Life in Moscow, as compared to life in London, is drab, monotonous, and depressed.  I am not, of course, comparing life there with that of the rich here, but with that of the average working-class family.  When it is realized that the highest wages are about fifteen shillings a month, this is not surprising.  I do not think that life could, under any system, be very cheerful in a country so exhausted by war as Russia, so I am not saying this as a criticism of the Bolsheviks.  But I do think there might be less police interference, less vexatious regulation, and more freedom for spontaneous impulses towards harmless enjoyments.

Religion is still very strong.  I went into many churches, where I saw obviously famished priests in gorgeous vestments, and a congregation enormously devout.  Generally more than half the congregation were men, and among the men many were soldiers.  This applies to the towns as well as to the country.  In Moscow I constantly saw people in the streets crossing themselves.

There is a theory that the Moscow working man feels himself free from capitalist domination, and therefore bears hardships gladly.  This is no doubt true of the minority who are active Communists, but I do not think it has any truth for the others.  The average working man, to judge by a rather hasty impression, feels himself the slave of the Government, and has no sense whatever of having been liberated from a tyranny.

I recognize to the full the reasons for the bad state of affairs, in the past history of Russia and the recent policy of the Entente.  But I have thought it better to record impressions frankly, trusting the readers to remember that the Bolsheviks have only a very limited share of responsibility for the evils from which Russia is suffering.

FOOTNOTES: 

[5] The ninth Communist Congress (March-April, 1920) says on this subject:  “In view of the fact that the first condition of the success of the Soviet Republic in all departments, including the economic, is chiefly systematic printed agitation, the Congress draws the attention of the Soviet Government to the deplorable state in which our paper and printing industries find themselves.  The ever decreasing number of newspapers fail to reach not only the peasants but even the workers, in addition to which our poor technical means render the papers hardly readable.  The Congress strongly appeals to the Supreme Council of Public Economy, to the corresponding Trade Unions and other interested institutions, to apply all efforts to raise the quantity, to introduce general system and order in the printing business, and so secure for the worker and peasant in Russia a supply of Socialist printed matter.”

VIII

TOWN AND COUNTRY