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It required much courage, much zeal and devotion to profess a patriotic faith and to persevere in the great national work.
As to the masses, were they able to show their national spirit?
Once a Russian Reactionary and Centralist said, regarding the Ukrainian claims, that the people asked for none.
Later on a speaker in the fourth Duma (February 22, 1914) replied to this reactionary:—
"You close the mouth of the people, and then you say they ask for nothing, that they are quiet. 'They are silent because they are happy,' as Shevchenko ironically said. No, gentlemen, the Ukrainian people are not happy, and they will not be silent much longer; and, besides, when they are silent it is dangerous to take their silence for a sign of assent."
And that speaker was not a Ukrainian, nor even a friend of the Ukraine. On the contrary, he was one of her most ardent adversaries. It was Milioukoff.
Thus all popular manifestations were impossible. But all the same the people made themselves heard in the end.
(a) The Dumas.
The first Russian Revolution gave birth to the so-called constitutional régime. The elections for the first and second Dumas were not based on universal suffrage, which was a great disadvantage for the Ukrainian people, who are entirely democratic. Nevertheless, it was sufficient to make the opinion of the people heard. Out of the 120 deputies sent by the Ukraine to the first two Dumas more than half were Ukrainians.
Nearly a century and a half after the summoning by Catherine II of the assembly of deputies, of which we have spoken, the Ukrainian deputies repeated what had been said then; they demanded afresh the return of the liberties of the Ukraine, which again must become a separate State, enjoying the most extensive political
