoners and persons under arrest in Kief prison; — It was resolved some time ago to tunnel undet the walls and escape. The scheme was betrayed by one of the conspirators, but the authorities allowed the prisoners to continue the excavation, and when the tunnel was complete, and the prisoners had entered it one after another, intending to come up through the opening beyond the prison precincts, soldiers previously posted at the opening shot the escaping prisoners as they came up, and when the bulk of the prisoners, terrified by noise of the firing, stopped and remained in the tunnel, soldiers were sent in from behind, and the unfortunate wretches, caught between two fires, were all shot dbwn. The proceeding seemed to give the officials much amusement, and the director of the Kief prison was praised and decorated for having acted with such cleverness and decision.

A correspondent declares that out. of 500. prisoners detained in prison 200 died within four mquths.