Page:Lars Henning Söderhjelm - The Red Insurrection in Finland in 1918 - tr. Annie Ingebord Fausbøll (1920).djvu/25

 Russian soldiers even executed Finnish citizens without as much as asking the permission of the Finnish authorities. The pressure was insufferable, and the yearning for deliverance from the yoke of Russia became stronger and stronger. It was obvious enough that the passive method would not in these circumstances lead to the goal. Once—in 1905—it had brought victory to us, now another vista was before us, and the time for action seemed to have come. Now at least a more or less complete liberation from Russian suzerainty might be thought of and dreamt of. Endeavours of such a kind could not be called treasonable, for, on the one hand, Russia had time after time broken her pledges to Finland, and, on the other hand, it was quite clear of what military importance Finland was as the sole bridge to Western Europe, as a port to the fleet, and as the owner of Åland, and this was tantamount to the future exposure of Finland to a policy of Russification still more intense, if possible, than hitherto. Ways and means of interfering were considered, and several proposals cropped up. The plainest illustration of this natural effort of Finland to get out of the connection with Russia which was so destructive to her nationality and culture, was given already in the first year of the war by a number of volunteers joining the German army, where they formed a special battalion of chasseurs which, after having been drilled, was placed on the Eastern front.

For the rest, the war carried with it in Finland the same difficulties, the same shortage of food and abundance of money, the same change of values and fortunes as in the rest of the world. But one more phenomenon must be pointed out: the Russian fortification work in the country. This stupendous enterprise, directed against an eventual Swedish invasion or a German landing, consisted both in the surrounding of the most important