mselves most dangerous. The agent through whom the exposure
had been made, by an ex-police chief, was an obscure Russian
journalist, Vladimir Bourtsev, who at once rose to international
prominence as the "Sherlock Holmes of the Russian Revolution." To
maintain his reputation he began with much publicity further
investigations and discovered a great number of smaller-fry spies in
the organization, with the result that all mutual confidence of the
members was broken and the organization went completely to pieces.

After this, 1907, little more was heard in foreign countries of
Russian revolution. Within Russia itself the university students who
had formed the best material for the working committees turned their
energies in other directions, degenerating into the notorious
"candle-light clubs" and other somewhat depraved practices with free
love as a basis.

Nor had anything occurred to revive the hopes of the friends of
Russian freedom when hostilities broke out between Russia and Germany
in 1914, and the greatest of all wars was precipitated. Certainly not
within revolutionary circles. Among the peasantry and the working
classes, indeed, and of spontaneous origin, there had appeared a great
economic movement, more directly revolutionary in character than the
more picturesque terrorist organizations. This was the cooperative
societies. In the towns and cities and the industrial centers they
took the form of consumers' organizations in which the people combined
their purchasing power and conducted their own stores for the supply
of their daily needs. These local societies again federated into the
Moscow Wholesale Society, which purchased in bulk for its
constituents. In the rural districts the peasants organized for the
purpose of marketing their produce jointly; this form of cooperation
was especially marked in Siberia among the dairy farmers. Then there
were the credit societies, cooperative banks which federated in the
Moscow Narodni (People's) Bank, and so had millions of rubles at its
disposal with which to finance more cooperative organizations. All
these societies were much restricted by the police, but they gained
enough headway to play an important part in the economic life of the
nation after the outbreak of hostilities and to become a big element
in the final revolutionary movement.

Closely akin to the cooperatives, and of much older origin, were the
Zemstvos. These local governing organizations were establ