was designed to remind him of his renunciation. It is well known that Constantine received this reminder with great displeasure. He did not consent to declare publicly his abdication to the throne, but at the same time he did not make up his mind to contest Nicholas' right, thus accepting neither solution. As a result there was a sort of interregnum which lasted sixteen days and produced general confusion.

On the thirteenth of December, Nicholas received the news of the abdication of Constantine. It was immediately decided that on the following day-the fourteenth-the Senate and all the high dignitaries should take the oath of loyalty to Nicholas. The ceremony was to be performed at eight o'clock in the morning. Ryleyev learned of this on the evening of December 13 and without delay summoned all the conspirators. They made a decision to give no oath of allegiance to Nicholas, to lead all the regiments under their command to the Senate Square, and to demand a consitution. Indeed, when at dawn of December 14 the troops in Petersburg received the order to swear loyalty to the new tsar, the conspirators succeeded in carrying off with them several regiments, and when these appeared on the Square, cries for freedom and a constitution were heard among their ranks.

What happened on the Senate Square can be described in a few words. The rebels beat off the cavalry attack and continued to stand firmly, succumbing neither to exhortations nor threats, and were finally dispersed with grape shot. Retreating from the Square they attempted to rally on the ice of the Neva, but the cannons continued their bloody work, destroying every possibility of a serious resistance. The revolt was crushed and wholesale arrests were made. Nicholas severely punished the vanquished for the fear he had suffered during the uprising. Pestel, Ryleyev, Mikhail Bestuzhev-Ryumin, Sergius Muraviev-Apostol, and Kakhovsky were sentenced to capital punishment by hanging and were executed on July 13, 1826. One hundred and sixteen of the other conspirators, all belonging to the most cultivated class in Russia, were sentenced to banishment and hard

labor and were transported in chains to Siberia. All secret societies were suppressed, and the victory of the reaction was complete.

What was the meaning of the revolt of the Decembrists? Was there a possibility of a favorable issue which would have meant the triumph of civil and political liberty in Russia? The admissions of many Decembrists, as well as recently published documents of that time, clearly show that the conspirators had little faith in the immediate success of their undertaking. And this circumstance the doubt of the Decembrists as to the outcome of their movement-is to us a most illuminating revelation of a remarkable feature of their psychology. Doubting the realization of their plans, the members of the secret societies did not on that account weaken in the struggle nor cease to bend every effort toward an open revolt. They regarded their destruction as necessary for the awakening "of the Russians asleep," their death as a means of inspiring the development of Russian political thought, and they were ready to sacrifice themselves for the welfare of their country. A poem of Ryleyev clearly expresses this psychological attitude of the Decembrists:

'Tis known to me: ruin waits

On him who first revolts

To free the people from oppression.
Yet freedom is my destination;
Though where, tell me, and when
Was freedom, without ransom, gained?

I shall perish for my country's need-
This I feel, I know indeed,

And, Holy Father, joyfully

I bless my lot, my destiny.

Ryleyev well knew that he was going to his death. This, too, the others knew. The young prince, Odoyevsky, on the eve of the revolt, said to his friends: "We shall die, yes, but we shall die with honor." Pestel declared to the members of the Northern Society that ". . . . he would allow no one to save himself, that the larger the number of victims the greater would be the benefit-and he kept his word. To the

investigating committee he frankly pointed out all who had taken part in the society's activities; if only five instead of five hundred men were hanged, Pestel was indeed not in the least to blame. He did everything in his power to bring about the execution of all.3

It is clear that, in the face of such a frame of mind, the question whether or not they would succeed in overthrowing the government forces could have in the eyes of the Decembrists only secondary significance.

If then, considering the Decembrist revolt from this standpoint which to me seems to be the only correct onewe ask ourselves: Was the chief aim of the rebellion attained? Without hesitation we must answer in the affirmative, saying with Herzen: "The guns on the Senate Square awakened a whole generation."

Indeed, during many years stories of the daring of the Decembrists, of their courage and self-sacrifice for the good of the people, circulated secretly from mouth to mouth in families, in schools, and even in the higher government educational institutions. The impossibility of speaking openly about this attempt at revolution, of discussing the plans and aims of its promoters, the cruelty with which they were punished-all this surrounded them, in the eyes of the major part of the Russian society, with a halo of martyrdom. Even during the life-time of many of them, stories of their exploits and their fate had become legends working with secret strength on sensitive minds.

The spirit of the Decembrists lived on in Russia all through the nineteenth century and their example constantly incited others to imitation. The seeds of protest they sowed in the soil of their country put forth such strong roots that all the might of the autocracy, no matter how mercilessly it crushed the opposition, was not able to tear them out.

A hundred years has passed since the day of the revolt of the Decembrists. Four generations have disappeared in

Byloe, "Notes on the Decembrist A. M. Muraviev," The Past, No. 25, p. 275, Leningrad, 1924.

the grave. And what generations! How much thought, feeling, endeavor, strength, suffering, heroism, and selfsacrifice has been spent in the struggle for political liberty in Russia. Those were the generations of Belinsky and Herzen, of Turgenev and Tolstoy, Chernishevsky and Lavrov, Korolenko and Mikhailovsky, and many other opponents of existing conditions, who used thoughts and pens for their weapons. But there is still no political freedom in Russia. From the yoke of the tsars Russia has passed to the despotism of the Bolsheviki.

Throughout Russia the oppression of one class-now that of the proletariat-over all other classes of society is still felt. The movement for civil and political emancipation of the Russian people, which originated a hundred years ago, has not yet come to its fulfillment. So far as political freedom is concerned, present-day Russia as a whole, being ruled by one class, is little different from the Russia of 1825, in which it befell the Decembrists to live. But the most difficult and the longest part of the path to liberty has been traversed by the Russian people. When the propitious moment shall come, Russia will finally release itself from the bondage of the Bolsheviki and win civil and political freedom for each and every member of Russian society, whatever his station may be.

INTAGLIO

ETHEL BRODT WILSON

When the sky has turned a shell

Of turquoise luster and blue enameling,

And underneath,

The mountain is an opal

Of black slumbering,

And along the far horizon,

Blazes a flame of topaz

Above the skyline

Of the darkened mountains

Then bare trees

In matchless loveliness

Make upon the turquoise sky

Patterns of scroll and coral,
And the design of the oriole-

Graving, exquisitely,

Line on line, clear cut, fine,
An intaglio.