Not at all discouraged by this failure, nor by the discovery of its secret printing-press by the police, the Executive Committee next tried to attain its object by an explosion of dynamite in the Winter Palace when the Imperial family were assembled at dinner.  The execution was entrusted to a certain Halturin, one of the few revolutionists of peasant origin.  As an exceptionally clever carpenter and polisher, he easily found regular employment in the palace, and he contrived to make a rough plan of the building.  This plan, on which the dining-hall was marked with an ominous red cross, fell into the hands of the police, and they made what they considered a careful investigation; but they failed to unravel the plot and did not discover the dynamite concealed in the carpenters’ sleeping quarters.  Halturin showed wonderful coolness while the search was going on, and continued to sleep every night on the explosive, though it caused him excruciating headaches.  When he was assured by the chemist of the Executive Committee that the quantity collected was sufficient, he exploded the mine at the usual dinner hour, and contrived to escape uninjured.* In the guardroom immediately above the spot where the dynamite was exploded ten soldiers were killed and 53 wounded, and in the dining-hall the floor was wrecked, but the Imperial family escaped in consequence of not sitting down to dinner at the usual hour.

* After living some time in Roumania he returned to Russia under the name of Stepanof, and in 1882 he was tried and executed for complicity in the assassination of General Strebnekof.

For this barbarous act the Executive Committee publicly accepted full responsibility.  In a proclamation placarded in the streets of St. Petersburg it declared that, while regretting the death of the soldiers, it was resolved to carry on the struggle with the Autocratic Power until the social reforms should be entrusted to a Constituent Assembly, composed of members freely elected and furnished with instructions from their constituents.

Finding police-repression so ineffectual, Alexander II. determined to try the effect of conciliation, and for this purpose he placed Loris Melikof at the head of the Government, with semi-dictatorial powers (February, 1880).  The experiment did not succeed.  By the Terrorists it was regarded as “a hypocritical Liberalism outwardly and a veiled brutality within,” while in the official world it was condemned as an act of culpable weakness on the part of the autocracy.  One consequence of it was that the Executive Committee was encouraged to continue its efforts, and, as the police became much less active, it was enabled to improve the revolutionary organisation.  In a circular sent to the affiliated provincial associations it explained that the only source of legislation must be the national will,* and as the Government would never accept such a principle, its hand must be forced by a great popular insurrection, for which all available forces should be organised.  The peasantry, as experience had shown, could not yet be relied on, but efforts should be made to enrol the workmen of the towns.  Great importance was attached to propaganda in the army; but as few conversions had been made among the rank and file, attention was to be directed chiefly to the officers, who would be able to carry their subordinates with them at the critical moment.