" In the darkest hour of the
barbaric dominion it was truer to say, "Scratch a Tartar and you find a
Russian." It was the civilisation that survived under all the barbarism.
This vital romance of Russia, this revolution against Asia, can be proved
in pure fact: not only from the almost superhuman activity of Russia during
the struggle, but also (which is much rarer as human history goes) by her
quite consistent conduct since. She is the only great nation which has
really expelled the Mongol from her country, and continued to protest
against the presence of the Mongol in her continent. Knowing what he had
been in Russia, she knew what he would be in Europe. In this she pursued a
logical line of thought which was, if anything, too unsympathetic with the
energies and religions of the East. Every other country, one may say, has
been an ally of the Turk; that is, of the Mongol and the Moslem. The French
played them as pieces against Austria; the English warmly supported them
under the Palmerston regime; even the young Italians sent troops to the
Crimea; and of Prussia and her Austrian vassal it is nowadays needless to
speak.
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