RUSSIA'S INTERNAL STATE.

Waikato Times, Volume XIV, Issue 1224, 4 May 1880, Page 2

RUSSIA'S INTERNAL STATE.

A Home paper says :—"Trustworthy accounts received ke re within the last few clays represent the interior condition of Russia as becoming daily more critical. One of them states that the return of the Empress to St. Petersburg, in spite of her precarious condition of health, was caused by the anxiety she experienced as regards the position of the Imperial family. The feature upon which particular stress is laid, in the reports I have read to-day, is the disaffection of a certain number of superior officers, some of them high in command. Those who failed to obtain promotion and honours after the late war have, with few exceptions espoused the revolutiunary cause, and General Todleben's admonition to the Odessa garrison some months ago, docs not seem to have proved an effective oarrier to Nihilist propoganda, either amongst officers or men. The Russian army cannot bo kept inactive for any length of time with impunity. Nothing can be more dull and unentertaining than the existence of Russian officers at home outside St, Petersburgli, Moscow, and a few of the large towns. There is no scope for intellectual culture, or rational social recreation, aud the only resources that are left are gambling and politics. The former is necessarily limited to the means of such as indulge in it, and when once they are exhausted, nothing remains but politics. That is comparatively an unexplored field for the officers in the Czar's service, and the chiefs of the revolutionary movement both in and out of Russia have for some time past concentrated their efforts on making it attractive. 1 have seen specimens of Nihilist literature especialy destined for military consumption, in which it is explained that the revolution counts upon the co-operation of the army, and that those officers who throw in their lot with the people may rely upon their gratitude. Fame, fortune and honors are in store for them, and no matter what their rank may be, no matter how obscure their origin, their reward is certain. It is impossible to say how such seditious prose as this finds its way to the remote parts of the Russian Empire, but there can be no doubt that it does. Nor in presence of the accounts that have been received here is it possible to deny that it has had a deep and wide-spreading influence upon a large number of those into whose hands it has fallen.

A wise doctor always keeps his temper, even if he loses his patients. Love is proverbially blind ; but a girl loses nothing if she allows a little common sense to mix with it. Many a girl has had her whole happiness for life destroyed because she obstinately chose to form her estimate of the charaoter of a suitor exclusively from his behavior towards her and his professions of love, rather than from his conduct towards others. It is a pretty safe rule that a man whose whole life is but an exemplification of selfishness will not long cqu« tinue generous in relation to his wife.