e the law. In this manner St. Petersburg
reacted upon the cries of indignation which rang at that
time through Europe and America.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE EXPULSION FROM MOSCOW

1. PREPARING THE BLOW

The year 1891 had arrived. The air was full of evil forebodings. In the
solitude of the Government chancelleries of St. Petersburg the
anti-Jewish conspirators were assiduously at work preparing for a new
blow to be dealt to the martyred nation. A secret committee attached to
the Ministry of the Interior, under the chairmanship of Plehve, was
engaged in framing a monstrous enactment of Jewish counter-reforms,
which were practically designed to annul the privileges conferred upon
certain categories of Jews by Alexander II. The principal object of the
proposed enactment was to slam the doors to the Russian interior, which
had been slightly opened by the laws of 1859 and 1865, by withdrawing
the privilege of residing outside the Pale which these laws had
conferred upon Jewish first guild merchants and artisans, subject to a
number of onerous conditions.

The first object of the reactionary conspirators was to get rid of those
"privileged" Jews who lived in the two Russian capitals. In St.
Petersburg this object was to be attained by the edicts of Gresser,
referred to previously, which were followed by other similarly harassing
regulations. In February, 1891, the governor of St. Petersburg ordered
the police "to examine the kind of trade" pursued by the Jewish artisans
of St. Petersburg, with the end in view of expelling from the city and
confiscating the goods of all those who should be caught with articles
not manufactured by themselves [1]. A large number of expulsion followed
upon this order. The principal blow, however, was to fall in Moscow.

[Footnote 1: See above, p. 170 et seq., and p. 347 et seq.]

The ancient Muscovite capital was in the throes of great changes. The
post of governor-general of Moscow, which had been occupied by Count
Dolgoruki, was entrusted in February, 1891, to a brother of the Tzar,
Grand Duke Sergius. The grand duke, who enjoyed an unenviable reputation
in the gambling circles of both capitals, was not burdened by any
consciously formulated political principles. But this deficiency was
made up by his steadfast loyalty to the political and religious
prejudices of his environment, among which the blind hatred of Judaism
occupied a prominent place. The Russian public was inclined to atta