Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-07-28

you will remember. had been met by the
assertion on the part OF the porter that
no such person was known IN tnat stree..
When you consider that the manufactures
was after il one of the twenty or thirty
mos. important business men In the city
you must agree with me that the people
there are about as stupid as can be found
en- the face of the earth.
1T Is the stupidity, the stolidity, of the
mass of Russians that in my judgment
will prevent the present upheavals in the
land of the car from resulting in any
great Improvement. though l hope / am
wrong, of course.
Never heard of the lack of directories
In Russia? Why there are no telephone
directories, even. Business men are not
even allowed to have private mailing lists.
If you are doing business in Russia you
must get the government to send out your
circulars. Suppose yeu want to send out a
thousand circulars to a thousand people of
certain c,ass You inclose your thousand
circulars in a thousand envelopes and take
them to the proper government department.
There you pay the necessary postage. plus
3 kopecks for each name, and the circulars
are addressed and sent off for you-per-
hapS the full thousand, perhaps half of
them; you never know how many. and
there is no way for you to find out.
In Russian High Places.
IF there are any in Russia who do not
graft they are the peasants. They have no
tell you about a bit of graft by men of high
degree which heard about in Russia.
1T is law, or custom that has all the
force of law, In Russia, that the domes
of the churches shall be brightly gided
with gold leaf. No matter how much suffer-
ing there may be among the people, no
matter how much heavily over-taxed they
may be, no matter what else is neglected
the domes must always CLEAN brightly
when the sun shines upon them and, OF
course, they have to be regilded at fire.
quent intervals.
Naturally contracts to do the work are
much sought after, and naturally, too. they
are given to members of the privileged
classes Sometimes they are given not be-
cause the domes need regilding but because
somebody needs the money. There was
such an instance while was in Russia.
Two young men, belonging to the grand
ducal set. had been on an excursion to
Ostend and had gambled so heavily be-
sides indulging in other designations. that
they were dead broke. So they went to
Pobedonestseff, then procurateur Of the
Russian church and suggested that the
dome of certain famous church edifice
was badly in need of a fresh coat of gold
leaf. He agreed with them. They sug-
gested. further, that they would like a con-
tract to do the work. They got it.
For some reason the profits on the job
weren't as large as the two contracto an
ticipated or perhaps they went broke again
Anyway, about three weeks after the work
was finished, fresh contract was gwen 10
the same young men and the dome was
glded all over again, the reason assigned
being that Providence had sent such bad
weather to punish the people for their sins
that the gliding had all turned green.
1.-The double gliding cost the equivalent of
$4,000. How much of that was net profit
I haven't any idea but there was under
standing among those who heard the inside
gossip of the day that the finances of the
two young contractors were again easy for
the time being.
This was at the time of the first mobil-
ization. One bitter cold afternoon-the tenn
perature was below zero-while the second
gliding was in progress l saw lot of men
and women old and women mostly
fathers and mothers of soldiers who We're
about to be sent to the far east. where
death would almost certainly be their por-
ton. gathered in front of a great ikon-an
image of Mary-in the street.
Among these devotees was an old
couple scantily clad and with bare hands
The weather was not only cold, but it was
showing ami there was a bitter wind L
noticed this couple first at about 2:30 in the
afternoon Four hours and half later, at
o'clock when I passed that way again,
they were still in their place kneeling be-
fore the ikon, their bare hands still clasped
before them, and they were still praying
that their son. to be sent away the next
day to fight. the Japs, might be restored to
fhay,