A YEAR IN RUSSIA
BY
MAURICE BARING
AUTHOR OF “WITH THE RUSSIANS IN MANCHURIA,” ETC.
METHUEN & CO.
36 ESSEX STREET W.C.
LONDON
_First Published in 1907_
DEDICATED
TO
LADY CONSTANCE LYTTON
“Vieni a veder Montecchi e Cappelletti,
Monaldi e Filippeschi, uom senza cura;
Color già tristi e costor con sospetti.
Vien, crudel, vieni e vedi la pressura
De’ tuoi gentili, e cura lor magagne:
E vedrai Santafior come si cura.
Vieni a veder la tua Roma, che piagne,
Vedova, sola, e dì e notte chiama:
Cesare mio, perchè non m’ accompagne?”
DANTE (_Purg. VI._)
“Une nation ne se sépare jamais de son passé sans de cruels
déchirements.”
“Why, Sir, absolute princes seldom do any harm. But they who are
governed by them are governed by chance. There is no security for good
government.”
DR. JOHNSON
PREFACE
The basis of most of these chapters is composed of letters contributed
during the current year to the _Morning Post_, by whose kind permission
they are here republished. They reflect the fleeting ideas, the passing
moods of the moment; but as the various moments of which they reflect
some kind of image form part of what must constitute an eventful chapter
of Russian history, I have thought that it would be worth while to
republish them, so as to furnish some kind of record of what people were
thinking and saying while the interesting things—which history will
relate—were happening, and so as to give a few sidelights showing the
attitude of “the man in the street,” during the hours of crisis. Such
sidelights tend to show how little even the greatest crises in the lives
of States affect the daily life of the average man. The people who cry
out that the state of things is intolerable and not to be borne are, for
the most part, well-to-do people who work up their indignation towards
the end of a good dinner. The people who to the far-off looker-on seem
to be undergoing intolerable oppression are themselves lookers-on, and
they scarcely look, hardly realise and seldom say anything.
I have endeavoured in these chapters to present impartially the widely
divergent points of view of various people; at the same time I have made
no attempt to disguise the whereabouts of my sympathies, being mindful
of the sage, who, as Renan translates him, says: “Ne sois pas trop
juste, et n’affecte pas trop de sagesse de peur d’être un niais.”
These sidelights being the reflections of fugitive phases, I have made
no attempt to introduce an element of consistency into them, nor have I
in the light of subsequent events tried to modify the effect of the
hopes which proved to be illusory or of the fears which were
groundless—hopes and fears which I myself shared with those by whom I
heard them expressed.
To those who take a serious interest in the Russian evolution I would
suggest two valuable books, “The Crisis in Russia,” by Professor
Milioukov (London: Fisher Unwin, 1905), and “La Crise Russe,” by Maxime
Kovalevsky (Paris: Giard & E. Brière, 16, Rue Souflot, 1906).
“Modern Customs and Ancient Laws of Russia,” by the same author (Nutt,
1891), will be useful to the student of the past history of Russia. Nor
can one too often recommend “L’Empire des Tsars,” by M. Leroy-Beaulieu.
Sir Donald Mackenzie Wallace’s work on Russia needs no recommendation.
All these books, which deal with the past of Russia, will help the
student to understand what is happening at present; for without some
knowledge of the past history of Russia, what is now taking place cannot
but be incomprehensible.
ST. PETERSBURG
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE ix
INTRODUCTION xiii
CHAPTER
I. ST. PETERSBURG TO GODZIADAN 1
II. JEN-TZEN-TUNG 11
III. THE STRIKE AND THE MANIFESTO OF OCTOBER (30TH) 17TH 21
IV. MOSCOW AFTER THE MANIFESTO 31
V. ST. PETERSBURG BEFORE THE SECOND STRIKE 39
VI. MOSCOW—THE DECEMBER RISING 43
VII. MOSCOW—AFTER THE RISING 63
VIII. THE “INTELLIGENZIA” 75
IX. THE BEGINNING OF THE REACTION 84
X. CURRENT IDEAS IN ST. PETERSBURG 97
XI. DOSTOIEVSKI’S ANNIVERSARY 121
XII. THE POLITICAL PARTIES 128
XIII. IN THE COUNTRY 137
XIV. THE ELECTIONS 152
XV. EASTER AT MOSCOW—THE FOREIGN LOAN 162
XVI. THE AGRARIAN QUESTION—ON THE EVE OF THE DUMA 178
XVII. THE OPENING OF THE DUMA 191
XVIII. FURTHER IMPRESSIONS OF THE DUMA 202
XIX. THE DEADLOCK 212
XX. CURRENT IDEAS ON THE DUMA 225
XXI. THE BEGINNING OF DISORDER 233
XXII. PRINCE URUSSOFF’S SPEECH 250
XXIII. NAZARENKO, AND OTHER PEASANT MEMBERS 258
XXIV. THE DISSOLUTION OF THE DUMA 281
XXV. IN THE COUNTRY AFTER THE DISSOLUTION 288
INDEX 309
INTRODUCTION
This book is nothing else but a collection of notes, a bundle of
impressions gathered during a year’s stay in Russia. It lays no claim to
be either exhaustive or even of any practical use to the serious student
of the Russian Evolution. It is written for the ignorant, and with the
object of helping them to decide whether they wish to take an interest
in what is now happening in Russia, or not. I cannot take them into the
house and show them all over it from floor to ceiling with the knowledge
and authority of a master-builder; all I can do is to open a small
window and ask them to look through it and observe certain things,
pointing out how far these things are typical of the whole; and my hope
is that the glimpses I have given them will enable them to decide
whether they wish to go and knock at the front door and investigate for
themselves.
This book consists solely of a record of things I have seen and heard
myself in Russia during an interesting year of the history of that
country. My experience of English opinion on Russian things has
convinced me that in order to make such a record as intelligible as
possible, a great deal of introduction and explanation would be
necessary. The reason of this is that the ignorance in England about
Russia is extraordinary; and most of the current literature—I mean the
books published on Russian affairs—instead of dispelling that ignorance,
succeed rather in increasing it. Russia and Russian affairs are so
little known in England that the country has proved a happy hunting
ground for sensational writers of fiction and still more sensational
purveyors of facts. Leaving the writers of fiction out of the question,
the chief bar which seems to separate writers about Russia from a just
estimate and a valuable appreciation of that country is the language. It
is possible to convey information about Russia if you are ignorant of
the Russian language; and such information may prove to be not only
useful, but of surprising interest to people who are totally ignorant of
the country. But unless you are acquainted with the Russian language it
is impossible to acquire an intimate knowledge of the Russian people,
and it is difficult to understand many things which happen in Russia.
I had, therefore, the intention, before proceeding to a record of any
things I had seen myself, to collect and convey the impressions I had
received of the Russian character and of Russian life in various
classes, correcting and illustrating my impressions by those of others
who have worked in the same field, and by evidence drawn from Russian
literature. I meant to try and illustrate books by examples taken from
life, and throw light on events and people by examples taken from
literature; but I found when I began to do this that the writing of such
an introduction was equivalent to the writing of two large books, one on
the Russian people and one on Russian literature, a task which I still
hope to accomplish some day, but for which I do not at present feel
sufficiently equipped. Moreover, even were I sufficiently equipped, the
writing of two such books cannot be accomplished in a hurry in a country
which is in a state of political effervescence. I have therefore sadly
resigned myself to work backwards, and give to the public my record of
raw facts first and the explanation at a later date.
Nevertheless in giving this collection of scraps to the public I still
have an aim and a purpose. As I have said, Englishmen are amazingly
ignorant of Russia; not only because they deliberately prefer the works
of sensation-mongers to those of really well-informed writers like Sir
D. M. Wallace or M. Leroy-Beaulieu, but also because, when they honestly
seek for truth in the newspapers which are by way of being serious, they
are almost invariably misled. On the other hand Englishmen who live in
Russia, even if only for a short period—such as officers from the Indian
Army who come out on leave to learn the language—find no difficulty in
forming a just appreciation of the country and its people. It has always
struck me that if any such person were to write a record of what he saw
and thought, that record would have a real value because it would
constitute an aspect of the truth and not an aspect of the lie. This is
therefore my aim, and it is the only merit I claim for this work. It
contains aspects of things, seen by some one whose object was to try and
understand the ordinary and not to invent the extraordinary. And
therefore, although my work has no sort of claim to be taken seriously,
either as history, or as a manual of useful information, it will have
the negative merit of being free from any attempt at sensationalism,
and, I hope, the positive merit of containing some aspects of the truth,
some unvarnished record of _la chose vue_.
If what I have written leads others to take an interest in Russia and to
go and see for themselves, and to treat exhaustively in a masterly
fashion the things at which I have hinted incompletely and haltingly, I
shall feel amply rewarded.
Somebody might object that even if we are totally ignorant of Russia in
England there is no great harm done, that Russia is a far-off country
with an impossibly difficult language; why should we bother about it? To
this I would reply that the British people have shown themselves to be
gravely concerned about the increasing competition with which the
Englishman has to contend in all branches of life, and at the alarming
improvement in the methods of his neighbours, which is met by no similar
improvement at home. British trade, British influence, are rapidly, it
is said, being outstripped. Remedies, such as protection, are suggested.
As to whether such a remedy would prove efficacious or not I have no
idea; but one practical reason of our stagnation in certain matters
cannot fail to strike the most indolent observer. Our neighbours are
well and practically educated. We are not. Is not this fact the cause of
a great many things? If we want to remedy an evil we must look for the
cause. I firmly believe that the unpractical education which is given to
so many of us is largely responsible for the comparative stagnation of
Englishmen in matters of trade and enterprise, compared with the
sedulous efforts of the citizens of other countries. I am not advocating
the introduction of a purely continental system of education, nor would
I like to see our system of athletics disappear; but it is obvious that
there is not and never will be any danger of either of these two things
happening. But I never mean to lose an opportunity of advocating a
radical reform in the old-fashioned strictly classical education given
and received at our public schools and rendered necessary by the
obstinacy of our universities, owing to which Greek and Latin are taught
(but no longer learned except by a slender minority), to the exclusion
of all other useful knowledge.
The mass of boys who now learn nothing because Greek and Latin mean
nothing to them, would gladly assimilate something which would be useful
to them in after life: for instance, some smattering of their own
history, some mastery of the English tongue, or the knowledge of a
modern language.
There is no country where the disadvantage at which an Englishman finds
himself compared to his continental rivals is made so plain as in
Russia. In Russia there is, and there will be even more in the future,
an immense field for foreign enterprise. The Germans have taken, are
taking, and will take the utmost advantage of this fact. The English are
content to send advertisements here, written in the English language,
and never dream of trying to learn Russian themselves.
A working knowledge of the Russian language is acquired here by the
average British officer, working for an examination, in the course of
six months. Therefore this difficulty, though serious, is not
insurmountable. This, then, is the practical reason which I advance for
the furthering of knowledge about Russia. I say that such knowledge is
useful and advantageous to Englishmen. I have another reason for wishing
such knowledge to be propagated, which is personal and moral, but not
sentimental. It is this. I confess that I entertain perhaps a foolish
desire for goodwill among nations. Of course I know very well that
rivalries and conflicts must exist. Sometimes such rivalries and
conflicts are the result of a fundamental antagonism and of the struggle
for existence. But sometimes they are merely the outcome of
misunderstanding and prejudice.
One of the wickedest things which shelters itself under the holy name of
patriotism is the spirit which stirs up such prejudice and incites one
country against another groundlessly by playing on ignorance and popular
passion. With regard to Russia this has been done with considerable
success. So far from considering such action to be patriotic, I consider
it to be criminal; and although it may not be of the slightest interest
to any one to hear this opinion expressed, to express it is a pleasure
which I cannot deny myself. Whatever faults this book may contain, I
mean to make up for the disappointments which it has caused me by
indulging to the full in the luxury of saying exactly what I think in
its pages. I cannot, unfortunately, hope to be among those masters who,
speaking with inspired authority and unerring skill, compel the crowd to
listen to their message, and at the sound of whose clarion-like
utterance the “forts of folly” fall to the ground like the walls of
Jericho. Mine is a humbler task, a more inglorious ambition. I hope to
be like an obscure mouse who nibbles in the darkness at the net which
holds the lion captive. The mouse in his lifelong effort succeeds
perhaps only in gnawing away a little; and I shall be content if I
succeed in nibbling through the most tenuous thread of this great net of
error, misunderstanding, and falsehood. There are other mice who will
come after me, and who knows? perhaps one day the lion will be set free.
Finally, if it be asked from what point of view I approach my study of
Russia, I would answer that I have no political views whatever in the
matter; I have tried to make it my business to discover, understand, and
explain the points of view of the people with whom I have met; with some
of these views I sympathise, with others I do not. I have already said
that I have not disguised my sympathies, but I have attempted to
understand even what repelled me; my attitude is that of a sympathetic
friend, for whether the Frenchman who said “L’intelligence est presque
toujours la sympathie” was right or wrong, I am convinced that the
converse is true, and that the spirit of carping is nearly related to
stupidity.
A YEAR IN RUSSIA
CHAPTER I
ST. PETERSBURG TO GODZIADAN
_August 8, 1905._
I left St. Petersburg this evening for Manchuria. The one absorbing
discussion in St. Petersburg is the question of the peace negotiations.
Will there be peace or not?
IN THE TRAIN ON THE WAY TO IRKUTSK,
_August 11th_.
I started for Irkutsk on the 9th from Moscow. The train is crowded with
people—officers going to the war, men of business going to Siberia,
women and children. It is exceedingly hot. The last time I travelled in
this Trans-Siberian express the winter had just given way to the
leafless and bare aspect of early spring. Now we travel through great
stretches of green plains, past huge fir-woods which are burnt and
browned by the heat. The topic of the peace negotiations continues to
prevail above all other topics. I am constantly asked my opinion. We
have just received the latest telegrams from Portsmouth. A man of
business asked me if I thought there would be peace. I said “Yes.”
“There won’t be,” he replied. The railway line is fringed all the way
with pink flowers, which, not being a botanist, I take to be ragged
robin. At night the full moon shines spectral and large over the dark
trees and marshes, and every now and then over stretches of shining
water. The officers discuss the war from morning till night. They abuse
their generals mercilessly. They say that it is impossible for Russians
to look foreigners in the face. In my compartment there is an army
doctor. He assisted at the battle of Mukden and is now returning for the
second time to the war. He tells me that he wrote a diary of his
experiences during the battle and that he is unable to re-read it now,
so poignantly painful is the record. He trusts there will not be peace.
He is sanguine as to the future. He loathes the liberal tendencies in
Russia and detests Maxim Gorki. Yet he is no Jingo.
A gentleman from Moscow, and his wife, on the contrary, inveigh bitterly
against the Government and the war. (I saw these same people again at
Moscow after the December rising. Their house was situated in a street
where the firing had been heavy and abundant. They had had enough of
revolution and blamed the revolutionaries as severely then as they now
blamed the Government.) We constantly pass trains full of troops going
to the war. The men all ask the same question: “When is peace going to
be?” They ask for newspapers and cigarettes. I gave some of them some
bottles of whisky, which they drank off then and there out of the
bottle. An amusing incident happened last evening. We had stopped at a
siding. Everybody had got out of the train. I was walking up and down
the platform with one of the passengers. We saw a soldier throwing big
stones at the window of the washing compartment.
“What are you doing that for?” we asked.
“I want to speak to his Honour,” the soldier said; “he is washing his
face in the washing-room.” And through the window of the compartment,
lit by electric light, we could see the silhouette of an officer washing
his face.
“Why don’t you go and knock at the door?” we asked.
“They are” (to speak of a person in the third person plural is
respectful in Russian, and is always done by inferiors of their
superiors)—“they are ‘having taken drink’ (_Oni Vipimshi_),” he replied,
and then he added, lest we should receive a false impression, “His
Honour is very good.”
As we passed train after train of troops I reflected on the rashness of
prophecy. How often I had heard it said in London, when the war broke
out, that the line would break down immediately. Even when I reached
Mukden I heard people say that the line could not possibly last through
the summer, and here it is supporting gaily train after train in the
second year of the war.
ON THE WAY TO CHITA, _August 20th_.
We arrived at Irkutsk on the morning of the 17th and took the train for
Baikal. At Irkutsk station there was a train of sick soldiers returning
from the war. They begged for newspapers. The tedium of their long
journey is, they say, intolerable. They say there has been a good deal
of typhus in Manchuria.
We crossed the lake in the steamer. Its summer aspect is far less
striking than the strange glory which it wears when it is frozen, and
the distant mountains seem like “a sunny pleasure dome with caves of
ice.” In summer the waters are blue, the nearer hills grey and the
distant mountains blue, but with nothing strange or unreal about them.
Yet when the sunset silvered the grey tints and spread a ragged golden
banner in the sky, the lake was extremely beautiful in another way. At
Baikal station there was the usual struggle for places in the train. How
well I remembered the desperate struggle I had gone through to get a
seat in a third-class carriage at this same place last year! This time
it was in the first-class carriage that the conflict took place. An
engineer got into the same carriage as I did. He occupied one of the
lower berths and I the other. Presently a lady arrived, bound for Chita,
and looking for a place. She came into our carriage and asked to be
allowed to have one of the lower berths. The engineer flatly refused and
said that he had occupied his seat and had a right to keep it. I told
her I would let her have mine with pleasure. She occupied it and went
out. I moved my things into the upper berth. “Why on earth did you give
up your seat?” the engineer asked. “You had a _right_ to keep it.” When
the lady came back she said to me: “Ah! you are evidently not a Russian;
no Russian would have given up his place.” The engineer turned out to be
quite a good-natured sort of person, but there is something about trains
which makes people who are by nature mild and good-natured turn into
savages, and instils into them a passionate determination to cleave to
their rights. The next morning another man arrived in our carriage, with
a large basket and a second-class ticket. This upset the engineer, who
complained to the “Controller” of the train, and the poor man was turned
out. The engineer snorted and said: “There’s an insolent fellow for
you.” The lady was the wife of an engineer who was employed at Chita;
and she told me much about life in Chita: how hard times were, owing to
the war, how scarce food was getting—
“Und wie so teuer der Kaffee,
Und wie so rar das Geld!”
The “Controller” of the train, an official in plain clothes, whose exact
duties I was not able to determine, except that he was able to turn the
second-class passenger out of our carriage, spent a day and a night with
us. He and the engineer talked without ceasing of the meetings of the
Zemstva all over the country; of the discontent of the public servants
and of the imminence of a strike. They told me there would be a big
railway strike, but I did not pay much attention to this, nor did I in
the least realise the importance of what they were discussing. In one of
the second-class carriages I made friends with two young officers who
were going out to the war as volunteers, and two ladies, one the wife of
an officer already out there, and the other a hospital nurse. With them
also was the son of the officer’s wife, a student from Odessa, who told
me many interesting things. He described to me in great detail the
mutiny of the Black Sea Fleet, and he prophesied, if not a revolution,
at least a great change in Russia in the immediate future. One of the
carriages of the train was barred, and in it sat a political prisoner, a
schoolmaster from Irkutsk. Some of my friends went to speak to him, but
they came back in melancholy and disappointment, since they said this
prisoner was hissing hatred and rage through the bars in an undignified
and painful manner.
Soon after we left Baikal a young man joined us who said he was employed
in a firm at Chita. He had brought with him some flowers from Irkutsk.
These he carried in a large basket full of wet sand. They were a kind of
pathetic stock but not “in fragrant blow”; poor, feeble, starved and
rather dirty flowers they were. But in Transbaikalia flowers were rare,
and he had paid 18 roubles, he said (£1 8s.), for this nosegay, and he
was bringing them to Chita as a gift to the girl to whom he was engaged
to be married. He looked after these flowers with the utmost care; the
basket was put in my berth and, as it was full of water, a constant
stream trickled down from it and made a small pond on the floor of the
carriage.
_August 20th. Later._
We are nearing Chita; the husband of the lady to whom I gave my place
has arrived to meet her and take her home. He is an engineer. They are
deeply engaged in discussing local politics. The husband talks of a
coming strike, and tells me that if I wish to see political meetings I
had better stay in Chita. There are meetings every evening; some of them
are dispersed by the police. I now realise the importance of flowers in
this country; it is “a land of sand and ruin and gold.” The young clerk
has produced two perforated bouquetholders (is there such a word?) and
has carefully placed the flowers in them, with a sigh of relief. They
have not quite faded, although they droop sadly. At Chita the lady and
her husband get out. The engineer also. I am now alone in my carriage.
Beyond Chita the country is mountainous and fledged with fir-trees.
_August 21st._
The hilly country has ceased and we have once more reached the flat
plains. This morning the guard brought a man into my carriage and asked
me if I minded his sitting there. I said I did not mind. I offered him
some tea. The man made no answer, and looked at me with a vacant stare.
Then the guard laid him down at full length, and said, “This man is the
assistant station-master at Manchuria station. He is drunk, but you need
not be alarmed; he will be quite quiet.” He was quiet; at Manchuria
station he woke up from his stupor automatically, as though from
frequent habit.
_August 22nd._
We arrived at Manchuria station last night. The chaos that always reigns
there is terrific. I had the utmost difficulty in obtaining permission
to continue my journey. The officials said I needed an extra paper,
besides those I had with me, from the Chief of the Staff in Kharbin. The
initial difficulty was to get one’s ticket, as the crowd was dense and
long. What quantities of people seem to be drawn to Manchuria, like
filings to a magnet! An officer got me my ticket, and just when I had
utterly despaired of being able to travel further, the gendarme brought
me my permission to proceed. Then came the struggle for a place in a
third-class carriage. This was successfully got through. I obtained an
upper berth across the window. The compartment is crammed with people.
_August 23rd._
We are travelling through the hills of northern Manchuria. News has
arrived of the summoning of a new Duma. Now people say there will not be
peace, and the war will become a national war because it will have the
consent of the people. Others contest this; there are hot discussions. I
have moved into a second-class carriage in which there is a photographer
and a captain. I had my fortune told with cards by a lady in the train.
She said I should soon meet a lot of friends and experience a change of
fortune for the better.
_August 28th._
We arrived at Kharbin the day before yesterday. The town seems to have
got much bigger than when I left it last year. The climate has not
improved, nor have the prices at the hotel diminished. I have already
met some old friends of last year at the bank and at the staff. There is
a new restaurant opposite the bank, where a band plays the overture to
“William Tell” without ceasing. Kharbin is empty. It appears that
Linievitch does not allow officers to come here except on pressing
errands. I dislike Kharbin more than any place I have ever seen in the
world. The one topic is, of course, the peace negotiations. The matter
is hotly discussed; some are in favour of peace, others vehemently
against it. The news is contradictory. I have asked for leave to go to
the front. I shall have to wait some days before I receive it.
_August 31st._
I am laid up in bed, and Mr. Ostrovski of the Russo-Chinese bank has
just been to see me. He has come from the staff, where they told him
that news had been received from St. Petersburg that there would not be
peace. Orders had come to dispatch everything available to the front
with all possible speed and to get ready for an offensive movement.
_September 1st._
Peace has been officially announced. Among the officers I have seen,
opinions vary, but the men are delighted. They are tearing the telegrams
from each other.
_September 7th._
I arrived at Gonchuling yesterday. Gonchuling is now what Mukden used to
be before the battle of Mukden was fought. It consists of dozens and
dozens of small grey brick houses, with slate roofs, on one side of the
line, and on the other side of the line is a small Chinese town. The
Military Attachés are here in their car. I am living with the Press
Censors. People talk about peace as if it was not yet a fact. An
officer, whose wife I met in the train coming out, has been sent to
fortify positions. Kouropatkin’s army is said to have received orders to
advance. People express doubts as to whether the peace will be ratified,
and there is talk of a revolution in Japan.
I have the intention of joining the 2nd Transbaikal Cossack battery,
with which I lived last year. I have telegraphed to them to send horses
to meet me at Godziadan, the Head Quarters of the Staff.
_September 10th._
I have arrived at Godziadan. In the station is the train of the
Commander-in-Chief. There is also a correspondents’ car, where I have
been put up and hospitably entertained by Boris Nikolaievitch
Demchinsky, correspondent of a Russian newspaper. The news has come of
the first _pour-parlers_ which are to take place between the Russian and
Japanese Commanders-in-Chief.