History of Russia

In the summer of 1891, the wheat and rye crops having harvested but seventy percent of the average yield, a famine seized upon a scattered area tributary to the Volga, covering a territory of thirty thousand square miles, with a population of twenty-five million souls, and whole villages perished before food could be shipped and distributed. While private individuals and foreign governments came nobly to the relief of the sufferers with cash and kind, the liberality of the contributions from the United States evoked special acknowledgment. Besides gifts of money, four ships were dispatched laden with flour, bread stuffs and clothing, valued at over one million roubles, equivalent to the support of seven hundred thousand persons for a month. About this time, an encounter between a Russian expeditionary force and one thousand Afghan soldiers, over a disputed fight of way in the passes of the Pamirs, created a diversion from domestic woes, and aroused a good deal of excitement in India as well as in England. When it became known, however, that Russia was merely expelling intruders from her own territory, European political equanimity was restored.

Few incidents of an alarming character now disturbed the surface peace of Alexander's days. The drastic measures resorted to in the treatment of the Terrorists seemed, for a time at least, to have hypnotized them into a state of acquiescence, and the only conflict that Russia had upon its hands was a tariff war with Germany, and a misunderstanding with Great Britain on account of the poaching by Canadian sealers within the thirty mile marine limit in Behring's Sea. A commercial treaty, however, concluded in Berlin, in which Germany made the necessary concession, and an arrangement with the British Government, by which sealing was to be provisionally regulated, offered a peaceful solution of both these difficulties. This, together with a modus vivendi  agreed on between the United States and England, with the co-operation of China and Japan, would, it was believed, promote pelagic interests in the north Pacific.

The Cossack outrages on the Catholics were carried to such an extreme in 1894 that papal protests ensued. In an autograph letter to the Pope, the Czar promised that peace should be preserved. The pledge, however, was either not respected, or its fulfillment was found to be impossible. The attacks were repeated.

The progressive commercial treaty concluded with Germany instituted a new era in tariff reform, while it brought Dr. Witte, the Finance Minister, in direct but brief conflict with the Czar, who had set his heart upon the expansion of trade relations with Germany, it also aroused the opposition of a large wing of German politicians who resented Emperor Wilhelm's announcement that "rejectment of the treaty by the Reichstadt meant, not only a tariff war with Russia, but later a war of actual hostilities."

At this time, a veritable war cloud darkened Europe's horizon, and the attitude of nation towards nation, was not only watched with dread suspense, but with deep diplomatic interest. The Emperor Wilhelm's visit to England was viewed by the Czar with ill-concealed jealousy, while he threatened to break Russia's commercial treaty with France, on account of a dispute over the corn duties. The theater of anarchist plot having been temporarily transferred to Paris—culminating in the assassination of President Carnot—extended to Alexander a slight surcease from personal anxiety, and opportunity for needed physical rest.

In April the betrothal of the Grand Duke Nicholas—heir apparent to the throne—to the Princess Alix of Hesse, was announced and in August the Grand Duchess Xenia, only daughter of the Czar, was married to the Grand Duke Alexander Michailovitch at Peterhoff. The condition of the Czar's health now caused the gravest apprehension, and the darkest forebodings filled the minds of the people. As the forbidding character of the Russian landscape has exerted a marked influence on the ethnological characteristics of the people, so it has also contributed to the national pessimistic character of the race. "The music of Russia," writes Noble, "has a plaintively pessimistic ring. Even the cries of the street peddler are more like wails of anguish. Repression and somberness are the distinguishing features."

In September the malady from which Alexander was suffering assumed a more malignant form, and he repaired with the Empress to Livadia. On October 10th he was told by Professor Zacharias that there was no hope. Bright 's disease in an aggravated form had set in; it was now apparent that the Czar was doomed. On the afternoon of November 1st, All Saint's Day, the booming of cannon at Livadia and St. Petersburg announced that Russia's autocratic ruler had passed away.