New-York tribune., 1922-04-06
Russia -
In the Red Shud0w
{Con,lnued from pass snsl

tconslnued from psss snsl
guests. A neighborhood consecrated to
bright lights, music and dancing sud
! denly overgrown with cobwebs; win
dows unwashed, broken panes pieced
out with paper and old clothes.
1t is not so much destruction that
impresses one in Moscow. Here and
there vacant place among the houses
looks like q brickyard here and there
the skeleton of building stands high.
the interior gutted by fire and cannon
shot. There is something heroic about
these. But the tragedy Of Russia is
I the tragedy of the settling down into
hopelessness.
To get true sense of Russian life
IN the cities to-day one must go into
the crowded apartments, where whole
family eats and sleeps and receives
guests in two rooms Uttered with the
remainders of household goods of bet
ter days. In thousands of homes
there is now no central heating. Brick
ovens are built on parquet floors with
stove pipes sticking through windows.
Water pipes have burst and plumbing
is thing Of bad odor.
Race of Cave Men Remain
In Wake of Soviet Wave
Sovietism came like great surge Of
an ideal to hungry people. The wave
has receded, leaving Russia race Of
cave men living in holes and crannies.
stoop shouldered, racked with coughs,
blinking at light. wrapping the rags of
| five years ago around their bodies.
Again we are on the streets In
broad open place building stands in
| bright light Before the building.
stretching for two blocks, is a line Of
people, patiently standing. neither talk
ing nor moving, waiting like sheep.
The government gives free motion
picture performances an hour long. In
order to get in one has to wait in the
( street two or three hours. But one
might AS we'll wait outdoors as indoors
1t is not comfortable anywhere The
pictures show Trotzky inspecting the
Red army, some views Of recent con-
! ference between representatives Of the
government and of the Far Eastern
Republic, some staged views of a SAM
tary train. These pictures are pre-
sented over and over hour after hour
for weeks at time
Let us go into the theater. Any
theater will do. 1t may be the Bolshoi
Iheater Of Moscow, the Conservatory
OF Music. the AlcXandrinsky Theater
of Petrograd or the theaters of the
regime came in mirrors, tapestries.
draperies, mural paintings, carpets,
hne furniture went out. The halls are
now bare and barnlike Tables
boards on trestles) are set up here
and there with samovars, bottles of
citron water, cakes and sandwiches.
DURING the. action of the play the
people cough a great deal. Sometimes
1t is impossible to hear the words or
-,
that passes over the audience After
the curtain falls the people rush out
into the Railways and foyers to march
madly up and down. 1t is cold in the
theaters and the people are thinly clad.
Looking over the people in the city
streets, one is struck with the absence
Of all sense of class. In the old days
no society showed firmer gradations
Of class from nobleman to mushik.
Now all are leveled down. Only the
/ inordinately wealthy can have new
clothing. But even the wealthy man
thinks twice before making too much
of display. The memory is still
strong on the people Of the days when
earrings and jewery we're torn from
the bodies of women, when men were
made to walk back home without furs
and shoes. If one has comfortable
i things hidden away he is still likely
! to be Clrcumspect.
The soft collar is to-day the best
! style for men. And so there is little
to distinguish class from class. Among
the people of the city two classes tend
always to avoid display, the suffering
middle class people, the widows and
| splnsters living on incomes which have
now vanished, who are now in desper-
ate straits and are hiding in crannies,
and the new wealthy class, who do not
as yet dare show their riches.
Here and there among the crowds
there are prosperous people At
Christmas time Of this year magnif-
cent furs that had been hidden away
four years ago began to come out. But
who wore them. 1t was a member of
the new billionaire class, the class
suddenly elevated into riches by the
wave Of speculation that broke over
Russia after trade had been made free
[ The women who wear elegant furs
now are all of a type healthy, large
the full-blooded who can prosper even
n revolution.
j Here is picture Of typical street
{ in Moscow in the year 1921. Sidewalks
narrow and incredibly rough Iron
| cutters from houses formerly buried
! in the cement now stand high in the
! air. On these sidewalks half the peo-
{ pie are holding reception; the other
/ half pushing forward as if to a fire.
i Many children on the streets, many
| women bearing bundles. MANY men
and women with faces bound up on
account of toothache.
Beggars Crowd Street;
i Apples 10000 kubles Each
/ Against the walls girls and women
selling sunfower seed, poppy-seed
cakes, little bits of candy. pieces of
pastry. Prices from 1000 rubles up.
Cigarettes 1000 rubles apiece. Apples
10000 ruhles apiece.
Hundreds of beggars, manned and
mutilated; few soldiers, the streets
crowded with peculiar low wagons, the
horse htched to large arched ar
rangement over his neck: some auto
moh'les, travelling usually at very