Republican farmer., 1919-06-06
SOCIALIST HTS AT bOLSHEVISM G. H. Jones Calls It a Deadly
 and Contagious
 Disease.
By c. H. JONES. (Just Returned from Petrograd.) Copyright, 1919, By The Interna- n tional News Bureau, Inc.)

Bolshevism is a disease, contagious and deadly.
 Lenin and Trotsky. dream of world l well as cruel They work behind l veil and they would like you to think | their ideal is simply theoretical so- cialism brought to a practical con- | clusion.
 l l have always been a, Socialist but, | with the nightmare of this Russian | version of it now over me, m afraid ] of the very thought.
 l heard the first shot fired in the | revolution - it killed the Priestaf l (Chief of Police) in Petrograd- and l had unusual opportunities to study Russia's most terrible ordeal from that time tFebruary. 191) until last month. when I returned to England, | after twenty years in Petrograd. Russia today is the saddest coun- try on earth.
 The cruel spectre of famine stalks through the land; every one, rich as well as poor, fears
 the worst; commerce is being
 crippled by a creeping paralysis; there is a cancer in the very heart of the country. Call it BoIshevism - the Russian idea of social reform, equality of class, uplifting of the masses and other idealistic goals we hear so much about nowadays-and you can think twice in the future.
 These Red Terrorists---tyrranfS If you lille-are out on the run, not to level things up so much as down and, as the night follows the day so the death-knell of civiliza ton sure ly sounds in the trumpet-bell of Bol- shevism.
 Countries other than Russia must awake to their peril or perish.
 We must fight this grim and dead ly enemy of mankind; it is suicidal to ignore it.
 Selfishness and Greed.
 Like a gigantic octopus it seeks to encompass the world in it's death- ly grip. Its tentacles alreedy reach out to all European lands, and everywhere it is bound to find some fertile ground for it's seeds of sell fishness and greed.
 They are the attributes of human nature.
 Why. before I left Russia only four weeks ago, we read almost daily of the Progress of Bolshevism in the British Isles"
 Of course the only papers now pub lished preach the gospel of Lenine and Trotzky. And yet. among the thinking classes--- no matter how poor-the true mean ing of Bolshevism. I hope. is being realized, and time will show whether the real Russia will recover, or suc- cumb to the poison that is threaten- ing her very life.
 Here, in Great Britain I find they are complaining of such things as high prices and DrOfiteering
 When I left Petrograd last month you could not buy many articles of necessary food. no matter what you offered. Bread was 40 roubles a pound and the rouble used to be worth 44c. Horsef1esh was eagerly bought at 25 roubles. and the butter even fetched as much as 120.
 Of course one of the first things the Revolutionists did was to rob the banks. but the enormous sums hand ed to supporters of the movement soon proved almost worthless, and l day and night, money" hardly l worth paper 1t is printed, is being turned out without the slightest re- gard to the future.
 But, then. one of the many dreams of the Bolshevist is to abolish money; l perhaps this is his method
 Pork at 1SO Roubles Per Pound
 
 if not impossible. to determine the | purchasing value of rouble. My | wife recently paid 1S0 roubles for a | pound of pork. In the olden days | that would have meant about s90.0O. |
 The price of everything is pro- portionate. Minimum tram fares | formerly about three cents are now | sixty-six cents, and newspapers sell | at forty-four cents:
 Of course, the food prices are greatly enhanced by the systematic | thefts of the Red Guards, who think | nothing of taking precedence in a po- tatoe queue and ordering what they | want with not the slightest intention | of paying.
 Then, to make up his loss, plus | illegitimate profit, the shopkeeper un- 1 blushingly charges 12 roubles.
 Just before we came away the food | question was rapidly approaching 2 | crisis.
 All we had for a fortnight was a | small allowance of oats, which we ground In the coffee-mill or meat | mincer and made into a pasty kind of | porridge.
 Milk was almost unobtainable, but if you waited in the queue long enough you might sometimes get | pint for ten roubles (S150O).
 MotnerS Wlrn young children Ire Quently would take up their stand | for the morning milk just after mid night, and then there is not enough l to go round.
 Babies Die by the Thousand.
 The mortality especially among | babies is too awful for words. Thous- ands die every day, and no relief | seems to be forthcoming soon enough | to save Russia from herself.
 As a nation she must inevitably die l unless help from outside comes in | due time.
 There is food In abundance in parts | of the country, of course, but no l means to convey it to the centres | most in need.
 Fever. smallpox, and other hideous diseases are rampant