he villages to teach the serfs, help them with
their labor, minister to them in sickness and to make their condition
better in every way possible. Thousands of boys and girls of gentle
birth flocked to the Russian Universities and from there went to
befriend the serfs. Throughout the younger generation a different
feeling existed toward the common people than ever before in Russian
history.

Catherine's father himself was liberal in his views and had already
done what he could to alleviate the sufferings of his former bondsmen.
When Catherine came to him and told him that she did not think that she
could endure living in idleness any longer, but desired to support
herself, he consented, and the girl who all her life had been used to
the greatest luxuries went away to become a governess in the house of a
nobleman, where she could live honestly by the fruits of her own labor.

Her father did not long consent to this, however, and helped her to
open a boarding house for girls, where she taught school until she was
twenty-five years old when she was married. Her husband was a young
nobleman who sympathized with her liberal ideas, and himself had done a
great deal to better the condition of the Russian people. He helped his
wife work for the peasants and began a cooperative banking scheme by
which they might benefit.

But Catherine grew more and more discontented with the terrible
conditions that surrounded her on every side. She happened to go to the
city of Kiev to visit her sister and she took her meals at a student's
boarding house. She heard a great deal of discussion of the condition
of Russia there and saw a great many young students who were interested
in public affairs. And one day she held a secret meeting of students in
her room to talk over what more could be done to make Russia a better
place to live in.

While the younger generation had been striving in every way possible to
help the serfs, the Russian Government did all in its power to hinder
them. This government was then an absolute autocracy, which means that
it was under the complete control of one ruler and a few advisors. The
Czar of Russia knew that when his people grew better educated and more
enlightened his own power would grow less, so he did all that he could
to keep them in the state of darkness and ignorance in which they had
languished for centuries. When young noblemen and girls sought to teach
or help the peasants, they met with obstacles