The “well-intentioned Emperor” very solemnly and tersely expressed his adherence to his father’s policy, so far as Poland was concerned, as we have already seen; and therefore we are not surprised to find that the much be-praised amnesty, published by him at his coronation, in August, 1856, and which recalled from Siberia those of the victims of the November revolution, who had survived their twenty-five years of suffering there, is rather unsuited for close inspection. It pompously declared that all then suffering penal sentences for the revolt of 1831, should be immediately restored to their hereditary rights and titles—always excepting their forfeited property. Princes might abandon the wheel-barrow at Nerchintsk; nobles might throw down the trowel with which they had been labouring at the walls of Omsk; the chains might be struck from their ankles, and they might return to the land of their birth, to be addressed as “your highness” and “your grace,” and if strength enough were left to them, to secure perhaps the place of steward or huntsman under the German parvenu or Russian Dvoramin, to whom their hereditary domains had passed in the interval. But that was all.
We have still to cite another of the Second Alexander’s decrees, perhaps more insulting in its irony than those fulminated by Nicholas himself. After referring to the confiscations which had taken effect during his own and his father’s reign, in consequence of the rebellion in 1830, his Imperial Majesty proceeds, “as there may be still property legally liable to forfeiture, we, wishing to give a new proof of our clemency on the anniversary of our beloved son, Nicholas Alexandrovitch attaining his majority, ordain: that all state prosecutions with reference to the “resumption” (escheature) of forfeited property shall from henceforth cease, and only those actually commenced prior to the present date (the 8th of September, 1859), concluded in the usual manner . . . . . All such property shall pass to the natural heirs without even excepting those persons actually incriminated in the rebellion: always provided they have since obtained pardon, and have returned to our domains.”
A curious example of magnanimity! After twenty-nine years of unremitting prosecutions and persecutions, aided by all the supple machinery of Russian police and Russian espionage, the Czar declared he would stay his hand—would spare the vanquished; would, in short, be “un bon prince,” and as every one was beggared, would, in fact, wait for a more profitable employment of his severity.
Many emigrants in France and elsewhere applied to the Russian embassies for authorisation to return home after the publication of this amnesty. Four among them, whose names had escaped the lynx eyes of Russian justice, became thus unhappily the cause of their own ruin; three out of the four were refused permission, but their property in Poland was seized without delay: the third obtained a full and complete pardon; but, a few weeks after his return, the administration in like manner confiscated all he had possessed in Poland before enjoying the imperial clemency, which thus reduced him from affluence to poverty. Those who return are the especial objects of police surveillance, and must hold themselves constantly prepared to be awakened at midnight, without previous warning, and to depart for Siberia—as a precautionary measure.
At the coronation of Alexander, pardon was also granted to all Russians sent to Siberia between 1826—29, for participation in Pestal’s conspiracy: twenty-six of the whole number were still living. The same decree further declared that political offenders from the Western Guberniums, who were suffering penal sentence in Siberia in consequence of the revolt of 1831, and “who, by their good conduct have obtained the approval of the local authorities to return to their homes, . . . should be permitted to do so, and further receive restitution of all their previous rights and immunities, always excepting those affecting real or personal property.”
Another decree, published August, 1856, extended this amnesty to the same class of prisoners from the kingdom of Poland; but the apparent generosity vanishes wofully when we learn the conditions imposed on the recipients.
Clause VI. declares: “If the aforesaid persons, condemned for political offences, satisfactorily prove their repentance by irreproachable conduct, they shall receive a diminution of their sentence, or be exempted from exile in Siberia, and allowed to reside in certain localities appointed them in Russia proper. Others shall be at liberty to settle in any part of the empire, except Petersburg and Moscow.”
Those who were allowed to avail themselves of this amnesty, after an expiation of twenty-five years, had still to endure strict police surveillance for another five years, in whatever district of the imperial dominions they might dwell; when this period of probation had passed, worn out with age and sufferings, they might crawl back to their desolate homes; and, if very submissive and grateful, they were allowed to die on Polish soil.
On the 19th of February, 1860, Alexander gave a supplementary ukase to the admiring world. It was the same in character as that for the Western Guberniums, which appeared in September, 1859. His Majesty declared that his joy at the majority of the young Czarowicz needed further demonstration, and that he would therefore benignly extend the clemency accorded to the ancient Polish possessions to the kingdom itself. He decreed that all escheatures, founded on the revolt of 1831, should thenceforth cease, and that only those offenders should be prosecuted whose delinquencies had been discovered prior to September 8th, 1859. Of course, in the kingdom of Poland, just as in the Lithuanian provinces, the number of victims obtainable from the revolt decreased in inverse ratio as time advanced, and Alexander was merciful at very little cost.
Such are the moral characteristics of Russian ukases. We may learn by those of the present Emperor how to estimate his generosity. His justice was aptly illustrated but a short time since by a massacre of unarmed men and women in the streets of Warsaw; his wisdom by a midnight conscription which brought on the present rebellion; and his magnanimity by those orders which
