the people, which, although
conflicting in many details, enabled me to form a tolerably correct
picture of the trend of things and to forecast what was coming.

Among other communications I received proposals from Moscow with the
request that I should present them to one of the British delegates, who
was supposed to be then taking an active interest, or at any rate
playing a prominent part, in the reconstruction of Russia, less for her
own sake than for that of the general peace. But as it chanced, the
eminent statesman lacked the leisure to take cognizance of the proposal,
the object of which was to hit upon such a _modus vivendi_ with Russia
as would enable her united peoples to enter upon a normal course of
national existence without further delay. Incidentally it would have put
an end to certain conversations then going forward with a view to a
friendly understanding between Russia and Germany. It would also, I had
reason to believe, have divided the speculative Bolshevist group from
the extreme bloodthirsty faction, produced a complete schism in the
party, and secured an armistice which would have prevented the Allies'
subsequent defeats at Murmansk, Archangel, and Odessa. Truth prompts me
to add that these desirable by-results, although held out as inducements
and characterized as readily attainable, were guaranteed only by the
unofficial pledge of men whose good faith was notoriously doubtful.

The document submitted to me is worth summarizing. It contained a lucid,
many-sided, and plausible account of the Russian situation. Among other
things, it was a confession of the enormity of the crimes perpetrated,
on both sides, it said, which it ascribed largely to the brutalizing
effects of the World War, waged under disastrous conditions unknown in
other lands. Myriads of practically unarmed men had been exposed during
the campaign to wholesale slaughter, or left to die in slow agonies
where they fell, or were killed off by famine and disease, for the
triumph of a cause which they never understood, but had recently been
told was that of foreign capitalists. In the demoralization that ensued
all restraints fell away. The entire social fabric, from groundwork to
summit, was rent, and society, convulsed with bestial passions, tore its
own members to pieces. Russia ran amuck among the nations. That was the
height of war frenzy. Since then, the document went on, passion had
abated sensibly and a number of well-intentioned