o be pedantic than a
genuine Russian. When I called on him one evening and reminded him of
his friendly offer, I found to my surprise that he had in the meantime
changed his mind. Instead of answering my first simple inquiry, he
stared at me fixedly, as if for the purpose of detecting some covert,
malicious design, and then, putting on an air of official dignity,
informed me that as I had not been authorised by the Minister to make
these investigations, he could not assist me, and would certainly not
allow me to examine the archives.

This was not encouraging, but it did not prevent me from applying to the
Governor, and I found him a man of a very different stamp. Delighted to
meet a foreigner who seemed anxious to study seriously in an unbiassed
frame of mind the institutions of his much-maligned native country, he
willingly explained to me the mechanism of the administration which he
directed and controlled, and kindly placed at my disposal the books and
documents in which I could find the historical and practical information
which I required.

This friendly attitude of his Excellency towards me soon became
generally known in the town, and from that moment my difficulties were
at an end. The minor officials no longer hesitated to initiate me into
the mysteries of their respective departments, and at last even the
Vice-Governor threw off his reserve and followed the example of his
colleagues. The elementary information thus acquired I had afterwards
abundant opportunities of completing by observation and study in other
parts of the Empire, and I now propose to communicate to the reader a
few of the more general results.

The gigantic administrative machine which holds together all the various
parts of the vast Empire has been gradually created by successive
generations, but we may say roughly that it was first designed and
constructed by Peter the Great. Before his time the country was governed
in a rude, primitive fashion. The Grand Princes of Moscow, in subduing
their rivals and annexing the surrounding principalities, merely cleared
the ground for a great homogeneous State. Wily, practical politicians,
rather than statesmen of the doctrinaire type, they never dreamed of
introducing uniformity and symmetry into the administration as a whole.
They developed the ancient institutions so far as these were useful and
consistent with the exercise of autocratic power, and made only such
alterations as practical necessity