CHAPTER III

SOME IMPRESSIONS OF TIFLIS AND ARMENIA

Tiflis. 1 January, 1916.—­Kind wishes from the Grand Duke and everybody.  Not such an aimless day as usual.  I got into a new sitting-room and put it straight, and in the evening we went to Prince Orloff’s box for a performance of “Carmen.”  It was very Russian and wealthy.  At the back of the box were two anterooms, where we sat and talked between the acts, and where tea, chocolates, etc., were served.  They say the Prince has L200,000 a year.  He is gigantically fat, with a real Cossack face.

Scandal is so rife here that it hardly seems to mean scandal.  They don’t appear to be so much immoral as non-moral.  Everyone sits up late; then most of them, I am told, get drunk, and then the evening orgies begin.  No one is ostracised, everyone is called upon and “known” whatever they have done.  I suppose English respectability would simply make them smile—­if, indeed, they believed in it.

2 January.—­I don’t suppose I shall ever write an article on war charities, but I believe I ought to.  A good many facts about them have come my way, and I consider that the public at home should be told how the finances are being administered.

I know of one hospital in Russia which has, I believe, cost England L100,000.  The staff consists of nurses and doctors, dressers, etc., all fully paid.  The expenses of those in charge of it are met out of the funds.  They live in good hotels, and have “entertaining allowances” for entertaining their friends, and yet one of them herself volunteered the information that the hospital is not required.  The staff arrived weeks ago, but not the stores.  Probably the building won’t be opened for some time to come, and when it is opened there will be difficulty in getting patients to fill it.

In many parts of Russia hospitals are not wanted.  In Petrograd there are five hundred of them run by Russians alone.

Then there is a fund for relief of the Poles, which is administered by Princess ——.  The ambulance-car which the fund possesses is used by the Princess to take her to the theatre every night.

A great deal of money has been subscribed for the benefit of the Armenians.  Who knows how much this has cost the givers? yet the distribution of this large sum seems to be conducted on most haphazard lines.  An open letter arrived the other day for the Mayor of Tiflis.  There is no Mayor of Tiflis, so the letter was brought to Major ——.  It said:  “Have you received two cheques already sent?  We have had no acknowledgment.”  There seems to be no check on the expenditure, and there is no local organisation for dispensing the relief.  I don’t say that it is cheating:  I only say as much as I know.

[Page Heading:  ILL-BESTOWED CHARITY]

A number of motor-ambulances were sent to Russia by some generous people in England the other day.  They were inspected by Royalty before being despatched, and arrived in the care of Mr. ——.  When their engines were examined it was found that they were tied together with bits of copper-wire, and even with string.  None of them could be made to go, and they were returned to England.