Lest We Forget Part 17

While steamboats, railways, telegraphs, and automobiles are very useful, they are not so mysterious and individual but that they may be exactly copied and many, many duplicates be made and used by every country under the sun.

If all the music of the great composer Beethoven should be destroyed so that no copy remained in the world, there perhaps would be some master musicians of to-day who could remember and write down the notes, and so reproduce the wonderful compositions once more.

But there have been artists who have seen visions and dreamed dreams of G.o.d and heaven and the best and happiest things they had found in life.

Such a one, with the power of his great genius, has made the dream into a picture, a painting, a statue, or a wonderful building, which no other person in the world is able to copy exactly. Indeed, there are many half-finished works which no artist, however great, has been able to complete. The creator has put into the work his soul, the best of all he thought and knew. So when many artists with their many dreams brought their finest works together into one place, it was certain that forever that place would be cherished and the wonder of it would belong to all people everywhere. While the artists have died long ago, their spirits, their very souls, seem alive to-day in the beautiful art works which they have left. It is for this reason that we speak of great artists who lived eight or nine hundred years ago, as if they were still living to-day, for their souls are alive in what they so wonderfully made. Those who look upon these works are mysteriously inspired to live better and happier lives themselves.

[Ill.u.s.tration: RHEIMS CATHEDRAL]

The loveliest art works in France are its Gothic cathedrals, and of them all, the Cathedral at Rheims was probably the most wonderful. No monument of ancient or modern times is more widely known to the world.

It was built in the Middle Ages and expressed all the aspiration and faith of the people of that time. For seven hundred years it has been cherished for its great beauty, for the memory of the men who made it so beautiful, and for the sacred services which have been held in it.

All the kings of France, except six, were crowned in it. One of the most striking services was the coronation of Charles VII, while Joan of Arc stood beside him with the sacred banner in her hands.

The cathedral held the works of many ancient artists. It was especially famous for its rose window, in which the figures of prophets and martyrs were glorified by the afternoon sun. Beneath the window was a magnificent gallery. Statues of angels, a beautiful statue of Christ, and one of the Madonna were to be found in this wonderful building. The stained gla.s.s windows were all very beautiful. Even the bells in the tower were famous.

With the excuse that the French were using the great towers of the old cathedral as observation posts, the Germans bombarded and destroyed the church. The roof was battered in and burned, the stained gla.s.s windows broken, the famous bells pounded into a shapeless ma.s.s of metal, and the wonderful statues and decorations hopelessly destroyed. Only the statue of Joan of Arc, in front of the cathedral, remained uninjured, as though to say, "I am the soul of France. You cannot injure or kill me." Afterwards the Germans bombarded the church a second time, attempting to tear down even the walls that were still standing.

Even savages in war respect sacred places, but the Germans deliberately aimed their guns at them. No excuse can ever be accepted by the civilized world for this deliberate destruction, and certainly the excuse cannot be accepted by military men that the act was due to bad marksmanship.

Other ancient churches were horribly damaged. The Germans stabled their horses in them, broke down the candelabra and statues, and carried away many valuable relics.

The burning of the University buildings at Louvain completely destroyed the treasures that had been preserved for centuries. Priceless ma.n.u.scripts, paintings that can never be replaced, and valuable books in rare bindings were lost to the world.

The Germans scornfully but ignorantly declared, "Why should we care if every monument in the world is destroyed? We can build better ones."

But the German idea of beauty is great strength and huge size. Their own public buildings and statues are often horrible in color, immense and awkward in appearance. They give people the impression of a fearsome brute spreading himself out before them. With few exceptions, there are no dainty figures and designs, nor any beautiful thoughts and feelings, as shown in the work of real artists.

The old cathedral at Rheims can never be restored. No one can ever bring back the old beauty and color; no one can revive those statues and paintings so that ever again they will seem to breathe forth the soul of the artists who fashioned them seven hundred years ago. The walls may be rebuilt, and artists of tomorrow may beautify them, but the spirit of the great men of the Middle Ages is gone--it has fled from the place forever. Thus the Germans, not content with killing the bodies of men, have in this way killed the souls of some of the greatest of the geniuses of the past. How can she pay the damage, or meet a fitting punishment?

What a peerless jewel was this cathedral, more beautiful even than Notre Dame in Paris, more open to the light, more ethereal, more soaringly uplifted with its columns like long reeds surprisingly fragile considering the weight they bear, a miracle of the religious art of France, a masterpiece which the faith of our ancestors had called into being in all its mystic purity.

PIERRE LOTI.

THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION

The controller, as he is called on the Siberian railroad, was pa.s.sing through the cars to see that every pa.s.senger had a ticket. He did not notice the _mooshik_, which is what the Russian peasant is called in his own language, hiding under one of the car seats with a large bundle in front of him; or if he saw him, he pa.s.sed on without seeming to have done so.

The _mooshik_ had given the brakeman a small sum of money, about fifty cents in our currency, to let him hide there whenever the controller came around, and in this way ride from Petrograd, or Petersburg as the Bolsheviki renamed it after the revolution, to Vladivostok, a distance of about four thousand miles.

Now this _mooshik_ did not need to go to Vladivostok; but his Russian nature made him _go_, go somewhere, it made little difference where. He had been the year before to Jerusalem, but this was for religious reasons, and now he must go again for no reason except that from within came the impulse to travel, an impulse too strong to be denied. The Russian government did not attempt to discourage the people from traveling, but actually made it easier by fixing fares for long distances at very small amounts. This traveler did not have even that small amount, but he found it easy with a smaller one to bribe his way in Russia.

There is a society in Russia, whose members pledge themselves never to remain more than three days in any one place; and it is said that wealthy Russians, after their children have grown up, will often divide their property and with staff in hand spend the remainder of their lives in traveling from one holy place to another.

A dream, a vision, leads the wealthy man to do this, and perhaps this is true also of the _mooshik_; but it is as likely that he goes because of the reality, the real people, the real village, the real home that he leaves behind. He is uneducated, for only seven out of every hundred can read and write in Russia. He lives in a shed as filthy and bad smelling as a pig-pen, or rather he starves there, starves both for food and for comfort. Black bread, potatoes, and sometimes cabbage, make up his "balanced diet." He cannot afford money for meat, eggs, milk, b.u.t.ter, sugar, or any of the many other ordinary foods of the American home, nor for the light of lamp or candle.

It is not strange that such _mooshiki_ constantly move on and have no love for their native place, and have never established an "Old Home Day." It is not so strange that their former Tsar, Peter the Great, said, "One can treat other European people as human beings, but I have to do with cattle." Are they not treated like cattle?

But it is strange that a Russian writer can say of these people, and say it with truth, "A Russian may steal and drink and cheat until it is almost impossible to live with him; and yet, in spite of it all, you feel a charm in him that draws you to him, and that there is something more in him, some good or promise of good, that raises him above the level of all other races you have ever met." It is strange that he is so religious, so pitying of others, and so critical of himself; that he has so many n.o.ble visions and dreams for which he is ready and willing to die.

Uneducated, with little or no respect for truth or honesty in their own dealings, with no experience in government, having always been robbed by the aristocracy, and now eager and willing in turn to rob them, but with dreams of a society of men where all crime and hardship and unnecessary suffering are abolished, where there are no grafters, no self-seekers, no wrong-doers, no conflict, no robbery, no war--these Russian _mooshiki_, workmen, soldiers, and sailors, as a result of a revolution, found themselves attempting to govern a nation nearly twice as large in population as the United States. There are indeed two problems before the world, to make the world safe for democracy, and to make democracy safe for the world.

History tells the story of many revolutions. The story of the American Revolution, which was an uprising of the American colonies against the mother country, and that of the French Revolution, in which the laborers and peasants and some others rose against the extravagant and autocratic rulers of France, are well known to Americans.

When the real character and aims of the German autocracy were made plain to the world, all free people hoped for and expected the World War to end in a revolution of the German people. But the ma.s.s of the German people are kept ignorant of what the rest of the world feels and thinks about them, and have so long been trained to unquestioning obedience that a German revolution can come, if ever, only after some unexpected and appalling German defeat.

It has been said that if, at the time the Russian revolution broke out, a few regiments of trained veteran soldiers had been in Petrograd, the revolution would have been put down by these soldiers, to whom obedience to commands of superiors had become second nature. Those on guard in the city were newly-formed regiments recently trained and taken into the service.

The Russian revolution of March 9-13, 1917, overthrew Tsar Nicholas and the Romanoff dynasty. The Tsar has since been shot, and his son and heir has died--from exposure, it was reported. When Tsar Nicholas succeeded his father on the throne of Russia, the Russian people rejoiced and felt certain better days were at hand, and that they should love and loyally support the new Tsar. He had his opportunity and he threw it aside. Instead of granting larger liberty and a greater part in the government to the common people when they pet.i.tioned for it, he replied, "Let it be known that I shall guard the autocracy as firmly as did my father." His father was as autocratic as the German Kaiser.

Tsar Nicholas was weak and fickle. He made promises when in trouble and refused to keep his promises when trouble seemed avoided. The Russian people were much disappointed in him, and every year their disappointment grew. Some dreadful ma.s.sacres of workers at Jaroslav, of peasants in Kharkov, and of miners on the Lena changed their disappointment to hatred.

As the Tsar grew older he drew away from touch with the people, and lived in his palaces, leaving affairs of state to his ministers who were chosen from a small and selfish clique. They brought on the war with j.a.pan, and its failure was due to them. When Russia was defeated, the people were on the brink of a revolution; but the Tsar promised them a const.i.tution, and trouble was put off for a while. When the people were quiet again, he broke his word and did not give them a const.i.tution. Instead, in every way possible, he lessened the power and freedom of the people, and took revenge upon those who had caused the trouble by having them arrested and exiled, or executed.

He was very much under the influence of his wife. She was even weaker in many ways than he was and seemed to be in the power of an ignorant and wicked peasant who claimed to be a monk and was called Rasputin, the Black Monk. His influence over the weak Tsar and the weaker Tsarina so angered and disgusted some of the young Russian leaders that finally they had him secretly put to death--but not until he had helped to set every one against Tsar Nicholas and his wife.

For a while after the World War broke out, matters seemed to be going better. The people wanted the influence of Germany destroyed, and they expected the Russian army would soon be in Berlin. But when defeat and disaster overwhelmed the armies through the treachery of government officials, the people began to turn and to condemn Rasputin, the Tsarina, and the Tsar. It is said that Rasputin had one of his friends serving as physician to the Tsar and that he kept Nicholas drugged. It hardly seems possible that this can be true, but at any rate, the Tsar seemed to show no sense in his dealing with the situation. Instead of appointing better ministers, he appointed worse ones, suggested by Rasputin. Every one became disgusted and felt that only a revolution would save Russia. If it had not come from the people, it would have come from the n.o.bles. It was looked forward to by all, but not until after the war.

There was suffering everywhere in the capital, Petrograd. Living was very high. It was difficult to get enough to eat or to get carried from place to place. Steam trains and trolleys were few and irregular.

Though there was plenty of food in Russia, the railroads were in such bad shape that it did not reach the capital. But the Russians were fighting Germany, and no one expected or seemed to desire a revolution until after the war. When it did come, it was not planned, but seemed to come as if by accident.

Trouble began in the factory districts, in connection with bread riots.

Stones were thrown, and some damage was done to property. Then crowds gathered and marched up and down the streets crying for bread, singing revolutionary songs, and carrying red flags.

The police were not able to handle the situation alone, and the soldiers were called upon. These were Cossacks and recently trained.

There was bad feeling between the police and the Cossacks, and so the Cossacks were inclined to listen to the people and to become friendly with them.

On Sunday, March 11, the factory hands planned to make a great demonstration. The Tsar, learning of it, ordered notices to be posted warning the people that if they gathered, the soldiers were ordered to fire upon them. A few people did gather, and they were fired upon by machine guns and several were killed. The next morning, the officers who had ordered the soldiers to fire upon the people were killed by their own men. Then notices were posted by the government saying that unless the rioters went to work, they would immediately be sent to the front.

Other regiments revolted, and there was a battle between these and the few who remained loyal to the government. It was not a serious battle; but some were killed and the loyal regiments were defeated. Then soldiers and people ran through the streets crying, "Down with the Government."

The Tsar was at the front. Had he been in Petrograd, he might have saved the government by making some new promises; but, as it was, it soon fell.

As soon as the government was overthrown and the Tsar taken prisoner, those who had long sought for a revolution and had been forced to flee from Russia, came rushing back from Switzerland, Greece, France, and the United States. They were the real leaders after they arrived.

An American who was in Petrograd at the time gives the following account of the revolution:

Their first demand was that all prison doors should be opened and that the oppressed the world over should be freed.

The revolution was picturesque and full of color. Nearly every morning one could see regiment after regiment, soldiers, Cossacks, and sailors, with their regimental colors, and bands, and revolutionary flags, marching to the Duma to take the new oath of allegiance. They were cheered; they were blessed; handkerchiefs were waved; hats were raised, as marks of appreciation and grat.i.tude to these men, without whose help there would have been no revolution. The enthusiasm became so contagious that men and women, young and old, high and low, fell in alongside, or behind, joined in the singing of the Ma.r.s.eillaise, and walked to the Duma to take the oath of allegiance, and having taken it, they felt as purified as if they had partaken of the communion.

Another picturesque sight was the army trucks filled with armed soldiers, red handkerchiefs tied to their bayonets, dashing up and down the streets, ostensibly for the purpose of protecting the citizens, but really for the mere joy of riding about and being cheered. One of these trucks stands out vividly in my mind: it contained about twenty soldiers, having in their midst a beautiful young woman with a red banner, and a young hoodlum astride the engine.

No one knows, at the end of the fourth year of the World War, what the result of the Russian revolution will be. It has so far left Russia a prey to Germany, but Germany is showing such criminal greed and unfairness that she may find her easily gained plunder will be her destruction, like the drowning robber with his pockets filled with gold.

The Russian _mooshik_ has a motto, or rather a philosophy, which is expressed by the word "_nitchevo_." This word has several meanings, one of which is "nothing." Just what the _mooshik_ has in mind when he says "_nitchevo_" is ill.u.s.trated by the following story.