itself with getting up a phantom insurrection in Herzegovina,
preparatory to an attack upon Turkey. Nor is it a secret that a
Bulgarian Committee of Insurrection, affiliated to Russia, had been in
existence at Bucharest for years previous to the late war. All these
propagandistic intrigues were in a measure designed to occupy some of
the more active minds in Russia, who hesitated, between home reform and
Panslavistic ambition.

The Czar has indulged in his warlike enterprizes, but he has deceived
himself in his calculations as regards home policy. All his frightful
spilling of blood abroad has not been able to prevent the formation and
extension of what is called the Nihilist Conspiracy. Side by side with
his wars, the Secret League has grown apace, overshadowing all his
glory. So extensive have the ramifications of that Conspiracy become
that the liveliest interest is now awakened as to its origin and its
earliest germs.

In the nature of things it is impossible, at present, to speak with full
certainty on this subject. The Russian revolutionists, being engaged in
a desperate struggle, have neither the leisure necessary for writing
such statements; nor is it their interest to go into details. Judicial
inquiries have lifted, here and there, some corner of the mysterious
winding-sheets in which the secret _Vehme_ is enveloped. But more light
can only be expected after the Conspiracy has been entirely crushed,--in
which case, however, owing to the heroic silence which its adherents
generally maintain, a great deal of knowledge will for ever be buried in
the grave,--or the fuller clearing up will come when, as I would fain
hope, this fierce struggle ends with a triumph, whether complete or
partial, of the cause of freedom.

Even under the iron rule of Nicholas, there were, many years after the
St. Petersburg insurrection of 1825, still some faint traces of Secret
Societies, in which the spirit of Pestel and Murawieff was continued.
One of these occult Leagues was that of Petrascheski, detected in 1849,
whose members were sentenced to forced labour and to banishment to
Siberia. A nearer approach to the plebeian element than was observable
in the Conspiracies of 1817-25, characterized this later association.
Altogether the more educated classes gradually began to seek closer
contact with the people at large.

This task was in so far facilitated by the tyrannical Czar-Pope
Nicholas, in that he not only trod under foot tha