The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1933-12-12

cratic deputies in the Duma. Comrade
Kozyrev relates that one Of the stu
dents tried to trip Ilyieh up and make
it appear that Hyieh attached more
Importance to work in the Duma
than to carrying on agitation in the
army. Ilyich smiled, and went on to
talk about the Importance OF work in
The Duma. OF course, he did not for q
moment think that the work in the
army should be slackened in the least
degree, but he did think that this
work ought to be carried on more
secretly. "This work." he said, must
be done, but not talked about" just
at this time letter had arrived from
Toulon, from 8 group of sailors, So
cial-DemOcrats, on the cruiser
"Slava" asking for literature and par
ticularly for a person to be sent to
carry ON revolutionary work among
the sailors. Ilyich sent comrade
there who had much experience in
secret work and this conlrade settled
in Toulon. OF course, Ilyich did not
even as much as hint about this to
the students.
Although Lenin's thoughts were al
most entirely taken up with Russia,
he nevertheless made q careful study
Of the French labor movement. AT
that time the Socialist Party Of
France was opportunistic to the core.
For example; In the spring Of 1909
a great strike of postal employees
broke out. The whole city was in
state of excitement over the event;
but the Party kept aloof. 1T is the
business of the trade unions and not
ours" the Party leaders said. To us
Russians this division of labor the
Party's aloofness from an economic
struggle, seemed positively monstrous.
Ilyich paid particular attention to
the election campaign. The cam
paign did not seem to concern imrne-
date political problems; it was all
taken I'D with personal pickering and
mutual abuse. Only a few Of the
meetings were interesting. At one of
them I saw Juares. He had tremen-
douS influence on the crowd; but /
did not hike his Speectl-every word
seemed. to be deliberately chosen. I
liked Vaillant's speech much better.
Valiant had been fighter in the
Paris Commune and was particularly
loved and esteemed by the workers.
can recall the figure of a tall work
er who had come to the meeting
straight from work, with his shirt
sleeves rolled up. This man listened
to valiant with wrapt attention and
suddenly he exclaimed: Fine speak
err, the old mani" Two young lads, the
sons of this worker, sitting beside
him, were equally enthusiastic. But
not all the orators at the meetings
were Juareses and Vaillants. The or
binary speakers played down to their
audiences: they spoke in one way to
working class audience and in an
other way to an audience of intel
lectuals. BY attending French cleo
ton meetings, We got clear insight
into what elections mean in a demo
cratic republic" To an outside OBJ
server, the thing seemed simply
astonishing. That is why Ilyich was
so fond of the revolutionary music
hall singers who poured ridicule on
the election campaign. / remember
one song which described how a can
didate goes to a village to canvass
for votes; he drinks with the peas
ants, tells them a lot Of cock nd-buli
stories, and when the peasants are
drunk they vote for him and sing:
"Tas ben dit mon gal" (What you
say is true, ladD. After having got
the peasants votes, the candidate be-
gins to draw his 1900 francs salary
as deputy, and petrays the interests
of the peasants. On one occasion a
Socialist member of the Chamber of
Deputies named Dumas came to
visit us and related to us how he
went around the villages during the
election to canvass for votes and I
involuntarily called to mind that mu-
sic-hall song. One of the most popu-
lar rnusic-hall singers Of that time
was Montagues, the son of fighter