otiators between the Government and the Jews in the cause of
Russification. In reality, the mission of the Society was carried out
within exceedingly narrow limits. "Education for the sake of
Emancipation" became the watchword of the Society. It promoted higher
education by granting monetary assistance to Jewish students, but it did
nothing either for the upbuilding of a normal Jewish school or for the
improvement of the heders and yeshibahs. The dissemination of the
knowledge of "useful subjects" reduced itself to the grant of a few
subsidies to Jewish writers for translating a few books on history and
natural science into Hebrew.

Even more circumscribed and utilitarian was the point of view adopted by
the Odessa branch of the Society. This branch, founded in 1867, adopted
as its slogan "the enlightenment of the Jews through the Russian
language and _in the Russian spirit_." The Russification of the Jews was
to be promoted by translating the Bible and the prayer-book into the
Russian language, "which must become the national tongue of the Jews."
However, the headlong rush for assimilation was soon halted by the
sinister spectacle of the Odessa pogrom of 1871. The moving spirits of
the local branch could not help, to use the language of its president,
"losing heart and becoming rather doubtful as to whether the goal
pursued by them is in reality a good one, seeing that all the endeavors
of our brethren to draw nearer to the Russians are of no avail so long
as the Russian masses remain in their present unenlightened condition
and harbor hostile sentiments towards the Jews." The pogrom put a
temporary stop to the activity of the Odessa branch.

As for the central Committee in St. Petersburg, its experience was not
less disappointing. For, despite all the endeavors of the Society to
adapt itself to the official point of view, it was regarded with
suspicion by the powers that be, having been included by the informer
Brafman among the constituent organizations of the dreadful and
mysterious "Jewish Kahal." The Russian assimilators, now branded as
separatists, found themselves in a tragic conflict. Moreover, the work
of the Society in promoting general culture among the Jews was gradually
losing its _raison d'etre_, since, without any effort on its part, the
Jews began to flock to the _gymnazia_ and universities. The former
practical stimulus to general culture--the acquisition of a diploma for
the sake of equal rights--was