Even in those days we strove to guard against reckless charitable effort, which can only have a demoralising influence. I call to mind one person who insisted on his name being unknown, offered my son 1000 roubles to be spent in providing food for the inhabitants of a certain village on the condition that the amount were regarded only as a loan, which should be repaid and subsequently spent on that same village for educational purposes. This donor was doubly a donor by the proviso he made.
It was a tragedy to see splendid men in the prime of their lives, walking about with stony faces and hollow eyes. With them were women clothed only in wretched rags, and little children shivering in the cold wind. They would crowd round the relief parties, which drove about in sledges, holding out their hands saying:
"We have sold our last horses, cows and sheep, we have pawned all our winter clothing; we have nothing left to sell. We eat but once a day, stewed cabbage and stewed pumpkin, and many of us have not eaten that."
This was true. There were some among them who had not tasted food for days. It was agonising to hear these poor people pleading to us for mercy lest they die of starvation. As they spoke in dull voices, tears would spring up into the eyes of strong men and course slowly down their cheeks into their rough beards; but there were no complaints, no cries, just the slow, monotonous chant, broken by the sobs of worn-out mothers and the cries of hungry children.
We had neither wood nor coal, only straw and the refuse of stables, for fuel. The Volga was frozen, and in some provinces corn was absolutely unprocurable.
MY SON. ALEXANDER NOVIKOFF
In that great calamity the help given by the English Society of Friends was very remarkable. After some preliminary enquiry, I was invited to attend a Committee Meeting. There were, I think, between twenty and thirty present, and I was the only woman. A series of questions was addressed to me about the state of things in Russia. I exaggerated nothing. I concealed nothing. I told them that an unforeseen blow had befallen sixteen of our provinces and found us unprepared to combat its effects. My son, Alexander Novikoff, was just organising a committee in the district of Kazloff (Tamboff province), and, thanks to him, I knew the question fairly well. "The Friends" listened attentively, but said very little. Mr. Braithwaite, the chairman, only expressed a hope that "God will help our efforts." Nothing more: but without losing a day they went to work, and worked splendidly. They not only collected about £40,000, but sent their delegates—Mr. Edmond Brookes and Mr. William Fox—to distribute their help on the spot amongst the famine-stricken peasantry.
Do you know one of the results of such practical application of sympathy?