The would-be "reforms" proposed in the interval, in the beginning of the forties, did not deceive the popular instinct.

The Jews of the Pale saw not only the hand which was holding forth the charter of enlightenment but also the other hand which hid a stone in the form of new cruel restrictions.

Soon the Government threw off the mask of enlightenment, and set out to realize its reserve program, that of "correcting" the Jews by police methods.
It will be remembered that the principal item in this program was "the assortment of the Jews," i.e., the segregation from among them of all persons without a certain status as to property or without definite occupations, for the purpose of proceeding against them as criminal members of society.

As far back as 1846 the Government forewarned the Jews of the imminent "bloody operation over a whole class," against which Governor-General Vorontzov had vainly protested.

[1] All Jews were ordered to register at the earliest possible moment among the guilds and estates assigned to them, "with the understanding that in case this measure should fail, the Government would of itself carry out the assortment," to wit: "it will set apart the Jews who are not engaged in productive labor, and will subject them, as burdensome to society, to various restrictions." The threat fell flat, for it was rather too much to expect that fully a half of the Jewish population, doomed by civil disabilities and general economic conditions to a life of want and distress, could obtain at a stroke the necessary "property status" or "definite occupations." [Footnote 1: See above, p.