institutions have all grown out of real, practical
wants keenly felt by a large section of the population. Cautious and
conservative in all that concerns the public welfare, we regard change
as a necessary evil, and put off the evil day as long as possible, even
when convinced that it must inevitably come. Thus our administrative
wants are always in advance of our means of satisfying them, and we
use vigorously those means as soon as they are supplied. Our method of
supplying the means, too, is peculiar. Instead of making a tabula rasa,
and beginning from the foundations, we utilise to the utmost what we
happen to possess, and add merely what is absolutely indispensable.
Metaphorically speaking, we repair and extend our political edifice
according to the changing necessities of our mode of life, without
paying much attention to abstract principles or the contingencies of the
distant future. The building may be an aesthetic monstrosity, belonging
to no recognised style of architecture, and built in defiance of the
principles laid down by philosophical art critics, but it is well
adapted to our requirements, and every hole and corner of it is sure to
be utilised.

Very different has been the political history of Russia during the last
two centuries. It may be briefly described as a series of revolutions
effected peaceably by the Autocratic Power. Each young energetic
sovereign has attempted to inaugurate a new epoch by thoroughly
remodelling the Administration according to the most approved foreign
political philosophy of the time. Institutions have not been allowed
to grow spontaneously out of popular wants, but have been invented by
bureaucratic theorists to satisfy wants of which the people were still
unconscious. The administrative machine has therefore derived little or
no motive force from the people, and has always been kept in motion by
the unaided energy of the Central Government. Under these circumstances
it is not surprising that the repeated attempts of the Government to
lighten the burdens of centralised administration by creating organs of
local self-government should not have been very successful.

The Zemstvo, it is true, offered better chances of success than any of
its predecessors. A large portion of the nobles had become alive to the
necessity of improving the administration, and the popular interest in
public affairs was much greater than at any former period. Hence there
was at first a period of ent