436 Finnish army.— The Imperial House [1815-32

possession " for " possession ") ; but he soon gave a practical proof that these guarantees were not to be literally respected ; for, by a rescript of 1826, he extended to Finland the penalty of banishment to Siberia, and, by another of August, 1827, he formally declared persons of the Orthodox faith qualified to hold offices in the grand duchy. There could be no question of resistance, considering the defenceless state of the country. The Finnish army, or " Separate Finnish Corps," i.e. the national militia, was composed in 1825 of one regiment of riflemen, and two regiments of infantry, in all 3600 men, besides the battalion of the School of Cadets, 500 strong; these troops assembled once a year in the spring for six weeks' training. Under Nicholas I they were rearranged in two battalions — the Finnish battalion of Riflemen of the Life Guards and the Grenadier battalion of Riflemen. — to the number of 3000 men only; and from that time they were kept on a permanent footing. This small armed force could not protect the liberties of their country ; on the contrary, they were used to crush the liberties of others. By the express orders of Nicholas I the Finnish battalion of Riflemen of the Life Guards took part in the Polish campaign of 1831, and was obliged to fight against the Poles.

Alexander, in 1815, was 38 years old. His union with Elizabeth of Baden had produced no children ; and his relations with his wife, which were equivalent to a secret separation by mutual accord, excluded the possibility of his having any offspring. The successor to the throne was the second brother of the Tsar, two years younger than he, the Tsarevich Constantine. He also was without children, and openly separated from his wife, Anna Feodorovna of Coburg, who had run away from him in 1801. The heir next in order was, therefore, the third brother, Nicholas, who was much younger than the others, having been born on July 6, 1796. He was, at the suggestion of the Tsar, betrothed in the autumn of 1815, to the Prussian Princess Charlotte who took the name of Alexandra Feodorovna. Their marriage took place at St Petersburg in July, 1817; and of this union was born, on April 29, 1818, a son, Alexander, afterwards the Emperor Alexander II. This event was doubly important; it had a decisive influence on the question of the succession to the throne, and it greatly contributed to the maintenance of the close dynastic connexion between Russia and Prussia during the greater part of the nineteenth century. Shortly afterwards, as a result of negotiations which had lasted for several years, Constantine, with approval of the Tsar, obtained a divorce by decree of the Synod in March, confirmed by Imperial manifesto in April, 1820, after which (in May) he married, at Warsaw, a Polish lady, to whom he had long been deeply attached, Joanna Grudzinska (Princess Lovicz). But of this marriage, also, he had no children.

There had already been a proposal to transfer the succession to

1815-23] Renunciation of Constantine 437

Nicholas, who, in July, 1819, was privately informed by Alexander of this project; but no definite steps were taken towards carrying it out until 1822 (January 26), when Constantine, by request of the Tsar, handed to him personally in St Petersburg a formal letter of renunciation, admitting " that he possessed neither the courage, nor the capacity, nor the strength needed by a ruler," and referring to the expression of a similar intention made by him in March, 1820, during the divorce proceedings. It seems, however, that he did this on condition that the whole matter should remain a secret between him and the Tsar, and that he attributed to the document a purely contingent character. There exist even certain indications that he gave his renunciation mainly in view of the abdication of Alexander himself, a step which, in his later years, the Tsar had contemplated. It is clear, moreover, that if the Tsar had been convinced that the renunciation was irrevocable, the immediate publication of the letter would have ensued, and an official notification of the transfer to Nicholas would have been made to the people.

Alexander, without the knowledge of Constantine, gave instructions for exact copies of the letter to be made ; and he himself signed secretly (August 28, 1823) a manifesto, announcing the renunciation of Constantine and the right of Nicholas to succeed. These documents were then made up in four packets sealed with the Tsar's own seal, and with the superscription, in his own hand, " to be kept until required by me." The original was deposited in the Uspenski Cathedral in Moscow, and the copies with the Synod, the Senate, and the Council of State in St Petersburg. Of the contents of the packets he informed only three persons, viz. Philaret, Galitzin, and Arakcheieff; it appears, however, that Nicholas was apprised of the contents by one of them. Constantine probably knew nothing of what had taken place until the death of Alexander; and he did not yet regard the road to the throne as irrevocably closed to him.

Alexander in 1815, having victoriously terminated the struggle with Napoleon, had accomplished what had up to this time been the chief object of his life. During the next four years (1815-9), a fresh objective was afforded him by certain grandiose schemes of foreign and home policy, which he brought forward as part of a professedly Liberal policy. These were : the coercion of Turkey, and the furtherance of Greek aspirations ; the territorial expansion of the kingdom of Poland ; and the reorganisation of Russia in a spirit at once constitutional and federal — a spirit of reform and emancipation. The latter idea, which was first manifested in the Senatorial "inspections" and the projects concerning the Church and the peasantry, ultimately found expression in the instructions to frame a constitution for Russia, given by Alexander during his residence in Warsaw in 1818. The recipient of these instructions was the confidential agent attached to the Government of the kingdom of Poland, Novosiltsoff. The draft Constitution made by

438 Project of a Russian Constitution [1818-20

Novosiltsoff for the Empire was modelled partly on the Constitution of the kingdom of Poland. It provided for the division of the Empire into ten autonomous provinces, each under a Viceroy, possessing their own national Diets of two Chambers, elected every three years. There was to be also a central Diet in St Petersburg, or in Moscow, convoked every five years. This scheme, in its rough draft, was sent to the Tsar at St Petersburg by Novosiltsoff through Prince Viazemski in the summer of 1819 ; in October of the same year, while Alexander was in Warsaw, it was discussed by him with the author. All this was done without the knowledge of Constantine. At the same time Novosiltsoff, at the bidding of the Tsar, compiled for him an extract of the Acts of the Polish-Lithuanian Union promulgated at Horodlo, in the time of Jagiello (1413), and at Piotrkov, in the time of King Alexander (1501), which, with other indications, pointed to the inclusion of Lithuania in the kingdom. Yet, at the very same time, Novosiltsoff drew up for the Tsar the outline of an arbitrary manifesto, which, concurrently with the granting of a Constitution to the Empire, was to suppress the kingdom of Poland, and transform it into one of the Viceregal provinces, depriving it of its separate Constitution, and changing the name " Polish army " to " western army." In this way there were evolved in the unstable mind of Alexander the most contradictory projects, none of which was destined to be realised.

This period (1819-20) was extremely critical for Alexander. In it he showed a departure from the fantastic, yet, on the whole, progressive views he had held during the first years of peace; a return to reactionary measures, accompanied by self-absorption, which finally led to his hopeless entanglement in the net of his own psychological and political inconsistencies. This change was brought about by a series of unfavourable events and influences. In March, 1819, Kotzebue was murdered; in August an insurrection of the military colonists in Chuguieff took place, which was quelled only after much bloodshed. At the end of October the distinguished Russian historian Karamzin, an adversary not only of Polish independence, but of constitutional government and of the emancipation of the serfs, had a long conference at Tsarskoie Selo with the Tsar, earnestly warned him against the path he had chosen, and called upon him to return to the footsteps of Catharine II. In 1820 occurred the assassination of the Duke of Berry, and the revolutionary movements in Spain, Naples, and Portugal. Finally, while attending the Congress at Troppau in the autumn of the same year, Alexander received news of the insurrection of the Semenovski Regiment of the Guards, which had broken out in St Petersburg in October. This rising, albeit speedily quelled, gave a severe shock to the Tsar, though it had no political character, but was brought about by the ill-treatment of the rank and file by their colonel. The traditional use of the Russian Guards as an instrument of coups d'etat made any

1820-5] Death of Alexander 439

such outbreak a threatening reminder to the grandson of Peter III and the son of Paul.

Alexander had long been aware of the existence of secret societies in Russia and Poland; and originally, as has been said, he looked with some indulgence upon them. In 1821, after his return to St Petersburg from a long journey abroad, he received, on two separate occasions, information about the state of affairs among the confederates : first, in the form of a detailed report with the names of the conspirators and an account of their doings, from the Chief of the Staff of the Guards, General Benckendorff; and, next, a denunciation, also with full details, from the President of the Imperial Council, General Vasilchikoff. The Tsar, who, it seems, was already in possession of full details from another source, did not act upon either of these reports; he simply remarked to Vasilchikoff " ce nest pas d moi d sevir.'' However, he began, henceforth, to pay more heed to the reactionary voices ; he complied with the demands of the Synod, made arrangements for the change in the succession, and even contemplated abdication. He gradually became morose and suspicious, as he felt himself more and more isolated, not only in Europe, but among his people and even in his own family. A "sphinx, full of riddles to the end of his days" (so the Russian poet Prince Viazemski describes him), a crowned Hamlet, but even more deeply rent than Hamlet by his own emotions, conscious of his own moral participation in the assassination of his father, and now, in turn, threatened with retaliation by the conspirators, he was oppressed by the knowledge of his helplessness at home, and of the fruitlessness of his policy abroad; from year to year he felt the ground giving way under and around him. In August, 1825, fresh and alarming disclosures reached him of a conspiracy in the army. He received these disclosures, however, quite calmly, and did not take any precautionary measures. In September of the same year he left St Petersburg for the last time and proceeded to Taganrog. Here his health suddenly gave way. The rumours, prevalent at the time, of poisoning or suicide were entirely devoid of foundation, according to the statement of his private physician, Sir James Wylie. It appears, however, that he would not allow himself to be treated; he refused the medicines prescribed for him and thus hastened his own end. He died at Taganrog on December 1, 1825.

The news of the death of Alexander reached Warsaw on the evening of December 7, 1825. It was sent to Constantino, as Emperor, in the form of a humble report by the Chief of the Staff of the Southern Army, Diebitsch. Constantine was unwilling to accept the crown before the letter, by which he had renounced his rights to the succession, had been declared invalid; and he even wrote to Nicholas expressing his intention of fulfilling the undertaking contained in it, but without giving a clear and decided statement on the point. While not assuming the reins of

440 Nicholas and Constantine [1825

government, he, nevertheless, refrained from administering the oath of allegiance in the name of Nicholas to the official authorities, and to the troops in the kingdom of Poland and Lithuania. The news of the death of the Tsar reached St Petersburg on December 9. The minister of Justice, Lobanoff-ltostovski, as Procurator of the Senate, refused to open the packet deposited with the Senate, for, as he said, " les morts Vborib point de volonte"; in like manner, the packet deposited with the Synod was not opened; the Governor-General of St Petersburg, Miloradovich, who, as it appears, at that critical moment was taking the leading part in public affairs, declared himself definitely for Constantine; acting under pressure from Miloradovich, Nicholas himself took the oath of allegiance to Constantine; and it was thereupon also taken by the garrison of St Petersburg and the government officials.

However, at a meeting of the Council of State, Galitzin (doubtless not without an understanding with Nicholas) urged the opening of the secret packet, and the reading both of Constantine's letter and of the manifesto of Alexander. This was done, but, for the moment, nothing came of it. Moscow followed the example of St Petersburg; the packet deposited in the Uspenski Cathedral was not published, and the troops and authorities in Moscow likewise took the oath of allegiance to Constantine I — a course which was followed in Finland and the western provinces, including Vilna. Only in Grodno, owing to the express order of Constantine, the oath was not taken. In the meantime Constantine in Warsaw learned of the proceedings at the Council of State and the disclosure of his letter and, what was more important, of the manifesto of the deceased Tsar. His position as sovereign was thus, to a large extent, compromised, while at the same time he received disquieting information of the discovery of a conspiracy. Influenced by these events he finally decided to carry out his renunciation; on December 20, he sent an unconditional announcement thereof to Nicholas; this document reached St Petersburg on the evening of December 24. The accession of Nicholas I was then announced; and the interregnum of over three weeks at length came to an end.

Meantime the members of the secret societies, who had no detailed information about either the illness of Alexander, or the doubt as to the succession, were perplexed by the Tsar's death, and the complications regarding the succession which ensued. Finally, they resolved, although, at that time, they were not represented in large numbers in St Petersburg, to attempt a rising, profiting by the uncertainty of the situation and adopting, as their watchword, the rights of Constantine. This step, which they ventured upon, in spite of the advice of the more cautious members of their party, was taken principally under the influence of Ryleieff. Their intention was to force the Senate to issue a manifesto, convoking an assembly of national representatives