ar poet, "give relief, and call us to new
exploits." Russia was compared to a strong giant who awakes from sleep,
stretches his brawny limbs, collects his thoughts, and prepares to atone
for his long inactivity by feats of untold prowess. All believed, or at
least assumed, that the recognition of defects would necessarily entail
their removal. When an actor in one of the St. Petersburg theatres
shouted from the stage, "Let us proclaim throughout all Russia that the
time has come for tearing up evil by the roots!" the audience gave way
to the most frantic enthusiasm. "Altogether a joyful time," says one who
took part in the excitement, "as when, after the long winter, the genial
breath of spring glides over the cold, petrified earth, and nature
awakens from her deathlike sleep. Speech, long restrained by police and
censorial regulations, now flows smoothly, majestically, like a mighty
river that has just been freed from ice."

Under these influences a multitude of newspapers and periodicals were
founded, and the current literature entirely changed its character. The
purely literary and historical questions which had hitherto engaged the
attention of the reading public were thrown aside and forgotten, unless
they could be made to illustrate some principle of political or social
science. Criticisms on style and diction, explanations of aesthetic
principles, metaphysical discussions--all this seemed miserable trifling
to men who wished to devote themselves to gigantic practical interests.
"Science," it was said, "has now descended from the heights of
philosophic abstraction into the arena of real life." The periodicals
were accordingly filled with articles on railways, banks, free-trade,
education, agriculture, communal institutions, local self-government,
joint-stock companies, and with crushing philippics against personal
and national vanity, inordinate luxury, administrative tyranny, and the
habitual peculation of the officials. This last-named subject received
special attention. During the preceding reign any attempt to criticise
publicly the character or acts of an official was regarded as a very
heinous offence; now there was a deluge of sketches, tales, comedies,
and monologues, describing the corruption of the Administration, and
explaining the ingenious devices by which the tchinovniks increased
their scanty salaries. The public would read nothing that had not a
direct or indirect bearing on the questions of the day