At the station a special train was waiting to take the Governor's things to a place of safety—and the crowds were waiting to escape with their lives! Now every one with any sort of a boat that will float is making a fortune taking the terrified townspeople down the river. There are, of course, horrible accidents, for the boats are overcrowded. One completely turned turtle with its load of men and women and children. And yet the Governor's things must be removed to a place of safety.
Aeroplanes scout over the city every day, and at night you can see their lights moving overhead in the darkness. Sometimes they fly so low that you can hear the whir of their engines. For the moment you don't know if they're Russian or enemy ones.
And all night long high-powered automobiles rush up the hill to the General Headquarters, bearing dispatches from the front.
I lie in bed, and it is impossible for me to sleep. It is as if I were up over Kiev in an aeroplane, myself. I can see millions of Germans marching along the roads from Warsaw, dragging their cannon through the mud, fording streams, with their field kitchens and ambulances, moving onward irresistibly toward the golden domes of Kiev.
You seem far away to-night. Only I love you. I can't love you enough.
Ruth.
October.
Darlingest Mother and Dad:—
This afternoon I went up to the English Consulate with Sasha. 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. They stared ahead with a curious, blind look in their eyes, as though they did not realize the noise and movement of the city life about them. How strange it was, the passing of this silent peasant procession by the side of the clanging trains and gray war automobiles!