irs to verify scorbutous and
typhoid--about 15 miles from here; it is strange how entirely
different they are. The Tartars seem the most settled and grown up
and independent, and the Little Russians have more traditions. The
Great Russians are more individual and less distinctive. You can't
imagine the nice feeling of riding right out over the steppes, no
fuss, no get up, with a purpose. The feeling that at the same time
with the wild freedom of it that one is accomplishing something and
working. I can't wait to see you. When I get my Tibi and start again
across the seas, I shall be even glad to see that awful Liberty
lady!"

Kalaskshinovka 1912.

"Your letter enclosing Pata's and the picture of Lutie was the reward
of a walk of six to seven miles with a ton of mud on each boot, a
night on the floor and a return at dawn on a rickety horse horseback.
Everything is flourishing here, plenty of occasion for meditation and
consideration. I enjoy tremendously the peasants' bath house. One can
climb higher and higher and lie on shelves in different stages of
heat. I got so steamed up I wanted at one moment to open the door and
just fly out into the field without a stitch. When I look out on the
plains here and then think of New York and the subway, my brain
simply stops. This is about as small and poor a village as exists,
yet there is a teacher and all the younger generation read and write,
and the Tartars are really wise owls. I have no more desire to go to
Persia. I am afraid that country is done for. I think Arizona is as
safe as anywhere if they don't irrigate. Still those mission teachers
are a pest. There is something fundamentally wrong with everything I
know!"

Hardly had this episode of the famine finished, that the Red Cross
sent units to Belgorod in the Ukrania where there was a great
concentration of pilgrims for the canonization of St. Josephat. The
Government once again set up feeding stations and hospital units to
take care of the sick and aged and all emergencies arising from the
concentration of many thousands of pilgrims. Once again Nelka was
there and it was of great interest to her.

During all of these absences Nelka kept her little dog Tibi either
with us in the country or with friends in Kasan, the Krapotkins. She
went to pick up Tibi in Kasan from where she wrote in 1913.

"I caught some horrible microbe just before I arrived and had a
terrible grippy cold which kept me in the house and in bed--