The Russian government is autocratic inasmuch as over the larger part of the country it has simply succeeded to the position of the Mongolian khans who from the thirteenth to the fifteenth century held the Russian people in subjection.

But the sad pictures he drew in it, occasionally and almost as it were accidentally, of the wretched position occupied by the great masses of the people, then groaning under the weight of that yoke which has since been removed, stirred the heart of Russian society with a thrill of generous horror and sympathy; and the effect thus produced was all the more permanent inasmuch as it was attained by thoroughly legitimate means.

This is the more remarkable inasmuch as his character had many traits in common with the ardent spirits of the Romantic group.

It is the more unfortunate inasmuch as an admirable French translation of the work was afterwards made by M. Delaveau[B].