The Washington herald., 1915-05-09
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Of the Orient. What nohIer destiny
could he have than TO form A human
! bridge across the gulf of hate and igno-
rance between the East and the West
Foreigners who have lived in Russia
agree in their enthusiastic testimony To
the Eentleness. the sympathy and tho
essential warm-hcartednesS OF the peas
antry, notwithstanding the brutalttics
which they suffer and themselves per-
petrate matter of course. | am
bound to say that | never saw horses
that spoke of more humane treatment
than the swift. sleek. wCll-groomed ami
mails under the hoop of the dToskics
Not once did | see a lash laid on as
| those crazy carts whirled through the
streets. while many of the drivers were
without whips.
In spite of class lines and the terrible
injustice they unfailingly breed. the Rus
SLAMS have a democracy peculiar to them
selves. The Car does not address a
Russian. high or low. by title. but calls
all alike by name. The general Is likely
noble fondly nicknames his serving man
little pigeon. while at Easter master
and servant kiss as they cXult together
that Christ is risen
The Russians really arc one great fam
! lily. one immense household. They wor-
ship at the same altar in churches with
out pcws. The stranger in the land may
smile TO see the liveried coachman and
his aristocratic employer bowling toGeth-
or as their drosky passes a shrine in the
street. or poor. third-class Passenger
ana rlCn llTSt-CldSS niger StantlnE
/ side by side In the railway station and
! blessing themselves in unison before the
shrine that is as inevitable as the sam
cNar. But it is the touch that makes the
Russian world kin, the tic that binds to-
Gether all sorts and conditions of men.
The Autocrnt of Tomorrow.
When 7 first entered the land Of tho
Gar I saw a man by the track stand
ing to his knees in a pair of big boots
and staring incuriously UP at the train.
HIS shaggy, tawny hair scrambled out
from beneath high-peaked cap ard his
yellow. unkempt beard struggled over
the collar of a robe drawn n by a cord
blouse.
There was on mistaking him. for Toll
stoi had not only drawn his picture true
to life. but in his own garh he inper-
sonated him before the world. That
moujik by the railway is the brother Of
1g'. GO Russian moujiks-or little peo-
Pile
The Russian peasant is all the Russia
there is. Everything else Is but tho
froth. but an exotic like the Romauoffs
and their court. hut an imitation like the
streets and palaces of Petrograd. He Is
all the past and all the future all tn"
production and all the patriotism. all the
faith and all the hope. all the song and
all the story. all the music. literature
and art of Russia.
A writer in a recent number Of an
English magazine noted with surprise
that the peasants speak like the aristo-
Gratis. 1t Is more true to say that the
aristocrats speak like the peasants. for
the latter remained the custodians of the
native language when the former veneer
ed themselves with Western civilization
and took up foreign speech. Finally
when the contempt Of the noble for all
things Russian had subsidized. the peas
ant had to teach him the native tongue.
Tolstoi not only wore a PEASANTS blouse
but he also dressed his thoughts in the
language of the peasantry.
Only fifty years ago the moujik was
but chattel on the land OF an aristOo,
GRAFT Today he may be even poorer ini
body and estate. How could he ever
have been worse off or lived in a more
wretched den? And famine Is his IA
miliar acquaintance. for he knows how
to raise only eleven or twelve bushels OF
winter wheat to the acre on his little al
lotment of earth which his commune
purchased from the landlord under the
emancipation act Yet he is rich in the
patience to endure and rich in the own
ership Of the years to come.
Time and Russia belong to him.
ing school in citizenship and government
only second to the New England town
meeting. Since. however. 50 per cent of
the Russians are illiterate. the chances
are our moujik cannot read or write. but
he Is imbued with shrewd common
sense and he carries. as his saying is.
"A Gar in his head" Teach him his
letters and let him have a free news
paper-nearly 100000 Russians are going
to school now-and In good season, when
he il fitted for the task. he will become
the autocrat of all the Russias
Copyright. lsiJ by James Mosan.l