Evening star., 1937-11-02

~ TROYANOVSKY is the en-
~ bodiment of excitement and
a adventure and unexpected con-
tradictions.
He is the Ambassador Extraordinary
and Minister Plenipotentiary of the
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to
the United States, yet he plays the
game Of social diplomacy more vigor-
ously than anybody in Washington.
He has spoken of himself as a 'gilded
messenger boy"
He was exiled to Siberia by Czar
Nicholas for revolutionary activity and
escaped to France From Paris he
corresponded in invisible ink with
revolutionaries in Russia.
He worked closely with Lenin, but
disagreed with him so vigorously on
the Leninistic theory of making peace
for Russia after the World War that
he became Menshivist.
The Bolshevists arrested him in
1918, just 10 years after the Cars
agents arrested him.
This representative Of Communistic
Russia waited four years after the
establishment of the Soviet govern
ment before he became a Communist.
Got Start in 1922.
Stain, whom he met over a chess
table in Austria before the fall Of the
Gear, started him toward political sue
cess In 1922 by appointing him to a
post in the Commissariat Of Workers
and Peasants Inspection.
The same Stain sent him to the
United States in 1884 as the first
q. s. S. r. Ambassador in Washington
because Of his intimate knowledge OF
the Far Eastern question. At no time
more than now has this knowledge
been needed.
The Ambassador Is short, swart
man of IS, whose chief expressed gospel
IN the United States is peace.
In less than three years he has
become one Of the most popular
diplomats in the Capital He is
gracious and informal, talks well on
many subjects, plays tennis at the
exclusive Chevy Chase Club, is a su-
perior bridge player and has few
equals here at chess.
In the luxurious Sixteenth street
home which serves as the Embassy
and which the late George Pullman
built to help his wife crash Washing
ton society, Ambassador and Mrs.
Troyanovsky give magnificent recep-
tions, rivaling the most elaborate
funtions of George Bakhmetieff, the
last Ambassador of the Gar to the
United States.
Mrs. Troyanovsky, frail woman,
has taught herself how to stand and
shake hands for five hours without
collapsing. Caviar in gobs is available
to all guests, but caviar in Russia is
more common than butter here and
the Ambassador pays no duty on the
sturgeon eggs.
The guests who walk across the deep
red carpet into the Embassy consume
pounds of food, all prepared by John,
the slightly bearded Russian chef who
waited II years to become head of the
Troyanovsky kitchen.
Patience Is Rewarded.
When the Embassy, vacant from
1917 to 1894, was being renovated for
the Troyanovskys, a superintendent of
the work noticed that each day a
striking, bearded man sat on the door,
step. Intrigued. the superintendent
asked him who he was.
II am the Embassy Chef" the man
announced.
why, did not think any Of the
household staff had been hired" said
the superintendent.
II have been hired q long time"
said the chef. II was chef for Mr..
Bakhmetieff. When he went waited
for another Ambassador to come. Now
another Ambassador is coming, and I
am the chef"
So John, whose devotion to cookery
Is not complicated by questions Of poll
tics, was installed as the Embassy
chef. He is an artist at the stove,
but so quiet does he keep his private
affairs that even his last name Is un-