in 1954 for financial reasons shchebalsky retired from the military service and was appointed the chief of moscow police. in 1858, now the ministry of education official, shchebalsky started his career as a critic and literary historian. as the ministry's special envoy, in the course of 4 years he was compiling the comprehensive russian press reviews for the tsar. at the same time, by the then minister of education's request, he wrote his major treatise, "the history of censorship in russia". in those four years time shchebalsky also wrote the series of essays that were published under the title "readings from the russian history from the xvii century onwards". all the while his works on the history of russian literature were being published in "zarya", "russky arkhiv", but mostly in "the russian messenger" which he's been an active contributor to.