local customs.

The rod however may only be used on the strong who are able to bear it. Of petty matters their jurisdiction is extensive, covering those concerning communal rights, inheritances and other matters growing out of the peculiar organization of rural communities. Appeals are allowed to the assembly of cantonal rural chiefs in civil cases, where imprisonment or corporal punishment is imposed. By the reforms of Alexander II justices of the peace elected by the district zemstvos had jurisdiction over all minor civil cases involving five hundred roubles or less and criminal cases punishable by one year's imprisonment or three hundred roubles fine, but by the ukase of 1889 these, except in the great cities, were abolished and in lieu of them the office of rural chief was created for each volost with substantially the same jurisdiction, and also various administrative duties. These chiefs must be landowners belong to the local nobility and are paid a salary by the state. They are nominated by the governor of the province on consultation with the marshal of the nobility of the district and confirmed by the Minister of the Interior. The chief has supervision of the financial and police affairs of the commune and nominates the members of the peasants' volost court. From the decisions of the chief an appeal lies to the district assembly of canton chiefs. They receive in rural districts 2,200 roubles per year. The district courts, which are given general original jurisdiction in both civil and criminal causes, have three judges and a jury. The judicial reforms of Alexander II, which unfortunately have not been steadily carried into effect, contemplated the complete separation of judicial from administrative powers and public trials on the oaths of witnesses with the aid of advocates, following the most advanced models of western nations. Of these district tribunals there were in European Russia about sixty, and over them nine appelate courts located at St. Petersburgh, Moscow, Kazan, Saratof, Kharakof, Odessa, Kief, Smolensk, and Vilna. In trials by jury the court answers to the law and the jury only as to the facts. The unexpected acquittal of Vera Zassulich for the murder of General Trepof resulted in subsequent denial of jury trial in simi

lar cases, which were transferred to a department of the senate or heard before a military court. Reforms in the judicial system from the time of Catharine II to the present have been introduced modified and abandoned, and with the theory of a complete centering of executive, legislative and judicial power in the Czar still fully recognized, all innovations are to be looked on as tentative. Until the judiciary becomes independent of the will of the Czar, no permanent separation of powers can be assured. The ministry are still afraid of an independent judiciary, and the system of appointments is calculated to insure a degree of subserviency in the courts. The vast empire is ruled in fact by the ministers and their agents.

In the actual administration of the government the police department plays a most important part. There are two classes of police officers, one the regular under the Minister of the Interior, the other political, directly under the Czar himself. In the districts into which the provinces or governments are divided the chief officer is the ispravnik, a police officer. From the time of Catharine II till the emancipation these officers were elected by the nobility, but are now appointed by the governors. A great multiplicity of duties devolve on the police officers. Through them all administrative orders must be executed, conspiracies must be detected, conspirators arrested and prosecuted. They are health officers, censors, prosecutors in the lower courts, overseers of recruits and soldiers of the reserve and supervisors of passports. In the small towns and country there is no protection against the arbitrary exercise of their authority. It was through the famed Third Section of the Chancellery, the state police, that the arbitrary autocratic powers of government were mainly exerted. Though this has been in form abolished, its substance is still preserved, and police agents enter dwellings, as well as all other places, at any time of day or night without process, and make searches, seizures and arrests at will. The governors of provinces close at will any industrial establishment, forbid an individual to reside in a city, and take political suspects away from the regular courts. The government

may at any time place any province or district under a "state of extraordinary protection" under the most arbitrary military rule. By administative decree the publication of any periodical or other publication may be suspended or prohibited, and an educational establishment may be closed. In every city of any importance there is a colonel or captain of police to whom no place may be closed and from whom nothing may be concealed. His business is to keep all under surveillance, officials as well as citizens. To aid him he has secret agents scattered everywhere. Every indiscreet remark is reported, often with direful consequences.

The main purpose of the Czar in maintaining his secret police was to have a system through which he could keep informed of the doings, not merely of his subjects in general, but of the officials of the empire as well. Of all the difficulties under which an autocrat ruling a vast empire labors, none is greater or of more moment than that of gaining reliable information concerning the multiplicity of affairs which he is called on to direct. A secret police, composed exclusively of trustworthy and upright men, would be of incalculable value to him, but made up of corrupt and unreliable ones it becomes a means for perverting the best of intentions on the part of the ruler.

The constitution of Russian society, while now undergoing some changes, is still essentially the same as for several hundred years. More than eighty per cent of the total population are classed as peasants and live mainly in their rural villages, mirs. The mir is, and has been from a date long anterior to the establishment of the empire, a democratic self-governing community. It holds its lands in common and pays its dues to the government as a unit. The affairs of the mir are managed by an assembly including the heads of all the families. The tillable lands are divided and apportioned to each working unit. Women charged with the support of a family are entitled to take part in the assembly. Between the members of the community there is equality of right in the village property, but the culture is not in common. Pasture lands, and in some cases meadow and timber lands, are used in com

mon, the hay of the meadows and trees of the forest being divided for use. The custom of building their dwellings in village form has long been maintained, and communities which have settled in the United States have brought this custom with them. In the settlement of the affairs of the mir unanimous agreement is required. All are required to attend meetings of the mir. The majority may not enforce its will on the minority. The assembly of the mir may be convoked by the call of any one. The chief officer is the Starosta, who is paid by the mir and is charged with the preservation of order in the community. He supervises the roads, manages the communal funds, the schools and hospitals if any, and any other public institutions of the mir. He looks after the collection of the taxes and deals with the government officials in payment of public dues and other matters. He is a general police officer and arrests persons charged with offenses. He is the general business representative of the mir, but in all things he is its servant, not its master and must carry out its orders.

A collection of mirs, varying to include from six hundred to four thousand persons who were formerly charged with poll tax, is called a volost. At the head of this is a starschina, elected by representatives of the mirs, who holds for a term of three years. He is assisted by a board, volostnoye pravlmye, made up of all the starostas of the mirs or their assistants or special representatives chosen by the mirs. Important matters are decided by this board and minor ones only by the starosta. Aside from these officials the mirs and board employ such agents as their affairs require and pay them for their services. An important personage in the mir is the clerk, who keeps its records, and though without any recognized authority, by reason of superior education often wields great influence. The scarcity of persons able to write frequently makes it necessary to bring a clerk from without.

The volost assembly elects the judges, appoints representatives to district assemblies, and provides 'for roads, schools, hospitals and public works which a single mir cannot undertake. The assembly of the mir has power to discipline its

members, even to expel them, and to admit new ones. Meetings are usually held in the open air and are without any set form of procedure. Sunday after mass is a favorite time of meeting. While unanimous agreement is necessary to a decision in the mir, a majority may decide in the volost assembly.

Similar in principle to the peasants' commune is the artel, a name given to an association of workmen engaged in the same trade and working in concert. A head man is elected by the members, who represents the artel in its dealings with employers and the outside world. The wages earned by all are equally divided among the members. The artels are usually small, seldom exceeding twenty in number, and they expel and admit members at will.

All nobility in Russia starts from official station. Two sorts are recognized, hereditary and personal. The hereditary from the time of Peter are the officers of the army having the grade of ensign or higher and civilians of equal grade and their descendants. Inferior public servants belong to the personal nobility and are merely free citizens. The number is necessarily very great, about six hundred thousand hereditary and three hundred and fifty thousand personal. The feudal system never obtained in Russia, and it has no nobility of the kind developed in western Europe having hereditary political power. There are fourteen grades of rank. From the time

of Peter special dignities have been conferred by special diploma making about one hundred counts, some fifteen princes and sundry barons. Titles are inherited equally by all the children. There is no primogeniture. Till the time of Alexander II the nobility enjoyed, in common with the merchants and clergy, the privileges of exemption from military conscription, payment of poll taxes and corporal punishment. Of these the first has been taken away, and the others have ceased to be distinctions through the abolition of the poll tax and flogging.

Prior to the emancipation act of February 19, 1861, the title to the lands of the empire was mainly in the nobility and the crown. There was assigned to each village a tract for the cultivation and use of its inhabitants, but they were bound to