[From a Russian Correspondent]

Russian papers mention a great personage who, on overhearing some discussion about the possible conclusion of peace, observed significantly that the time was too serious for jokes. Whoever the personage may be, we may bless him for his remark. Yet English people discuss the possibilities of peace without any consciousness that their talk cannot be regarded as serious. There is evidently an insurmountable difficulty on the part of Englishmen to understand the way in which we regard this war in Russia. Were it not so we should hear less of the hopes so freely expressed and so thoughtlessly cheered that foreign advices might guide Russia in bringing our war to a close. In England you have evidently forgotten all about the object of the war in the eagerness with which you have followed its details. The death-struggle in Bulgaria and Armenia is to you what a gladiatorial combat was to the pampered populace of ancient Rome. You sit as spectators around the arena, cheering now the Turks and then the Russian, as if these brave men were being butchered solely to afford you an exciting spectacle. Tired at last, you cry “Enough, enough! clear the ring! Pass on to some other sport!” But had you not ignored the nature of the fight you would never ask to do that. It is not a mere gladiator as war. It is not a duel between two Powers about some punctilio of offended honour, which might be satisfied—as Mr. Freeman so well says—by the killing of a decent number of people. Were it either of these things there would be some reason for the tragedy to close, for it would have been a crime from the first. But the war in which my countrymen are dying by thousands, so far from being a crime, was the only means for attaining an end the righteousness of which all Europe has admitted.

We did not make the war for the sake of war. We sorrowfully but resolutely accepted that terrible alternative because we had no other chance, since ill-advised Turkey would not listen to the voice of justice. To us it would be a crime if, after having begun the work, we were to draw back without having accomplished the object which alone justified so terrible an undertaking. Hence all this talk of mediation, intervention, conferences, and of peace proposals sounds to us as mere mockery. There can be no peace until we have attained our end, and that we can not do until we have completely freed the Christian Slavs. The war to us is a cruel reality, instead of merely a theatrical spectacle. We bear the blows the mere sight of which unnerves you. It is our hearths that are darkened by the shadow of death. Yet in all Russia you will hear no cry for peace until our duty is fulfilled. I grieve to say Russia has its Beaconsfields; but, as I have already said, they are in a minority, and they become what they ought to be—thoroughly Russian, when asked to die for their country. Amongst the heroes whose deaths Russia deplores were people who—thanks to foreign influences, thanks to an idle, unoccupied life—became estranged from national interests; but their hearts throbbed afresh on hearing cries for help in accents of agony, and on seeing with their own eyes the appalling miseries of their brethren. This war brings out to daylight the best, the noblest elements of my country. Our armies are appreciated by the whole world. Colonel Brackenbury’s eloquent tribute to the Russian character, published by the Times (December 1st), carries with it such a strong conviction of its absolute accuracy, and it cannot be read without producing feelings of sympathy and admiration. As a Russian I read and re-read it with deep emotions of gratitude. But there is another side of the question, which, although seldom mentioned by the press, deserves the highest praise—I mean the part played in the war by the Russian women. From the highest to the lowest rank, regardless of any social differences, they devote themselves entirely to the relief of the sick and wounded, both on the field of battle and at home. In fact, the Red Cross Society includes in its ranks the whole womanhood of Russia. This spirit of self-sacrifice and devotion is shown even by those who, before the testing moment, appeared to be utterly lost in worldly, frivolous pursuits.

Yes, this grand war has given a new impulse to Russian life, a deeper feeling of higher missions in this world. Someone has said that life was nothing but an examination one had to pass in order to die nobly and to prove that we did not make a bad use of the greatest privilege given to mortals—that of moral liberty. My countrymen and countrywomen are passing their examination splendidly; and the Slavs—the cause of this new heroism of the whole of Russia—have claims upon our gratitude as much as upon our sympathies!

In vain we try to pierce the impervious veil which conceals the future, but we know that our Tsar is the very incarnation of his nation, and that the fate of the Christian Slavs is in noble and generous hands. The result of the war no Russian can for one moment doubt. Come what may, the Slavs will be freed. All “possible terms of peace” that do not include the ejection of the Zaptieh and the Pasha, bag and baggage, from the Balkans are manifestly impossible. Deluded and obstinate as the Turk is, he will not go out until he is beaten à plates coutures.

After the barbarian is swept away the task of reorganising the Government of these lands will be much simplified. It will not be impossible to maintain sufficient order in the province while its inhabitants are gradually acquiring, like the Serbs and Roumans, the habit of self-government. As to Constantinople, even if the fortune of war should compel us to enter that city, we should compel us to enter that city, we should enter it as the Germans entered Paris, to celebrate a triumph, not to make an annexation. Our Emperor’s word upon this was solemn and conclusive.

The refusal to believe such an assurance from such a man implies an incapacity to understand the very existence of good faith. Only souls darkened by their own deceit are blind to the rays which stream from the sun of truth. Certain suspicions reflect discredit only upon those who entertain them. The nobler England is above such unworthy distrust. We have no more ardent sympathisers than the foremost of English statesmen and scholars. Take, for instance, the letter from Sir George Cox, published on the 4th inst., in which he proposes that Englishmen who are determined that right and justice should be done should address the Czar personally, and tell him “that in the great work of freeing Europe wholly and for ever from the defilement of Turkish rule we heartily wish him and his people ‘God speed,’ and that we wait impatiently for the day when the Russian Emperor shall proclaim the freedom of the Christian subjects of the Sultan in the city of Constantine. There only can the work be consummated; and there, by establishing European law, and then withdrawing from the land which he shall have set free, he will have won for himself an undying glory, and, what is of infinitely greater moment, he will have done his duty in the sight of God and man.”

Roumania stretches as a barrier between us and the soil of Turkey which we are supposed to covet, and Roumania will not suffer for her alliance with Russia.

But in Asia? Well, it is a difficult question! I see the Guardian advises that we should annex Armenia. Mr. Forster and Mr. Bryce declare that for the Armenians Russian annexation would be a great change for the better. They received our troops as deliverers, and thousands accompanied them on their retreat into Russian territory. We cannot surrender these poor creatures into the hands of the Turks. What must we do, then? If we retire the Turk will return, and the last state of Armenia will be worse than the first. Russia is rich enough in territories already; but what are we to do about the Armenians? This difficulty is not felt by Russians alone, but is shared by Englishmen who have studied the question. One of those, whose name stands high in the literary world, remarked, the other day:—

“You have captured Kars thrice this century. Why should you give it up? The Germans did not give up Metz. They did not desire any conquest, they aimed at no aggrandisement; but they kept Metz as a safeguard against another war. Suppose you keep Kars, who has any right to complain? Not the Turks, for the victor has a right to the spoils. As for the other Powers, if they had helped you in your battle they might have claimed to be heard, but not now.”

Then there is Batoum. It is close on our frontier. It is notorious that it is solely due to a misspelling in an old treaty that it is not already ours. Why should we not rectify the clerical mistake of the transcriber? Batoum is the natural port of Russian Armenia. Its harbour is most frequented by Russian ships. It was certainly not worth while going to war for Batoum or Kars, and the Turkish fleet into the bargain. But now that we have had to go to war, is it not a moral duty to make the Turks pay as dearly as possible for the sacrifices which they have cost us? If we could punish the Turks without annexing any territory I would not annex either Kars or Batoum; but if that is the only way in which they can be punished, and the Armenians protected, my scruples against annexation may disappear.

There were many of us in Russia when war was declared who believed that the whole of the campaign would be simply a military promenade. Many said, “We will occupy Constantinople in June or July, and, after dictating in that capital our terms of peace, we will return home with the happy consciousness that we have arranged everything to our satisfaction.” But now we are in November; we have lost 71,000 men killed and wounded; we are spending millions and millions for the war, and we are not yet in occupation of Constantinople. The difficulty and costliness of the enterprise render it impossible for Russia to secure any adequate compensation for her sacrifices. We may get some kind of a war fine—and it is well to distinguish between a war fine and compensation. We have made great sacrifices, and we may yet have to make still greater should Lord Beaconsfield succeed in arraying England against us; but the liberation of the Slavs is now certain. Between the status quo ante bellum and the present lie too many precious graves for it ever to be restored. Our military promenade transformed itself into a gigantic burial procession; but when its end is attained our regret for the brave who have fallen in the fight will be rendered less poignant by the joy with which we shall hail the resurrection of the Southern Slavs.

December, 1877. O.K.