Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-04-09
INSTRUMENTATION
ABOUT RUSSIA

Il x x < 4 II Z
Say. on the level" said the Man with
the Chronic Crouch, Isn't IL a revelation
the different sorts OF news We are getting
out of Russia these days?'
The Receptive Listener could not claim to
be an authority on Russia, so he simply
said "Why?'
well. It's this way" said the Habitual
Kicker. 1T seems TO me there is something
In the air of st. Petersburg that leads
every man who has been there fifteen min
utes to come back and settle the whole des-
tiny OF the Russian empire offhand. have
been reading a whole lot OF stun in the
magazines and newspapers lately by people
that don't know any moro about Russia
than l do, and the amount of Information
that have accumulated is astonishing.
The Receptive Listener said that most OF
the matter he had read about Russia lately
had been written with an air of authority
and seemed to be the real thing.
Just what l am kicking on" said tho
c. G.. Il have been studying the system
and 1t is good one so far 1t goes. In
the first place, you want to figure out about
what your reader expects to hear of the
subject OF Russia Then you write It, and
II you throw In enough air OF authority II
Will go all right. OF course you want some
local color. II is good ching 10 know the
difference between the kremlin and the
you spell them. because the Russian alpha
bet is different from the English, and you
have to translate and spell the words pho
netically. You are careful never TO spell
the same word the same way twice. and the
more consonauts YOU can get into one OF
them the more authoritatively Russian IL
looks.
Then YOU want a statesman's Yearbook a
Whittaker's Almanac. and either an ency-
clopedia or an international biography.
When you are QUILTED to that extent you
are equipped to deal with the whole of the
Russian political system. There Is another
good thing to remember, and that is not To
interview a man till after he Is dead. There
have been all sorts of interviews with
Plehve appearing since he assassi-
mated. 1t is good game. There is no dan
ger Of dead man contradcting an inter
View Now. | have been personally ac-
quainted with some of the people who have
interviewed Plehve, and I'll bet the drinks
that none of them ever saw Plehve unless
they waited around on his sidewalk some
Thursday morning and watched him get
into his carriage going to the Baltic sta
ton when he was going down for his week
ly interview with the car. Plehve was
not one of the men that you interviewed
nor that you could ordinarily even get a
note sent in to. However. interviewing
dead men Is A tolerably safe proposition.
and IL you wait long enough you are sure
to catch them dead and defenseless, espe-
cially in Russia.
..Sergius has been interviewed a good deal
since his decease. but he was not such an
interesting personality Plehve II IL
should happen that the car gets killed. L
guess there will be whole lot of these re
turned Russian experts who VIII ind that
they had interviews with him while he was
alive, but did not think to print them till
his death called II to mind.
II notice that another political expert has
developed in the magazines within the past
month. Used to know him, too. He could
talk French, but he knew about much
Russian as / did Used to live down near
the Police bridge with very nice little
newspaper woman who kept a sort of
hang-out joint for several of the European
correspondents because she could talk Rus
sian and none of them could. Wells this
political expert not doing anything ia
the newspaper lire but writing letter stuff
for his paper, which he said himself was
not so, as 1t was London journal that did
not want the truth about Russia at any
price. He was putting in the bulk OF his
time writing an English serial story. ana
might as well have been living IN a three
pair back on Haverstock hill for he seldom
got out on the street at all except to go TO
an adjacent restaurant for dinner lie was
nvalided home after he had been doing
nothing for about two months but l notice
that he is now the real thing I'm authorita-
tive Russian criticism. l have been reading
his stuff with good deal OF interest. and L
see that he has been using every barber
shop story and hotel lobby scandal at space
rates. though most of them have been dis
proved by subsequent developments a good
while ago.
There is one thing about settling the des-
TIMES of Russia in a newspaper story-it Is
a pretty easy game. You know that ninety
nine people out of a hundred who read 1t
won't know as much about IL as you do.
and you are less likely to get called down
on any old statement than II you were
writing about something up at the White
House, where your ignorance was apt to
stick out"
Well IL you know so much about what
isn't true in the situation, why don't you
write some stuff about Russia yourself2'
inquired the Receptive Listener, more or
less naturally.
TOO much trouble said the Man with
the Crouch. Then there is another thing.
am a pretty good con man. but L nave
not the monumental nerve TO tell how the
cars ministers have patted me on the
back and taken me into their confidence.
| have not any particular prejudice In favor
of the truth, but 1 am not good enough Tor
this particular brand of confidence work. 1t
seems to me that corking roulette Wheel
or running lever box into faro game
ought to be quite remuneratfve and take
less self-Confidence than this particular
method of making easy money. However
as | said before. | guess the trouble with
me is that while | know the system, am
not good enough for the business