in a European State.”  In all other respects the serfs might be treated as private property; and this view is to be found not only in the legislation, but also in the popular conceptions.  It became customary—­a custom that continued down to the year 1861—­to compute a noble’s fortune, not by his yearly revenue or the extent of his estate, but by the number of his serfs.  Instead of saying that a man had so many hundreds or thousands a year, or so many acres, it was commonly said that he had so many hundreds or thousands of “souls.”  And over these “souls” he exercised the most unlimited authority.  The serfs had no legal means of self-defence.  The Government feared that the granting to them of judicial or administrative protection would inevitably awaken in them a spirit of insubordination, and hence it was ordered that those who presented complaints should be punished with the knout and sent to the mines.*** It was only in extreme cases, when some instance of atrocious cruelty happened to reach the ears of the Sovereign, that the authorities interfered with the proprietor’s jurisdiction, and these cases had not the slightest influence on the proprietors in general.****

     * See ukaz of October 7th, 1792.

** As an example of making presents of serfs, the following may be cited.  Count Panin presented some of his subordinates for an Imperial recompense, and on receiving a refusal, made them a present of 4000 serfs from his own estates.—­Belaef, p. 320.

     *** See the ukazes of August 22d, 1767, and March 30th,
     1781.

**** Perhaps the most horrible case on record is that of a certain lady called Saltykof, who was brought to justice in 1768.  According to the ukaz regarding her crimes, she had killed by inhuman tortures in the course of ten or eleven years about a hundred of her serfs, chiefly of the female sex, and among them several young girls of eleven and twelve years of age.  According to popular belief her cruelty proceeded from cannibal propensities, but this was not confirmed by the judicial investigation.  Details in the Russki Arkhiv, 1865, pp. 644-652.  The atrocities practised on the estate of Count Araktcheyef, the favourite of Alexander I. at the commencement of last century, have been frequently described, and are scarcely less revolting.

The last years of the eighteenth century may be regarded as the turning-point in the history of serfage.  Up till that time the power of the proprietors had steadily increased, and the area of serfage had rapidly expanded.  Under the Emperor Paul (1796-1801) we find the first decided symptoms of a reaction.  He regarded the proprietors as his most efficient officers of police, but he desired to limit their authority, and for this purpose issued an ukaz to the effect that the serfs should not be forced to work for their masters more than three days in the week.  With the accession of Alexander I., in 1801, commenced a long series