Der Nordstern. [volume] (St. Cloud, Minn.) 1874-1931, 1922-11-09

In an endeavOr TO bring ONE "
every Catholic the conditions in Ger
tain sections of Russia, which caused
the Holy Father to inaugurate Inn
mediate relief measures, and with the
purpose Of disclosing the plight OF the
children in the famine-stricken re-
gions, the following pamphlet has been
issued by the Vatican Press:
we are in presence of one of the
greatest ca~tastrophes of history. In
Vulnerable masses of human creatures,
stricken by famine, mown down with
.typhus and cholera, wander in a des-
perate condition over a country laid
waste, and crowd to the more populous
center, hoping there to find bread, but
are instead driven away by force of
arms. From the plains of the Volga,
many millions of men, threatened with
the most terrible death, invoke the aid
of humanity"
The dreadful picture of famine and
misery which Pope Benedict XIV OF
~venerated memory, concisely traces in
the above paragraph of his letter of
August 5, 1921, to Cardinal Gasparri,
although partly relieved in the region
of the Volga, remains almost unaltered
if not aggravated in its sad tints, if
.one regards the other immense regions
of Southern Russia.
The Scourge Of Famine.
Famine, in fact, continues to rage
al through the South of Russia. In
those vast regions which were atone
time the most fertile in the world, the
soil is dried up and left in the most
desolate abandonment. After having
exhausted their last provisions, and
sold all to procure themselves bread,
hundreds of thousands of peasants
have fed in search of more favorable
districts.
One of the worst aspects of the sit
uation arises from the immense num-
Der of orphans and of children aban-
doned by their relatives during the
flight.
Filthy insects, propagators of dis
ease, infest the rags of the unhappy
survivors, rags left unwashed through
absolute want Of soap.
Meanwhile, the absence Of workmen.
the difficulty of procuring seed, insult
ficient means of communication,
drought and various other causes have
combined to occasion this famine
which now forces the miserable pop
ulation of these districts to nourish
themselves with whatever fallssssi into
their hands. In autumn they ate herbs,
bark of trees, grubs and earthWorms;
now their daily food is straw from
the matched roofs, and in some places
horrible to relate!-evenS human re-
mains.
The Cry Of the Children.
One can readily imagine the dis
orders which such substances taken as
food occasion, especially in children.
Photographs of these wretched people
show us their emanciated bodies de-
formed and swollen by gases S % pro-
duced. Their intelligence alone remains
nnimpaired in >this general physical
destruction and reveals itself in their
eyes, which implore, with anguish,
some relief from their atrocious suf-
ferings.
The children, thus weakened by
hunger, become an easy prey to all
maladies: among others, oedema,
which brings with it gangrene and
death.
The greater number, however, die
of inanition; first the child becomes
emanciated, which the stomach sWells,
then the sufferer becomes SO extreme
~ weak as not to be able to stand, or
digest anything, and at this stage, in
spite of the aid of medicine or food,
the unfortunate child dies in spasms
of intestinal cramp.
One Vast Cemetery.
Children are dying thus in tens Of
thousand, and Southern Russia is be-
coming a vast cemetery. On the thaw-
ing of an affluent Of the Volga about
ten thousand corpses were found
heaped together at a point at which
the river describes in its course a
sharp curve. They had been carried
by the current from various Localities.
Death often surprises the famine
stricken on the roads; and the sight
has become so ordinary that %passers-
by no longer heed. The corpses, often
after having been food for dogs, are
thrown into the common trench, to-
gether with many others gathered in
the houses.
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