principal task of the Government consisted in the "extirpation of
sedition," i.e., in carrying on a struggle not only against the
revolutionary movement but also against the spirit of liberalism in
general. In this connection, Ignatyev took occasion to characterize the
anti-Jewish excesses in the following typical sentences:

The movement against the Jews which has come to light during the
last few days in the South is a sad example, showing how men,
otherwise devoted to Throne and Fatherland, yet yielding to the
instigations of ill-minded agitators who fan the evil passions of
the popular masses, give way to self-will and mob rule and, without
being aware of it, act in accordance with the designs of the
anarchists. Such violation of the public order must not only be put
down vigorously, but must also be carefully forestalled, for it is
the first duty of the Government to safeguard the population against
all violence and savage mob rule.

These lines reflect the theory concerning the origin of the pogroms,
which was originally held in the highest Government spheres of St.
Petersburg. This theory assumed that the anti-Jewish campaign had been
entirely engineered by revolutionary agitators and that the latter had
made deliberate endeavors to focus the resentment of the popular masses
upon the Jews, as a pre-eminently mercantile class, for the purpose of
subsequently widening the anti-Jewish campaign into a movement directed
against the Russian mercantile class, land-owners and capitalists in
general. [1] Be this as it may, there can be no question that the
Government was actually afraid lest the revolutionary propaganda attach
itself to the agitation of those "devoted to Throne and Fatherland" for
the purpose of giving the movement a more general scope, "in accordance
with the d signs of the anarchists." As a matter of fact, even outside