I do not know why, but, no matter in what frame of mind I may find myself, every time I recall this story, particularly the author's outcry of indignation, I cannot restrain a smile.

Dear Hertzen! You should have lived to see Lenin! He would have shown you things!

So they endured that frightful oppression, flew into fits of indignation, suffered and cursed, and still did not want to leave the country.

And everybody outside of Russia knew that the Russian régime was unbearable and that the Russian people were martyrs.

And now a strange thing happens. Foreign observers go to Russia and on their return say that, although things are not quite etc., nevertheless everything is arranged very nicely. They have seen well-fed people at Maxim Gorky's parties. They have even found it possible to have polite discussions and arguments with exhangmen. In short, things are not nearly as bad as the enemies of Communism try to picture them. Life is possible; not for everybody, of course, but surely for the Russians.

And yet is it not strange?- the Russians do not want to stay.

-

In vain does the kindly Soviet Government plug up every exit. The refugees crawl out, like cockroaches out of holes and cracks, hundreds of them, thousands. They give away their last rubles to bribe the guards, run away at night, in snow and rain, over treacherous ice. They flee with their wives and children, starving, freezing, wandering from their road, constantly risking death. And still they flee, and flee, and flee, across every border, over seas, fields, mountains, through marshes and forests - wherever man can walk, swim, or crawl. They flee and flee.

I think that if the Soviet Govern

I have been told the following story: A Russian general who lives in exile in Paris came out one day on the Place de la Concorde, looked about in all directions, glanced at the sky, at the square, at the houses, at the stores, at the gay crowd, scratched his nose, and said with profound feeling:

'All this is very good, of course. Very, very good. But what to do? What are we going to do?'

The general's dictum is just by way of introduction. The tale itself is coming. It really hangs therefrom.

Here are we, Russians, living a pecu

liar life, that does not seem like anything else in the world. We are held together not by a force of mutual attraction, as a planetary system, for example, but, on the contrary, by a force of mutual repulsion.

Every one of us hates all the rest, just as much as all the rest hate him.

say that he is a thief, and we let it go at that.'

'But suppose it is not true?'

'Oh, well. Why should n't he be a thief?'

And really, why should n't he?

Thus united by the force of mutual repulsion, the Russians are divided into two classes: those who sell Russia and those who save her.

Saveliev.'

This word has long since lost its original connotation. It now has the character either of an article, or else of a distinguishing title, similar to the Spanish 'Don.'

Nowadays you can hear conversation like this:

'Last night there was a party at thiefVelsky's. There were several people present: thief-Ivanov, thief-Gusev, thiefPopov. They played bridge and had a very pleasant time.'

Business men converse among themselves in the following manner:

'I advise you to engage thief-Parchenko. He would be most useful to you.'

'But would n't, he abuse my confidence?'

'He? Why, he is as honest a man as ever lived.'

'Perhaps it would be better to take thief-Kusachenko?'

'Oh, no, he will not do at all.'

A newcomer finds this custom very strange.

'But why is he a thief? Who has proved it? Where did he steal anything?'

Those who sell live in great comfort. They go to theatres, dance fox-trots, have Russian cooks, and entertain those who save Russia. And in the midst of

attention to their real occupation: if you ask them for how much and on what terms Russia can be bought, they will scarcely be able to give you an intelligent answer.

Those who save are different. They rush about all day long, get caught in the nets of political intrigue, and constantly expose each other.

They are rather kindly inclined toward those who sell, and get money from them for the work of saving. But among themselves, they hate each other bitterly.

'Have you heard what a scoundrel thief-Ovechkin has proven to be? He is selling Tambov.'

'You don't mean it? To whom?'
'Why, to Chile, of course.'
'What?'

"To Chile, I say.'

'But what does Chile want with Tambov?'

'What a question? They must have a base in Russia.'

'But Tambov does not belong to Ovechkin. How can he sell it?'

'Is there such a Government?' 'Well, there was. A LieutenantColonel (I've forgotten his name) declared himself the Government. He held out for a day and a half. If we had supported him in time, the thing would have been done. But what can you do without a typewriter? So the cause of Russia was lost. And all because of that thief-Ovechkin. And have you heard about thief-Korobkin? He has announced himself as the ambassador to Japan.'

'But who has appointed him?'

'Nobody knows. He says that it was the Tiraspol-Sortorensky Government. It is true that the Government existed only about fifteen or twenty minutes, through a misunderstanding. Then it became ashamed of itself and ceased to cxist of its own accord. But Korobkin happened to be by at the right moment, and fixed it all in those fifteen minutes.' 'But has he been recognized by anybody?'

'He does n't care. All he wanted was to get the visé. That was why he got himself appointed. Frightful, is n't it? And have you heard the latest news? They say that Bakhmach has been captured.'

'By whom?' 'Nobody knows.'

"That is n't known, either. Frightful, is n't it?'

'How do you know all this?'

'From the radio. We have two radio services, the "Sovradio" for Soviet Russia, and the "Ukradio" for Ukraine. Then we have our own service, the 'Perevradio' for Europe.

'And how does Paris regard this?' 'Oh, what does Paris care?' 'But tell me, does anybody understand anything?'

'Hardly. You know even Tiutchev said, "You cannot understand Russia with your brain." And since a human being has no other organ for understanding, you have to give it up. They say that a statesman around here began to understand things with his stomach, but they removed him quickly.' 'So . .

Yes. The general looked around on the Place de la Concorde, and said with profound feeling:

'All this is very good, of course. Very, very good. But what to do? What are we going to do?'

And really, what are we going to do?

1 Play on words. Sovradio sounds like the Russian word 'to lie'; ukradio sounds like the word 'to steal'; perevradio sounds like the word meaning to get things mixed up. - TRANSLATOR.

As a man grows older life becomes more interesting but less easy to know, for late in life even the strongest yields to the habit of his compartment. When he cannot range through all society, from the Court to the gutter, a man must go where all society meets, as at the pilgrimage, the festival, or the game. Here in England the game is both a festival and an occasion of pilgrimage. A man wanting to set down a picture of the society of England will find his models at the games.

What are the English games? The man's game is Association football; the woman's game, perhaps, hockey or lacrosse. Golf I regard more as a symptom of a happy marriage than a game. Cricket, which was once widely popular among both sexes, has lost its hold, except among the young. The worst of all these games is that few can play them at a time.

But in the English country, during the autumn, winter, and early spring of each year, the main sport is fox-hunting, which is not, like cricket or football, a game for a few and a spectacle for many, but something in which all who come may take a part, whether rich or poor, mounted or on foot. It is a sport loved and followed by both sexes, all ages, and all classes. At a fox-hunt, and nowhere else in England, except perhaps at a funeral, can you see the whole of the land's society brought together, focussed for the observer, as the Canterbury pilgrims were for Chaucer.

This fact made the subject attractive. The fox-hunt gave an opportunity for a picture or pictures of the members of an English community.

Then to all Englishmen who have lived in a hunting country, hunting is in the blood and the mind is full of it. It is the most beautiful and the most stirring sight to be seen in England. In the ports, as at Falmouth, there are ships, under sail, under way, coming or going, beautiful unspeakably. In the country, especially on the great fields on the lower slopes of the downland, the teams of the ploughmen may be seen bowing forward on a skyline, and this sight can never fail to move one by its majesty of beauty. But in neither of these sights of beauty is there the bright color and swift excitement of the hunt nor the thrill of the horn and the cry of the hounds ringing into the elements of the soul. Something in the hunt wakens memories hidden in the marrow: racial memories, of when one hunted for the tribe; animal memories, perhaps of when one hunted with the pack or was hunted.

Hunting has always been popular here in England. In ancient times it was necessary. Wolves, wild boar, foxes, and deer had to be kept down. To hunt was then the social duty of the mounted man, when he was not engaged in war. It was also the opportunity of all other members of the community to have a good time in the open, with a feast or a new fur at the end to crown the pleasure.

Since arms of precision were made, hunting on horseback with hounds has perhaps been unnecessary everywhere, but it is not easy to end a pleasure rooted in the instincts of men. Hunting has continued and probably will continue in this country and in Ireland. It is rapidly becoming a national sport in the United States.

Some have written that hunting is the sport of the wealthy man. Some wealthy men hunt, no doubt, but they are not the backbone of the sport so much as those who love and use horses. Parts of this country, of Ireland, and of the United States are more than ordinarily good pasture, fitted for the breeding of horses, beyond most other places in the world. Hardly anywhere else is the climate so equable, the soil so right for the feet of colts, and the grass so good. Where these conditions exist men will breed horses and use them. Men who breed good horses will ride, jump, and test them, and will invent means of riding, jumping, and testing them the steeplechase, the circus, the contests at fairs and shows, the point-to-point meeting - and they will preserve, if possible, any otherwise dying sport which offers such means.

I have mentioned several reasons why fox-hunting should be popular: (a) that it is a social business, at which the whole community may and does attend in vast numbers in a pleasant mood of goodwill, good humor, and equality, and during which all may go anywhere into ground otherwise shut to them; (b) that it is done in the winter, at a season when other social gatherings are difficult, and in country districts where no buildings except the churches could contain the numbers assembled; (c) that it is most beautiful to watch, so beautiful that perhaps very few of the acts of men can be so lovely to watch or so exhilarating (the only thing to be compared with it in this

My own interest in fox-hunting began at a very early age. I was born in a good hunting country, partly woodland, partly pasture. My home, during my first seven years, was within half-a-mile of the kennels. I saw hounds on most days of my life. Hounds and hunting filled my imagination. I saw many meets, each as romantic as a circus. The huntsman and whipper-in seemed then to be the greatest men in the world, and those mild slaves, the hounds, the loveliest animals.

Often, as a little child, I saw and heard hounds hunting in and near a covert within sight of my old home. Once, when I was perhaps five years old, the fox was hunted into our garden, and those glorious beings in scarlet, as well as the hounds, were all about