“I don’t feel that,” said the man who belonged to no Party; “the difference between us and all Europeans and the Japanese seems to me to be a difference of kind; they are as different from us as bees are different from men. The difference between you and the Cadets is merely a difference of class and of education.” “I could get on perfectly well with the Cadets,” said the ex-official, “just as I could get on with the clerks who used to be in my office. If I were the Emperor I would prefer a Cadet Government to a Conservative one. But, for their weal or woe, Russia is not Cadet. The Cadets can reform Russia if they choose just as the Japanese can reform China. But just as the Japanese will never make the Chinaman Japanese in character, so the Cadets will never make Russia Cadet.” “I don’t agree with you,” said the Cadet. “The same argument might have been used by an _Intendant_ at the beginning of the French Revolution with regard to the Tiers État. They no doubt said then that the Tiers État represented nothing, because it had not been allowed to represent anything up to that moment. The same thing is true here. The Tiers État has been suppressed politically, and owing to this suppression it has burst out. It is far bigger than you think, because all your minor mandarins and some of your major mandarins belong to it and form part of it. Only yesterday I heard a reactionary complaining bitterly that all the officials in St. Petersburg sympathised with the Cadets, which was scandalous considering that they received Government wages. Besides this, the Cadets include all the intellect of the country and all the most intelligent men. They have partisans drawn from every class.” “I disagree with you,” said the man who belonged to no Party to the ex-official, “on different grounds. I believe the Cadets to be just as Russian as you are, in the sense of being different from mere Westerners. The other day a charming old Cadet gentleman whom I know had some friends to dinner. They began playing _windt_ at nine o’clock in the evening and they went on playing until eleven o’clock the next morning without stopping. In what other country would that happen? Certainly not in England or in France.” “Grattez le Cadet et vous trouverez le Russe,” answered the ex-official. “Perhaps if you scratch the Japanese you will get at the Chinaman.” “Surely not,” said the man who belonged to no Party; “but apart from this the antagonism between officialdom and the Tiers État is not a thing exclusively Russian. It has happened in every country. The end of the struggle is that officialdom or lawlessness is put under control. That is what is happening here. Peter the Great was the first Cadet, only he was self-sufficient and had need of no Party.” ST. PETERSBURG, _June 9th_.