Ruth Pierce

“ They say there was no ammunition at the front. No shells for the soldiers. They had nothing to do but retreat. And now? They are still retreating, fighting with empty guns and clubs and even their naked hands. And still, trainloads of soldiers go out of Kiev every day without a gun in their hands. What a butchery! Can you imagine how horrible it is to see them march through the streets, swinging their arms and singing their stirring songs,—tall, able-bodied men,—while the beggars, cripples from the Russo-Japanese War, stand whining at the street corners. ”

“ We have been in Kiev several days. Our passports have been handed in to the police station to be viséed and put in order for our return trip to Bucharest. They say a human being in Russia is made of body and passport.
Kiev is full of color. It is framed in green trees that hide the ugliness of modern buildings and seem to lift the gold and silver domes of the churches up into the air. And how many churches there are! Kiev is in truth a holy city. Late afternoon, when the sun shines through the dust of the day and envelops the city in golden powder ”

“ Life is so terribly insecure. I feel as though I had been stripped naked and turned out into the streets, with no person or place to go to.
It was four o'clock, and we had just finished dinner. In an hour and a half we were leaving for Odessa. All our trunks and bags were packed, and our traveling suits brushed and pressed. Panna Lolla was crying at having to part from Janchu, and mending some stockings for him. He was asleep. Marie and I were sitting in our little salon, rejoicing that we should be in Bucharest in a few days where there was no war and we could speak French again. ”

“ There is a gypsy who sells fruit at the corner of Institutska Oulitza, a woman so enormous that she resembles a towering mountain, and her customers look, beside her, like tiny Russian toys. Every one looks at her curiously, and I have seen several gentlemen in fur pelisses, with gold-headed canes, stop and speak to her. ”

“ And yet when you hear, "The Germans are advancing! They are coming!" the German army seems to take on a supernatural aspect, to become a ruthless machine that drives everything before it in its advance, and in its wake leaves a country stripped of life—all the people and cottages rubbed off the face of the earth. ”

“ What strange abortions of life this Government brings forth! Is it curious that thinking men and women, who have lived apparently well-regulated lives, suddenly throw bombs at a minister in a railway station, or at an official as he drives to the palace in dress uniform, with jeweled decorations on his breast? I ran my hand over the faded sofa-covering, wondering who had sat there before me.
Suddenly the chief came into the room, closing the door carefully behind him. He was quite calm again.
"What do you want?" He looked at Douglas. ”

“ As we turned the corner we saw a long gray procession of carts crawling down the hill toward us. I stopped and watched them pass me, one after the other, crowded over to the side of the road by the usual traffic of a busy street. Peasants walked by the horses' heads, men in dusty sheepskin coats, or women muffled up somehow, their hands hidden in the bosoms of their waists for warmth. ”

“ How the proportions of things are twisted after going through a hospital. Things that counted before don't seem to count any more. You take refuge in generalities to get out of your mind a look you have seen in a soldier's eyes.
It was an improvised hospital,—some building or other turned into a place to receive the hundreds of wounded that are pouring into Kiev every day. It was a big room, with rows and rows of beds, and in every bed a man. ”

“ At Warsaw, where he was working, he was thrown into prison time after time on account of the radical, revolutionary character of his articles. He is well known for the strong, intellectual quality of his work. The reactionaries fear him. The slipshod Russian way of handling things gets on his nerves. His eyes get like steel when he talks about it. Russia's corruption and the German advance—ammunition willfully miscarried—guns sent to the front without ammunition, and ammunition sent that doesn't fit; and the soldiers obliged to fight with their naked fists! ”

“ In every Bulgarian house I've ever been in there is the picture of the Czar liberator. A Bulgarian regards a Russian as of his own blood. Bulgaria gave Russia her alphabet, and the languages are much the same: only the Russian is richer in words and expressions. Why, there is a Bulgarian, General Dimitrief, holding a high command in the Russian army. When I left Bulgaria there was no talk of her going with Germany. 'We will never go with Germany,' I've heard over and over. ”

“ It was dark and filled with people who had come to pray for help to stop the Germans. There were soldiers and peasants and townspeople, all with their thoughts fixed on God. I cannot tell you how solemn it was. All the people united in thought against the common menace. Women in black, soldiers and officers with bands of black crêpe round their sleeves, square, stolid-looking peasants, with tears running down their cheeks. ”

“ A short, fat priest, his face dripping with perspiration, led us through the catacombs. He would wipe the sweat out of his eyes with the sleeve of his dirty gown, and point to the saints' tombs with the big iron key he carried. I was pressed close to him by the crowd of peasants behind. The smell of his greasy body and the powder of dandruff from his long hair on the shoulders of his gown, the malicious way he looked at me as though to say, "You and I know that what I'm saying is rot, but it must be said to them"—it was indescribably disgusting. ”

“ The secret-service men were down on their knees before piles of clothes, going over the seams, emptying the pockets, unfolding handkerchiefs, tapping the heels of shoes; every scrap of paper was passed over to the chief, who tucked it into his portfolio. I watched him, hating his square, stolid body that filled out his uniform smoothly. His eyes were long and watchful like a cat's, and his fair mustache was turned up at the ends, German fashion ”

“ At any rate, there is much talk now of the Germans working through this disreputable creature.
I asked a Russian if there could be a revolution.
There seems to be no hope. Russia, apparently, lacks the coördination and singleness of purpose necessary for one. And so many unseen influences are at work. There is no agreement among the people as to what they want. Each faction is secretly encouraged to war against the other in order to weaken each other and blur the reason and end in the people's minds. ”

“ It is autumn, and the nights are cold and rainy, and the children cry in discomfort. I have seen the square packed with motionless, [Pg 96] sleeping people, and in the morning I have seen them fight for places in the train, transformed by this unbearable terror of the Germans into beasts that trample each other to death. And when the train goes off, they settle back, waiting for their next chance. Perhaps some are so much nearer the station, but others are carried away wounded or dead. Who knows what they are capable of till they are so afraid? ”

“ They began to look on themselves as human again. The grind of suffering and hopelessness began to let up and they had moments of hope. And then the reactionaries came into power with their systematic oppression of the Jews. Back to Siberia with them! This in midsummer heat. I saw them as they passed through Kiev for the third time, a few weeks ago. Never shall I forget them as I saw them last. The mark of the beast was on them. You couldn't call them living or suffering or martyrs any more. They were beyond the point where they prayed to die."
The gendarme had finished his list. ”

“ People here in Kiev feel the same terror of the German advance. Can nothing stop it? A panic has swept over the city that makes every one want to run away and hide. They crowd the square before the railway station and camp there for days, waiting to secure a place on the trains that leave for Petrograd or Odessa. For three weeks Peter has been waiting for his reservation to get to Petrograd. Our case drags on so. He wants to see the Ambassador personally. But the trains are packed with terrified people. Men leave their affairs and go down to the square with their families and baggage. ”

“ Only the richest Court ladies send their daughters there to be educated, and the Dowager Empress visits them when she passes through Kiev. The trees in the garden are gold and green in the late afternoon sun. A little bell tinkles musically.
Below in the street some passing soldiers are singing. How fresh and strong and beautiful their untrained voices are. ”

“ It is funny how much pleasure Count S—— takes in every foot of land the Germans capture. When he talks about the war, he seems to take a perverse pleasure in accenting their inexhaustible munitions and men and the perfection of their whole military organization. "We have men, but we are children." ”

“ There is the exultation of life, and the despair, the aggression and apathy, the frivolity and the revolt. The action is taken slowly. There are no stars. You look at the screen as though you were looking at life itself. And the films don't always have happy endings, because life isn't always kind. It often seems senseless and cruel and crushes men's spirits. ”

“ How can the soldiers give their lives so patiently and bravely for a Government whose villainy and corruption take no account of the significance of their sacrifices. The German influence is still strong. They say German money bribes the Ministers at home and the generals at the front.
[Pg 61]
There is great distrust of the Czarina and the Monk Rasputin. The latter was a serf in Siberia, and now has a malignant, hypnotic influence in the Russian Court. If he is refused anything, he falls on the floor in a fit and froths at the mouth until he gets what he wants. ”

“ Marie went on. "It was too good to be in a country, if only for a little while, where they took things easily. If I'd stayed a little longer, I believe I could have laughed myself and felt in a personal relationship toward life again."
That's what I was glad to get away from. You get too personal if you stay in Roumania long. Roumania gets to mean Bucharest, and Bucharest the universe. As I sat waiting in the douane, I felt like puffing out and growing to make room for Russia inside me.
We waited hours.
"Can't you hurry our passports?" Marie asked an official. "We want to leave on this train." ”

“ His blond mustache is getting thin and discloses his full, sensual lips. His hands are thick and soft, always stained with nicotine. He lives in constant terror of his wife, and all the pockets of his coats are burned full of holes from his hiding his cigarettes in them when he thinks he hears his wife coming. I have never seen her, but she is the invisible force that keeps the pension running, and controls her husband by her knowledge of his past failures. ”

“ The Jews lay on the ground as though trying to get some coolness out of the earth. Up and down the paths walked several spectacled men, who were brought up to me and introduced as Professor So-and-So, and Doctor So-and-So. They were constantly trying to get in touch with friends in Kiev or Moscow or Petrograd, or colleagues in medicine or other sciences, or relatives who could help them. They worked through the society. By the payment of certain amounts they could bribe the overseers to let them stay on in the Kiev detention camp, or even have the liberty of the city. ”

“ There was a stir among the Jews. Those lying down got up and approached him. The women, with their children, dragged themselves nearer. Every one stopped talking. The apathy and indifference [Pg 56] gave place to a strained attention. There was a kind of dreadful anxiety on every face—a tightening of the muscles round the eyes and mouths, as though the same horrible fear fixed the same mark there. I have never seen a crowd where personality was so stamped out by a single overmastering emotion. The gendarme began to read in a sing-song voice. ”

“ No, the priests and their autocracy don't matter. The people believe, and that's the important thing.
We went out yesterday afternoon to the Lavra—the stronghold of Black Russia. It is a monastery on the edge of the town, overlooking the Dnieper and flanked with battlemented walls to withstand the attacks of the infidels in olden times. From all over Russia and the Balkans pilgrims go there to visit the catacombs, where many church saints are buried, their bodies miraculously preserved under red and gold clothes—so the priests say. ”