8 November.—This afternoon I went to see Mrs. Bray, and then I had an unexpected pleasure, for I met [a]Johnnie] Parsons, who is Naval Attaché to Admiral Phillimore, and we had a long chat. When one is in a strange land, or with people who know one but little, these encounters are wonderfully nice.
The other night I dined with the Heron Maxwells, and had a nice evening and a game of bridge. Some Americans, called de Velter, were there. I think most people from the States regret the neutrality of their country.
VISIONS OF PEACE
Everyone brings in different stories of the war. Some say Germany is exhausted and beaten, others say she is flushed with victory, and with enormous reserves of men, food, and ammunition. I try to believe all the good I hear, and when even children or fools tell me the war will soon be over, I want to embrace them—I don't care whether they are talking nonsense or not. Sometimes I seem to see a great hushed cathedral, and ourselves returning thanks for Peace and Victory, and the vision is too much for me. I must either work or be chloroformed till that time comes.
9 November.—I think there is only one thing I dislike more than sitting in an hotel bedroom and learning a new language, and that is sitting in an hotel bedroom and nursing a cold in my head. Lately I have been learning Russian—and now I am sniffing. My own fault. I would sleep with my window open in this unhealthiest of cities, and smells and marsh produced a feverish cold.
Out in the square the soldiers drill all the time in the snow, lying in it, standing in it, and dressed for the most part in cotton clothing. Wool can't be bought, so a close cotton web is made, with the inside teased out like flannelette, and this is all they have. The necessaries of life are being "cornered" right and left, mostly by the commercial houses and the banks. The other day 163 railway trucks of sugar were discovered in a siding, where the owners had placed it to wait for a rise. Meanwhile, sugar has been almost unprocurable.
Everyone from the front describes the condition of the refugees as being most wretched. They are camping in the snow by the thousand, and are still tramping from Poland.
And here we are in the Astoria Hotel, and there is one pane of glass between us and the weather; one pane of glass between us and the peasants of Poland; one pane of glass dividing us from poverty, and keeping us in the horrid atmosphere of this place, with its evil women and its squeaky band! How I hate money!
I hope soon to join a train going to Dvinsk with food and supplies.
13 November.—I have felt very brainless since I came here. It is the result, I believe, of the Petrograd climate. Nearly everyone feels it. I had a little book in my head which I thought I could "dash off," and that writing it would fill up these waiting days, but I can't write a word.