Show 10 I 1 people ire are passive and unfathomable yet their love of independence pen Den dence proff promises ses briant futures futura Fu N 1816 emperor alexander I 1 of russia wrote mote to Stein helt then governor gen general al of F inland finland in t the be following ter terms ni As regards the conditions of ali finland iland my intention hns has been to give this people a at political existence so that they may bof not feel eel themselves conquered by russia but united to her for their own clear advantage therefore not only their heir civil but their poll political laws must bo be maintained today a century a after the those so words word s ware were written there seems at I 1 last ast good hope that alexander Is intention may lied be perm permanently fulfilled writes rosalind travers hyndman Hynd nian in new york sun v A raco race pt of Alon mongolian jolla n origin and language language the or people of the tens fens were chris p tiani zed very early in the thirteenth cantu century ry by the swedes who treated them tn on the whole with equality and justice and intermarried Inter married with them f freely edly not however allowing the finnish language langua geto to be written or spoken to any extent th the 6 result was that tn in 1808 russia conquered a people who spoke swedish and regarded themselves as independent swedes and although the finns have passed through enormous national changes inthe in the course of the century russians of the ruling classes could never get it our of their ahelf heads that finland desired to belong to sweden again the governors of russia having much vaster affairs in hand band did not realize that ahe remarkable development of finnish nationalism was directed first and last against the swedish language and finno swedish domination tho the finnish language was wag spoken only by the remote peasantry antry and finnish names even were not legally recognized yet meanwhile a great movement was steadily growing up tor for th the e revival of fin lands own singularly rich rind and beautiful tongue tho finnish people began to think of their country as something utterly distinct from Swe denor russia having a language ani and literature of lt its sown own from 1849 onward when lonnroth published the second I 1 edition of the kale rala Fin lands national epic educated finns were to give up swedish as a means of communication muni cation catlon and learning to use the strange difficult sonorous sono ious language which was their birthright naturally this development soon cleft the country in two many ri finns inns urged not u unreasonably areas p bably that it was hardly practicable for so small a people to cut themselves off from scandinavia from russia from the rest of europe in fact by clim climbing on to a language island in this way but nationalism triumphed in 1883 1803 the nice little constitution granted by alexander 11 II left the finns free to govern themselves in all internal matters in a fairly represent attye manner and from this time tho the study of finnish became an integral part of the general education the use of the revived language of finland grew so fast fasi that speaking finns began k to 0 o find themselves in a minority and in 1894 after a very hot debate the finnish language was placed on an equality with swedish in they inland se senate n koman swede F fann inn and finnish finn became cries of wardnie warf nie and the language conflict fell roughly into line with the divisions of class the progressive and prole tartan tarlan elements inthe country were alla the middle class conservative arid and aristo contic forces were lor for along a long while by speech and t traditions swede all this time the finns as a people and as a nation kept strictly to that policy of detachment and independence which aich has always marked thern them they took no part at all in russian affairs and showed little interest tn in those of scandinavia they appeared to europe generally as self cen as a chinese colony ln in th the west eWest might be finland meant bennt to work out her salvation alone rn in literature andara and art inde indeed ed the country was open to european influences for the F finns inns have always been great travelers tray elera elers wandering about abou t the continent with cold appraising eyes selecting and taking back with them thern such idea as they confide considered red likely to be of use they took tool political ideas also from scandinavia and from germany but they iad had no desire to make propaganda for their own ideas or their own race yet inevitably they were bound to be a growing trouble to the russian government ani and a stumbling block bloc k to pan slav policy obviously codr ay iy a democratic and almost self governing province was out at place among the folds of the vast autocratic rule which covered all the then nut but a far rowe more important objection was waa this the duchy of 0 lilien alien n language character and administration gasn wasn was a complete break in that scheme of one one vast homogeneous russia stretch ng from the norwegian coast to the pacific one language lows laws religion and govern government men t that t brenin bigit tit giant unity and monotony which seems in fi have hae filled the minds of the directors of russia for 80 years reals wid more there seems little doubt that the deposed dynasty cherished this design as the did that of mattel europa it was MRS a buge dull magnificent mischievous idea trampling even more widely over the rights of other nations and intended to produce an even more dismal uniform uniformity m ity of rule so dispassionately viewed and tho the finn even when consloe considering 1 ang his own misfortunes is eminently dispassionate dussias Rus sias first attack upon the liberties st f finland in 1890 was inevitable a catastrophe of nature there is little need to recall the bad years from 1899 1809 to 1000 when tho the finnish constitution was ius suspended and the country was placed under the rule of a military dictator general Do dobrinoff Bob rikon brIkoff they form a monotonous s record of press censorship dismissals dismissal of native officials illegal arrests arresta and exile tho the great strike of 1906 how however ever hunsuc in its ite main objects Sch loved two wage things iv q A v i g e av s 1 m 4 ln mw 13 elf A 9 ca m R Z 4 the election of the russian dumn duma and the temporary restoration of Fin lands constitution yet restored Is hardly the word for that restricted lestric ted cautious and eminently bourgeois constitution of oc 1803 was resurrected into something democratic anti and tl terrible a popular government based upon full adult suffrage and proportional representation with nn an elected house containing tit at its first ns its sem blage in april 1007 1907 80 social democrats democrats out of a total of and these were genuine uncompromising marxist social democrats the outcome ot of n party which was first formed in 1899 since then the social democratic representation of finland has haa steadily increased at every election F from rom the spring of 1907 to that of 1009 finland experienced two crowded years of glorious life in which the country simply hummed with internal progress and political development the old feuds of koman and were taken up with renewed vigor although the swedish speaking finns were now only one ninth of the population and still decreasing we all remember how in may 1910 members bers of the british parliament signed a mC memorial mOrIal to the dumn duma the apprehension with which they regarded the pro proposal Dosal to deprive finland of her constitutional rights while a large number of jG german erman french italian belgian and dutch dufach deputies formed and addressed similar memorials but all tills this was in vain and by july 1010 the bill for the of finland became ct law it was not immediately and violently put into practice the lindt dag was still assembled at intervals ter vals though it had rather less power than a municipal council A number of official dimis dismissals took place russians were given full finnish rights in finland and tho the usual series of arrests imprisonments and exi lings followed but until 1912 1012 the finnish press was only intermittently censored however tins this second series of bad years was much harder for the finns than the period of 1899 1000 soon after the war began finland was practically cut off from the civilized chill zed world set in with full force and the most stringent censorship of the press of correspondence and of nil fill written matter whatever was established even the internal business of the country suffered greatly and the whole people were put under hatches asat as it were and assuredly on very short rations for an unlimited time one piece of news only came through in the early days of the war to the effect that the dowager empress of russia had returned from denmark by way of finland and had shown much courtesy and common sense on her passage it was said that she had caused her personal guard to he be greatly relaxed that she had talked with finns everywhere and had taken pains to create a good ampre impression slon but shortly after her return the finns were specially dally and officially warned not to build any false hopes of restored liberty upon the friendly demeanor of the dowager empress naturally this ill III advised policy has had very bad results at the beginning of the war many finns were in favor of the allies chiefly by reason of their english trade connect connections lons and english a s j but when dussias Rus sias abst PC powerful y ind necessary ally forbade to say one word in wr favor avor of a reasonable treatment of finland and i when nhen the english press by its undiscriminating praise of all things thing russian actually gave more strength to the powers of reaction then the finns cannot be blamed for looking elsewhere re a their exiles flocked to germany in great num bers and it Is said that more than F inns took ur un their residence there the germans tire are further credited with making active actie e propaganda tor for their cause among the p professors sors rind and students of F inland finland but it ii seems doubtful whether they would really have found it worth while when the allies themselves were unconsciously doing so BO much to german sympathies there ii if M but no one can say more than it if F inland finland was occasionally used as a channel for comment j cation between germany and the traitorous party in russia the allies have only themselves to blame however this may be it seems pretty clear that ej j there were kye several ral german agencies in more than t one part of finland trying to sti stir rathe the people up ji to an armed revolt since alace our reactionary cresp at one time took upon itself to repeat the venerable ene rabIe and discredited cliches about Fin lands desire for independence j or for union with sweden it la Is well to cay once more that Fin lands great nationalist movement Z fi was all directed against swedish influence and al j that there are not five wiseacres wise acres in the whole country who would dream of the possibility of r suet such a union nor lia has s the fiercest advocate of T r finnish freedom ever contemplated absolute in dependence the position of the country and its very small population wholly for forbid bid it surely this tiny nation has a magnificent future I 1 it may even be possible for them highly trained t and politically ily qualified as they are to hurry ja through the intervening stages stage of their economic y H development and show to europe the working model of a operative cooperative co commonwealth they are in the main mongolians Mongo lians patient passive secret and unfathomable and their kinsmen in japan arid and chinn china have done equally par marvelous marv clous things j T 4 yet alien from us ua as they ore are racially their development Is so western weste rn that no englishman who has spent much time in finland has any sense ot of a race barrier on the contrary they seem once known curiously appe appealing aling and sympathetic this 1 brave ugly little people with their high cheek check bones great foreheads and deep set eyes their literature like their landscape ts Is extraordinarily tra ordinarily varied and beautiful and there runs 5 through it a sense of the timeless forests and the unbounded north it haunts you yon no one who hns has felt the charm of finland la Is really content tul till he aea sees the land of thousand lakes again y |