Persuading several other guard regiments to join them, they attacked Protopopoff's police squads. This event occurred at 5 o'clock in the afternoon of the 11th, and marked the beginning of the actual revolution. The fighting begun by the mutinied soldiers now became general. One by one other regiments were called out, but with very few exceptions all refused to fire on the people and joined the revolutionists. Then the Cossacks came over in a body. As twilight approached the firing in the streets became general and continuous. Meanwhile Michael Rodzianko, president of the Duma, made one more effort to avert the great crisis. The czar, having been assured by Protopopoff several days previous that all danger was over and the situation well in hand, had gone to army headquarters at the front. To him Rodzianko sent a telegram worded as follows: "The situation is extremely serious. Anarchy threatens in the capital, transportation of provisions is completely disorganized, and fighting has begun in the streets. It is of vital importance that a new cabinet be formed by some person enjoying the confidence of the people. Each moment of delay adds to the disaster. May the responsibility for a great national calamity not fall upon your head." To this telegram the czar made no answer. CHAPTER LXXX THE CULMINATION Meanwhile the deputies sat in session, helpless, regarding the situation with growing alarm. After all, the majority were naturally conservatives and feared revolution. As a matter of fact, they allowed themselves to lose grip of the situation. As has already been said, the uprising was not a blind force giving vent to elemental feeling, but a thoroughly organized revolutionary movement. The old revolutionary forces had awakened in time to take control of the developing situation. It was the leaders of the Social Democrats, the Social Revolutionists, the successors of the old-time Nihilists and the labor leaders, who were proving themselves masters of the situation. The Duma sat quiet, inert, and so lost its opportunity. It hated the dark forces on the one hand, it feared the revolution on the other, and at the critical moment helped neither. What saved it from being completely discredited was the fact that a number of the revolutionary leaders, such as Alexander Kerensky and Tcheidze, both Socialists, were also deputies in the Duma, and, being of well-balanced minds, realized that they must have the support of those elements which the Duma represented to succeed. The real center of government of the new democracy, then rising out of the birth pangs of the nation, was the Council of Workingmen's Deputies.