his
later Anarchist views, we still find him active in another political
direction. In a high-flown speech made at the Polish banquet on the
anniversary of the Warsaw Revolution (29th November, 1847), Bakunin
recommended the union of Russia and Poland in order to revolutionise
the former. The Russian Government thereupon demanded his extradition,
and set a price of ten thousand silver roubles on his head. In spite
of this, Bakunin escaped safely to Brussels. After the Revolution of
February, he returned to Paris, then went in March to Berlin, and in
June to attend the Slav Congress in Prague.

The question has not unnaturally been raised, What had Bakunin the
cosmopolitan to do at such an institution of national Chauvinism as
the Congress? What had the ultra-radical Democrat and sworn enemy of
the Czar to do with a congress held by the favour of Nicholas, and
visited by orthodox Archimandrites, by the envoys of Slav princes, and
privy councillors decorated with Russian orders? When the drama at
Prague ended with a sanguinary insurrection and the bombardment of
Prague, Bakunin disappeared, only to re-appear again, now in Saxony
and now in Thuringia, under all kinds of disguises, and (as those who
are well-informed maintain)[2] constantly occupied with the intention
of causing a new insurrection at Prague. Here too he was in
contradiction with the attitude that he had adopted both before and
after this event, for he must have known what a sorry part the Czechs
had played and still were playing as regards the Vienna Democracy and
the efforts for Hungarian emancipation.

[2] Karl Blind, "Vaeter des Anarchismus" (Persoenliche
Erinnerungen), 4 feuilletons in the _Neue Freie Presse_,
1894.

During the insurrection in May, 1849, we find Bakunin in Dresden, as a
member of the provisional government, and taking a prominent part in
the defence of the city against the Prussian troops. Bakunin here
appears as a champion of the very same cause that he had attacked at
the Prague Congress. After the fall of Dresden he went with the
provisional government to Chemnitz, where on the 10th of May he was
captured and condemned to death by martial law. The sentence, however,
was not carried out, since Austria had demanded his extradition. Here
he was also condemned at Olmutz to be hanged; but Austria handed this
offender, who was so much in request, over to Russia, which country
also wished to get hold of him. By a remarkable