Down the Volga
It was at the suggestion of one of the Delegates that the Bolsheviki
kindly arranged a trip down the Volga, that great central waterway
which flows for nearly two thousand miles to the Caspian Sea, and which
is fifty miles broad where it empties itself into this great lake.
We went in our special train, accompanied by interpreters, agents,
secretaries and journalists, a party of thirty to forty people, all
anticipating a good time, to the famous city of Nijni-Novgorod. The
plan was to take the steamer there and go to Saratov, calling at towns
and villages on the way, and returning by train to Moscow. It was
estimated the trip would occupy six days.
There is no longer any great Fair at Nijni-Novgorod. Foreign trade has
practically stopped, owing to the breakdown of communications. The
booths are empty and closed. The streets in this part of the city are
neglected and untidy. The coloured domes of the churches glitter and
sparkle with the old, quaint loveliness, but the city is the centre of
what has been described as “a starving province,” and is as sad as the
rest of Russia.
The usual Trade Union deputations, with soldiers, banners, bands and
speeches met us at the railway station. We were shown over the great
Somova iron-works, and made speeches to the hungry-looking workpeople.
We were informed that it is difficult to keep down the spirit of
rebellion here; but this one would have expected of the population
of Nijni-Novgorod, with its history of democratic struggles in the
past. Unlike the men at the Putiloff Works, these men complain, not
only of hunger, but of the incapable bureaucracy which is keeping back
production.
We had a great public meeting in the theatre in the evening, following
a dinner given us by the Soviet and Trade Unions, and, after the
speeches, we formed into a procession, and followed by numbers of
the townspeople as well as the audience, and accompanied by several
regiments of soldiers, we marched down to the S.S. _Bielinsky_ which
was to take us on our voyage. The procession marched all round the
higher part of the town that we might see the finest buildings and the
splendid view from the heights above the river, singing revolutionary
songs all the way.
The summer days are hot but the nights are bitterly cold on the Upper
Volga. One of our number neglected himself, and contracted pleurisy and
pneumonia within twenty-four hours of our setting sail, and his illness
obliged some of us to go forward to Astrakhan and return the same way
to Saratov. The organisation of the steamship, a magnificent vessel,
was mystifying to us. First there was the recognised commander. Then
there was Sverdloff, the Acting-Commissar for Ways and Communications,
who appeared to be the highest authority; then came the Trade Union
Delegate who travels with the ship; then the man in charge of our
party, who seemed to be armed with authority over the crew as well.
There were occasions when orders conflicted, and the result was very
funny. After the great bulk of the people left at Saratov the ship’s
human machinery ran with greater smoothness.
A trip on the Volga was supposed to be one of the great experiences of
the rich traveller before the war. It is an experience anyone may be
very glad and proud to have had. More of the heart and soul of Russia
lies on each bank of this mighty river than can be found in Russia’s
cosmopolitan cities. The country is low and fertile, except for the
desert stretches of the lower reaches. The green of its grass is a
bright emerald. Its roads and farm-buildings are a consistent brown,
like its sun-tanned, wind-bitten peasant people. Wild horses roam the
steppes with the Cossacks and Tartar tribes, some of whom live close
to the river, their brown, substantial houses seeming to rise straight
out of the water in the estuary of the Volga. The enormous rafts which
float slowly down the river, composed of the trunks of great trees
bound together, are things of wonder. They are of enormous size. Whole
families live on them, and huts have been erected on them for shelter.
It takes weeks, even months for these rafts to creep down the river
to the places for which they are bound. Often the rafts are built the
shape of a boat and so sent floating to their destination.
The friendly people waved us their handkerchiefs as we passed. The
passion for art of the Russian everywhere showed itself in the
decoration with green branches of these rafts, of our own handsome
steamer, and of the railway trains in which we travelled.
We called at many little villages or larger towns on the way down the
river. The banks of the river and the plains beyond teem with people.
It was no lonely prairie that we gazed upon as we floated idly. The
millions of dead fish in the river were symbolic of the country’s past
state and present suffering, and of its fearful fate if left too long
without substantial help. Nobody could tell us authentically why
those fish had died. Could the cholera germ have worked this miracle
of death? Or was it Koltchak’s poison gas? Their numbers made them
remarkable.
Our talks with the peasant men and women revealed the fact that they
were not Communists in the Marxian sense, scarcely Communist in any
sense. They were content not to quarrel with the Government because
it was so much better than the régime of Koltchak, whom they hated;
and because of the war. They grumbled at the requisitions of food,
and hated the soldiers sent to collect it. But they were amenable to
persuasion. One friend of the peasants, a Communist, told me that he
was sent by the Government to talk to the peasants, because he was so
successful in persuading them to give up their spare produce. He was a
man of quiet and gentle manner whom it would be difficult at all times
to resist.
The peasants we saw were a big, blond, stalwart race, with any quantity
of shaggy, curly hair and with matted beards. Their features were Slav.
They had large mouths, thick lips and broad noses. They wore high
boots, much the worse for wear, and smocks with broad belts. Their
women were big for the most part, pleasant and round-faced, and their
legs were bound in what looked like white canvas which gave them a
tubular appearance. They wore canvas or felt shoes, very inadequate for
country roads. Their aprons and blouses were amazingly white in one
village, which gave one the impression that there they probably made
their own soap. The children were attractive replica of their parents.
One small boy showed us proudly that he could write his own name in a
good hand.
Whenever we left the ship, we did so between two lines of peasants with
country produce for sale, eggs, milk and fruit; so there was no lack of
food on this river trip.
We talked to the peasants about the land. They were happier than before
for they had now more land, and all had some. The big estates had
been broken up and divided amongst them. Nominally it was the State’s
land, but it would have been counter-revolutionary propaganda to have
said this aloud. Really there is a system of peasant proprietorship,
with the substantial difference that the peasant may not part with his
land for money. If he works it well, it remains undisturbed in his
possession and usually it goes to the son after the father. The local
Soviet settles land disputes, and we were the interested spectators in
the adjudication of one quarrel.
One little house we entered was very clean and neat, but the rooms
were too dark and too small, and too many people lived in the house.
We were told that this specimen was very much above the average. In
every room was an ikon, and in every village a church, crowded with
worshippers, filled with expensive things. Truly, the Commissars would
be well advised to commandeer and not condemn the institution which has
so great a grip on the lives and affections of the people.
I am reminded here of a curious and beautiful adventure of ours, a
few versts on this side of Astrakhan. It was two in the morning, with
a bright round moon in the sky, when the ship stopped and boats were
lowered. A violin softly played, and the crooning of their Volga songs
by the boatmen added charm to the scene. We took to the boat and landed
on the right bank of the river. Millions of crickets chirped in the
grass. In the distance a bullfrog croaked himself hoarse. Suddenly
there came upon our view the outlines of an Eastern building. Its
cupola shone in the moonlight. It was a Buddhist temple.
We marched up to the door and entered, much to the concern of the
priest, who feared, doubtless, a revolutionary attack upon his person
and the church. He was a quaint old man, round and stout, dressed in a
bright red robe, his good-natured, Chinese-looking face adding to the
novelty of the scene. He was a Kalmuk, and his ministry extended over
a population of ten thousand Kalmuks, living in the little town beyond.
It was an amazing thing to discover this little bit of Asia in Europe.
The Kalmuks are an attractive race in appearance, clean, strong and
efficient-looking. The women have glossy black hair which they wear
neatly in two braids. Their children are chubby and well fed, with
slanting brown eyes and olive skins. We left this temple and its people
possessed of several tiny brass gods and holy pictures with which the
priest appeared not unwilling to part.
At Samara some of us went to inspect a children’s colony outside the
town. As usual, it was the expropriated dwelling of a former rich
citizen. Indeed, several houses were devoted to this good purpose. The
woman Communist who kindly conducted us had all the smiling good nature
of her race. She was evidently devoted to the children, and proud of
what had been accomplished. She was obviously in great need of new
clothes. Her legs were bare. One poor sock was falling over her shoe
top. The naked toes were peeping out of the other shoe. Her jacket was
the last word in shabbiness. Yet she was bright and cheerful as a bird
and infinitely pathetic as she asked me, with pride in her voice: “Have
you anything like this (meaning the summer school) in England?”
We drove back to the ship impressed with the pluck and cleverness of
those heroic people making bricks without straw. A great windstorm
caught us. The dust whirled about our heads. The rain began to fall. I
hid behind a bank of flowers, which had been given us, to avoid seeing
the half-eaten corpse of a dead dromedary as well as to shelter from
the rain. We reached the steamship. The whistle hooted, and off we went
to the next scene.
Saratov is the finest city we saw on the Volga. It is a great deal
cleaner than most, and compares in this very favourably with Tsaritzin.
But Tzaritzin has experienced more of the depredations and disorders of
the Koltchak bands, so must be excused.
It was at Saratov we discovered the origin of that silly story of
the nationalisation of women. Whoever knows the Russian woman would
wonder if she had changed to allow herself to be nationalised. I
could not imagine those huge women fish-curers and net-makers at
Astrakhan tolerating for one second of time any such gross interference
with their personal liberty; nor the gentle Kalmuk women, nor the
self-respecting peasant wives. There is not one atom of truth in the
story, and those who repeat it cover themselves with discredit. The
story had its origin in Saratov, where a tiny anarchist sect had for
one of their remote objects a state of society in which men and women
would dispense with marriage in their relationships with one another.
It was unscrupulous propaganda to place this upon the Bolshevik
Government.
It is true that marriage laws have been altered. Marriage is very cheap
now, since only a State ceremony is needed. Divorce is very easy,
but equal for all classes and both sexes. The children are the first
concern of the State, and illegitimate children are not penalised. But
there is nothing relative to marriage in Russia which is not true of
some Western state; and it is believed that with the reorganisation of
life on a sound economic basis, prostitution will entirely disappear,
as it has certainly been considerably reduced. The women of Russia
are not very happy, but their misery is not due to any sex-tyranny or
Government brutality. It is due to the lack of food and clothing for
themselves and their families, and to the bitter cold which makes their
work in the home so hard.
For during last winter almost everybody lived in his house in a
temperature of five degrees of frost. Tender children and old people
died like flies, of simple cold. Frost-bitten hands and feet and the
consequent loss of fingers and toes was a common occurrence. Pipes
were frozen, and when the thaw came, broke, everything in the house
being destroyed. There were no materials for repairs. Waiting in the
long queues their turn at the baker’s shop, trying to keep children and
home clean without soap, having to go long distances for water, without
coal and wood to cook and clean, with children crying for milk or food,
little bodies frozen for lack of blankets--these are the real griefs of
women in Russia, and not the ludicrous stories of imaginary wrongs.
We called at Kazan on our way down the river, and here we had a
curiously funny experience. At Kazan, and increasingly as we descended
the river, we were plagued with flies. They were so numerous, these
tiny little beasts, that they made a misty curtain round us, and filled
eyes and mouths and ears in a most irritating fashion.
We walked from the boat for about a quarter of a mile, ploughing our
way through deep sand, to the place which had been appointed for our
reception. We walked between lines of soldiers and sailors standing
strictly to attention. The local Commissars were late, so the lesser
officials thought it wise to begin, as the flies were troublesome and
the English guests were not used to them.
A ramshackle droshky, with an old Chinese driver, was commandeered for
a platform. One of our speakers mounted, and, standing on the seat,
commenced his oration. The horse showed a tendency to bolt at every
sentence, whether because of the flies or the unknown language it is
not quite certain. The sentences came explosively, as every movement of
the animal jerked the orator off his balance. The old Chinaman seized a
large twig branch from a man who was fanning himself and tried to keep
the horse quiet by driving away the flies. Round about our heads surged
and hummed masses of flies. We shook ourselves, we smoked, we did a
great many things besides; but the flies remained, and the speeches,
one after another, went on with interminable eloquence. For a solid two
hours we stood there suffering and grinning at the Chinaman, the flies,
the absurd seriousness of everybody, the familiar phrases: “Long live
the Proletarian Revolution.” “Long live the Soviet Republic.” “Long
live Lenin and Trotsky.”
At last we were released, to learn that a great demonstration of eighty
thousand troops had been arranged for the following day. We could not
stay, however, and bade our friends a warm good-bye; the flies also,
but for a different reason.
Seriously, though, the insect life of that part of Russia is
incredible. It is no exaggeration to say that at Astrakhan, when the
meal was finished, the big black flies on the table were so many that
it looked as though we had dined off a black instead of a white
tablecloth. The mosquitoes are so vicious and poisonous that they often
give one malaria, and the lice are inveterate conveyers of typhus.
Astrakhan is the dirtiest city it has been my lot to visit. Cesspools
and stagnant water pollute the streets. Piles of human excrement
lie about everywhere. The water-supply is thoroughly poisoned. The
market-places are abodes of filth. And it appears to be nobody’s
business to alter this state of affairs. Astrakhan and cities like it
should come under the supervision of an international Board of Health
if their governments are powerless to alter things, for they are a
menace to the well-being of the whole world. Cholera coming up the
river from Astrakhan could poison all Europe in time, and may yet do so
unless something drastic be done.
But Astrakhan is becoming busy again. Its shipping is very active.
We saw the loading of rice and fish, the curing of herrings, the
preparation of caviare, the making of nets, the ferry-boats loaded with
passengers, a general air of liveliness which contrasted so favourably
with the deadness of Petrograd. Persian carpets are to be bought for
a mere song in Astrakhan, and antique treasures of all kinds for the
equivalent in English of a few shillings or pounds.
The temperature at Astrakhan was 122 degrees in the shade when we
were there, and we simply wilted under the blazing sun. We talked of
Siberian snows and American ice cream to try to make ourselves feel
cool, when to our pleased surprise, the magician, Sverdloff, contrived
to conjure ice cream out of the kitchen and so saved our lives for
another day’s work.
Those last days on the Volga were very happy, in spite of heat and
flies and the anxiety we felt for our sick friend. The tumultuous crowd
had left us at Saratov; the atmosphere of politics disappeared; our
talk was of more interesting things; we sang our folk-songs and read
our books. In the hot evenings on the way back, we sat at the front of
the ship facing the glorious red sunset, and thought of home and of
dear old England, and of the kindly spirit which rules where peace and
plenty abound.