[1] Moreover, the Jewish masses, refusing to follow the lead of the handful of Russified Jewish intellectuals, live entirely apart and remain in the throes of talmudic fanaticism and hasidie obscurantism.

They "possess complete self-government in their Kahals, their own system of finance in the basket tax, their separate charitable institutions," their own traditional school in the heders, of which there are in the South-west no less than six thousand.

In addition, the Jews possess an international organization, the "World Kahal," represented by the _Alliance Israelite "Universelle_ in Paris, whose president, Adolph Cremieux, had had the audacity to protest to the Russian Government against acts of violence perpetrated upon the Jews.

For all these reasons the governor-general is of the opinion that "the revision of the whole legislation affecting the Jews has become an imperative necessity." [Footnote 1: According to the official figures, quoted in the memorandum, the number of Jews in the three South-western governments, i.e., Volhynia, Podolia, and the Kiev province, amounted to 721,080.

Of these, 14 per cent lived in rural districts and 86 per cent in cities and towns.