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Rh Bieletski; behind them were arrayed the aristocratic latifundists and the old landed gentry.

The last pre-revolutionary Prime Minister of Russia was old Ivan L. Goremykin, a rich, lazy, and cynical snob.

The official career of this dignitary ran its normal course. He was several times Minister of the Interior, but was unfortunate enough to be disturbed by the first ripples of the revolutionary waves. The governors of various provinces inundated the Minister with their wires, but the man, lazy by nature, never read those "stupid" telegrams, as he called them, stowing them away in the drawers of his desk. Someone informed Emperor Alexander III of it, and he sent his aide-de-camp to inquire. The latter found whole heaps of even unopened telegrams, many of which were sufficiently disquieting and even alarming.

Goremykin was obliged to resign.

When, shortly before the revolution of 1917, Goremykin was, through the influence of Rasputin and the Empress, appointed Prime Minister, the Dowager-Empress exclaimed:

"This old Idiot again!"

But he was no idiot He knew every Inch of Russia, and the only escape from revolution he saw in the conclusion of peace with Germany. He threw all his influence in the direction of such a policy.