The murder of the Emperor had not at all the effect which the Narodovoltsi anticipated.  On the contrary, it destroyed their hopes of success.  Many people of liberal convictions who sympathised vaguely with the revolutionary movement without taking part in it, and who did not condemn very severely the attacks on police officials, were horrified when they found that the would-be reformers did not spare even the sacred person of the Tsar.  At the same time, the police officials, who had become lax and inefficient under the conciliatory regime of Loris Melikof, recovered their old zeal, and displayed such inordinate activity that the revolutionary organisation was paralysed and in great measure destroyed.  Six of the regicides were condemned to death, and five of them publicly executed, amongst the latter Sophia Perovski, one of the most active and personally sympathetic personages among the revolutionists.  Scores of those who had taken an active part in the movement were in prison or in exile.  For a short time the propaganda was continued among military and naval officers, and various attempts at reorganisation, especially in the southern provinces, were made, but they all failed.  A certain Degaief, who had taken part in the formation of military circles, turned informer, and aided the police.  By his treachery not only a considerable number of officers, but also Vera Filipof, a young lady of remarkable ability and courage, who was the leading spirit in the attempts at reorganisation, were arrested.  There were still a number of leaders living abroad, and from time to time they sent emissaries to revive the propaganda, but these efforts were all fruitless.  One of the active members of the revolutionary party, Leo Deutsch, who has since published his Memoirs, relates how the tide of revolution ebbed rapidly at this time.  “Both in Russia and abroad,” he says, “I had seen how the earlier enthusiasm had given way to scepticism; men had lost faith, though many of them would not allow that it was so.  It was clear to me that a reaction had set in for many years.”  Of the attempts to resuscitate the movement he says:  “The untried and unskilfully managed societies were run to death before they could undertake anything definite, and the unity and interdependence which characterised the original band of members had disappeared.”  With regard to the want of unity, another prominent revolutionist (Maslof) wrote to a friend (Dragomanof) at Geneva in 1882 in terms of bitter complaint.  He accused the Executive Committee of trying to play the part of chief of the whole revolutionary party, and declared that its centralising tendencies were more despotic than those of the Government.  Distributing orders among its adherents without initiating them into its plans, it insisted on unquestioning obedience.  The Socialist youth, ardent adherents of Federalism, were indignant at this treatment, and began to understand that the Committee used them simply as chair a canon.