social life with which the Revolution was concerned—­the political and the economic.  With regard to the first there was practical unanimity; he would be a blind slave to theoretical formulae who sought to maintain the thesis that class interests divided masses and classes here.  All classes, with the exception of the bureaucracy, wanted the abolition of Czarism and Absolutism and the establishment of a constitutional government, elected by the people on a basis of universal suffrage, and directly responsible to the electorate.

Upon the economic issue there was less agreement, though all parties and classes recognized the need of extensive change.  It was universally recognized that some solution of the land question must be found.  There can never be social peace or political stability in Russia until that problem is settled.  Now, it was easy for the Socialist groups, on the one hand, and the moderate groups, upon the other, to unite in demanding that the large estates be divided among the peasants.  But while the Socialist groups—­those of the peasants as well as those of city workers—­demanded that the land be taken without compensation, the bourgeois elements, especially the leaders of the zemstvos, insisted that the state should pay compensation for the land taken.  Judgment upon this vital question has long been embittered by the experience of the peasants with the “redemption payments” which were established when serfdom was abolished.  During the period of greatest intensity, the summer of 1905, a federation of the various revolutionary peasants’ organizations was formed and based its policy upon the middle ground of favoring the payment of compensation in some cases.

All through this trying period the Czar and his advisers were temporizing and attempting to obtain peace by means of petty concessions.  A greater degree of religious liberty was granted, and a new representative body, the Imperial Duma, was provided for.  This body was not to be a parliament in any real sense, but a debating society.  It could discuss proposed legislation, but it had no powers to enact legislation of any kind.  Absolutism was dying hard, clinging to its powers with remarkable tenacity.  Of course, the concessions did not satisfy the revolutionists, not even the most moderate sections, and the net result was to intensify rather than to diminish the flame.

On the 2d of August—­10th, according to the old Russian calendar—­the war with Japan came to an end with the signing of the Treaty of Portsmouth.  Russia had experienced humiliating and disastrous defeat at the hands of a nation far inferior in population and wealth, but infinitely superior in military capacity and morale.  The news of the conditions of peace intensified the ardor and determination of the revolting Russian people and, on the other hand, added to the already great weakness of the government.  September witnessed a great revival of revolutionary agitation, and by the end of the month a fresh epidemic of strikes had broken out in various parts of the country.  By the middle of October the whole life of Russia, civil, industrial, and commercial, was a chaos.  In some of the cities the greater part of the population had placed themselves in a state of siege, under revolutionary leadership.