With the long-haired, wonderfully-robed priest came his choir and many villagers, who occupied one side of the square made by the soldiers standing there in the dusk to do last honors to their dead comrades. With chantings and doleful chorus the choir answered his solemn oratory and devotional intercessions. He swung his sacred censer pot over each body and though we understood no word we knew he was doing reverence to the spirit of sacrifice shown by our fallen comrades. There in the darkness by the edge of the forest, the priest and his ceremony, the firing squad’s volley, and the bugler’s last call, all united to make that an allied funeral. The American soldier and the priest and his pitiful people had really begun to spin out threads of sympathy which were to be woven later into a fabric of friendliness. The doughboy always respected the honest peasant’s religious customs.
XXXIII
BOLSHEVISM
Why Chapter Is Written—Venerable Kropotkin’s Message Direct From Central Russia—Official Report Of United States Department Of State—Conclusions Of Study Prepared For National Chamber Of Commerce—Authoritative Comment By Men Who Are In Position To Know—A Cartoon And Comment Which Speak For Veterans.
The writers have an idea that the veterans of the North Russian Expedition would like a short, up-to-date chapter on Bolshevism. We used to wonder why it was that John Bolo was so willing to fight us and the White Guards. We would not wish to emphasize the word willing for we remember the fact that many a time when he was beaten back from our defenses we knew by the sound that he was being welcomed back to his camp by machine guns. And the prisoners and wounded whom we captured were not always enthusiastic about the Bolshevism under whose banner they fought. To be fair, however, we must remark that we captured some men and officers who were sure enough believers in their cause.
And the general reader will probably like a chapter presented by men who were over in that civil war-torn north country and who might be expected to gather the very best materials available on the subject of Bolshevism. And what we have gathered we present with not much comment except that we ourselves are trying to keep a tolerant but wary eye upon those who profess to believe in Bolshevism. We say candidly that we think Bolshevism is a failure. But we do not condemn everyone else who differs with us. Let there be fair play and justice to all, freedom of thought and speech, with decent respect for the rights of all.
The first article is adapted from an article in The New York Times of recent date, according to which Margaret Bondfield, a member of the British Labor Delegation which recently visited Russia, went to see Peter Kropotkin, the celebrated Russian economist and anarchist, at his home at Dimitroff, near Moscow. The old man gave her a message to the workers of Great Britain and the western world:
“In the first place, the workers of the civilized world and their friends among other classes should persuade their governments to give up completely the policy of armed intervention in the affairs of Russia, whether that intervention is open or disguised, military, or under the form of subventions by different nations.
“Russia is passing through a revolution of the same significance and of equal importance that England passed through in 1639-1648 and France in 1789-1794. The nations of today should refuse to play the shameful role to which England, Prussia, Austria, and Russia sank during the French Revolution.
“Moreover, it is necessary to consider that the Russian Revolution—which seeks to erect a society in which the full production of the combined efforts of labor, technical skill and scientific knowledge shall go to the community itself—is not a mere accident in the struggle of parties. The revolution has been in preparation for nearly a century by Socialist and Communist propaganda, since the times of Robert Owen, Saint-Simon, and Fourier. And although the attempt to introduce the new society by the dictatorship of a party apparently seems condemned to defeat, it must be admitted that the revolution has already introduced into our life new conceptions of the rights of labor, its true position in society, and the duties of each citizen.
Not only the workers, but all progressive elements in the civilized nations should bring to an end the support so far given to the adversaries of the revolution. This does not mean that there is nothing to oppose in the methods of the Bolshevist government. Far from it! But all armed intervention by a foreign power necessarily results in an increase of the dictatorial tendencies of the rulers and paralyzes the efforts of those Russians who are ready to aid Russia, independent of her government, in the restoration of her life.