Under Alexander III. the period of partial reform, thanks to the industry of MM. Pobiedonostseff, Katkoff, and Count Ignatieff, and the indecision of their Liberal opponents, gave way to one of reaction in all directions. In administrative matters Alexander III., despite the advice of so firm a believer in the divine origin of kingship as the German Emperor William I., reverted to the methods of his own grandfather, Nicholas I.: the press censorship was revived, the village communes were placed under the absolute power of the police, flogging was restored as an instrument of “educating” the peasants; and the very mention of the Czar Liberator’s name became a punishable offence. At the same time the work of Russification proceeded, and side by side with the policy of racial uniformity was carried on a crusade for religious conformity. ♦1880–1890♦ Panslavism rooted out the national institutions and language of the Baltic provinces; Panorthodoxy stamped out their heretical and schismatic doctrines. The Holy Synod in 1893, inspired by the Imperial Procurator, M. Pobiedonostseff--who, though a layman, wielded an absolute control over the Russian Church and was by his opponents nicknamed “Lay Pope”--demanded the suppression of Protestants, Roman Catholics, Mohammedans, Buddhists, and other dissenters throughout the Empire. The thirteen years of Alexander III.’s reign form one of the gloomiest pages in a history not remarkable for brightness. ♦1894♦ Comparative tolerance followed upon the Czar’s death, and high hopes were built on the reputed liberality of his successor, Nicholas II. But these hopes have never been fulfilled. On the contrary, obscurantism continued to reign supreme, and of late years the Panslavist and Panorthodox programme has been vigorously pursued in the Caucasus, in Poland, and in Finland, as well as among the Buddhists of the trans-Baikalian district. In all these provinces national institutions have been attacked with a remorseless fury and a brutal thoroughness worthy of the Inquisition in its worst days. The Armenian Church was plundered,[155] and Russian bishops were inflicted upon a population whose language they did not understand. The Tartars, once loyal and contented, were roused to appeal to the Sultan of Turkey and the Western Powers for relief from the tyranny of the Czar. In their petition these Russian Mohammedans describe how their religious tribunals have been suppressed, how their children are forced into Russian schools, how when serving in the army they are made to eat food condemned by the law of Islam, and how they are compelled to observe Christian festivals and to abandon their faith.[156] But in no part of the Empire was more systematically repeated the process which, under Alexander III., had achieved the Russification of the Baltic provinces than in Finland. Nothing more inhuman or more insane than Russia’s treatment of that country has been known in Europe since the revocation