serfage bloom fully into slavery.

But in the latter half of the eighteenth century Russia gained a ruler
from whom the world came to expect much. To mount the throne, Catharine
II had murdered her husband; to keep the throne she had murdered two
claimants whose title was better than her own. She then became, with her
agents in these horrors, a second Messalina. To set herself right in the
eyes of Europe, she paid eager court to that hierarchy of scepticism
which in that age made or marred European reputations. She flattered the
fierce deists by owning fealty to "_Le Roi_" Voltaire; she flattered the
mild deists by calling in La Harpe as the tutor of her grandson; she
flattered the atheists by calling in Diderot as a tutor for herself.

Her murders and orgies were soon forgotten in the new hopes for Russian
regeneration. Her dealings with Russia strengthened these hopes. The
official style required that all persons presenting petitions should
subscribe themselves "Your Majesty's humble serf." This formula she
abolished, and boasted that she had cast out the word serf from the
Russian language. Poets and philosophers echoed this boast over
Europe--and the serfs waited.

The great Empress spurred hope by another movement. She proposed to an
academy the question of serf emancipation as a subject for their prize
essay. The essay was written and crowned. It was filled with beautiful
things about liberty, practical things about moderation, flattering
things about the "Great Catharine"--and the serfs waited.

Again she aroused hope. It was given out that her most intense delight
came from the sight of happy serfs and prosperous villages. Accordingly,
in her journey to the Crimea, Potemkin squandered millions on millions
in rearing pasteboard villages, in dragging forth thousands of wretched
peasants to fill them, in costuming them to look thrifty, in training
them to look happy. Catharine was rejoiced, Europe sang paeans--the
serfs waited.

She seemed to go further: she issued a decree prohibiting the
enslavement of serfs. But unfortunately the palace intrigues, and the
correspondence with the philosophers, and the destruction of Polish
nationality left her no time to see the edict carried out. But Europe
applauded--and the serfs waited. Two years after this came a deed which
put an end to all this uncertainty. An edict was prepared ordering the
peasants of Little Russia to remain forever on the estates where the day
of p