Part 18

HONORED PRESIDENT:--I desire to express my thanks for the courtesies and the privilege of becoming acquainted with the every day practical work of the Red Cross of Russia as shown by the kindness of your secretaries.

Nowhere have I seen more complete, comfortable and generous provision for the general care of the sick poor than here in the institutions of the Red Cross and under its work.

And there can be no doubt that the practical experience that the workers are receiving daily will greatly increase their efficiency for service in time of war.

It will be a source of pleasure to make a report to the American Red Cross of the practical work of the Russian Society in time of peace.

Regarding the arrival of the cargo of the ship "Tynehead," I trust your excellency has already understood by our Charge d'Affairs, Mr. Wurts, that no public demonstrations have been nor are desired. This cargo is largely from the people of an agricultural State, many of whom have suffered from failure of crops in their own country, and thus keenly appreciate similar conditions that others may suffer when such a vast territory as the interior of the Russian Empire is denied rain season after season in succession; and they have simply taken this method of expressing their sympathy, for it is their custom to give in like manner in their own country whenever occasions of calamity or suffering of any kind require the aid of outside help. At this particular time they feel that perhaps the same rains that had been withheld from their brothers in Russia had given the increase to their own crops, which have been unusually abundant the past year; and thus added duty to desire. Moreover, there is a deep brotherly feeling throughout the nation; for our people never forget that Russia has always been the friend of America.

And further, the arrangements of your various committees in the matter of distribution leave nothing to be desired, and that the final reports will afford great pleasure and satisfaction to those who have them to make, there is every reason to believe.

With great respect, J.B. HUBBELL, _General Field Agent American Red Cross in charge cargo "Tynehead_."

The following is General Kauffmann's answer:

ST. PETERSBURG, May 11/23, 1892.

J.B. HUBBELL, M.D., _General Field Agent, American Red Cross_:

MUCH HONORED SIR:--I am eager to express to you herewith my most sincere thankfulness for the sympathetic account of the activity of the Russian Red Cross Society, which you have been so kind to give in your letter of the eighth May current. You have had the occasion to persuade yourself of the common direction between the Russian and American Societies of the Red Cross, by which the help to our fellow creatures is not restricted to the relief of suffering in time of war, but is extended to all the calls of national calamities, from the gratuitous medical treatment of the poor to the large help afforded in time of epidemic disease, famine and other calamities. It is to me a great pleasure to see the sympathy of the American people to the Russian, the proof of which has been in the last years so evident. As you are instructed by the American Red Cross to express this feeling of sympathy to our society, I beg you to believe the heartfelt expressions of the like feeling from our side, which I pray to present in our name to your society and to the people of the United States.

The gift brought by the "Tynehead" will be accepted with deep gratitude and distributed among the needy people, according to the wish of the givers, through the offices of the beneficent committee under the august presidency of His Imperial Majesty the Heir to the Crown.

I avail myself of the present occasion to pray you to accept the assurance of my perfect consideration.

The president of the Russian Red Cross Society, M. DE KAUFFMANN.

Through the help of Mr. Wurts of our legation; our Consul-General, Dr. Crawford; Count Bobrinskoy, representing the Russian Red Cross, and the Government, as well as the Czarowitch Committee; and through the active help of Mr. W.H. Hilton, an Englishman at the head of the large linseed oil works, deacon in the Anglo-American Church, whose thirty years' business acquaintance over Eastern Russia and his sympathy with a people in distress, particularly fitting him for the work; with these agencies the assignment of the cargo was arranged to be sent to eighty-two famine centres for distribution. It was to be consigned to persons of unquestioned integrity and fitness for the work. These people had been communicated with, and their acceptance of the charge assured, and the number of carloads that each should receive made known to each, that he might make the necessary provision for its reception and distribution. Count Bobrinskoy had ordered 320 freight cars to be in readiness at Riga to receive and transport the cargo free of cost to whatever point might be desired. When these preliminary arrangements had been completed and the "Tynehead" sighted from the signal station, we started in company with Count Bobrinskoy for Riga, the port that had been previously selected by the Russian Ambassador in Washington as being free from ice and most favorable for transporting the cargo to the interior.

The "Tynehead" was a big ship, one of the largest ocean freighters, and came too heavily loaded to enter the harbor until her cargo had been partly discharged by lighters, and she anchored eight miles from the port. The governor's ship, having on board his excellency, M. Znovief; Count Bobrinskoy, representative of the Czarovitch Committee; N. von Cramer, representing the Red Cross of Russia; R. Kerkovius, president of the Exchange of Riga; von Richer, chief of police; von Keldermann, chief of customs; von Nagel, captain of the port; N.P. Bornholdt, United States consul, and J.B. Hubbell steamed an hour down the river to welcome the "Tynehead," which had all flags and streamers flying and by the activity of our consul, Mr. Bornholdt, the lighters already lying alongside to take in the grain. After an hour on board the captain was brought back in the governor's ship on which we lunched, and later dined at the governor's palace, where the captain was presented with a beautiful tea service of Russian enamel inlaid work as a present from the Czar.

It was arranged that two lines of cars be kept on the dock, into which the grain should be carried direct from the ship, which lay alongside the wharf. As soon as a car was filled it was shifted, weighed and sealed, and when enough were filled they were made into trains and sent to their destinations with right of way over every other traffic on the road, not excepting express and passenger trains; and at their destination no person presumed to break the seal save the one to whom it was consigned.

When we reached Riga, we learned that two hundred and forty peasants had been waiting on the dock two days, waiting and waiting for the ship from America. Not waiting for food, for Riga was not in a famine province, but waiting that they might not miss the opportunity and the honor of unloading the American ship that had brought food to their unfortunate brothers in the interior. As soon as they could get into the hold of the ship, one hundred and forty of them began the unloading. They worked night and day, without rest, determined to unload the entire cargo themselves without help. But on the third night our consul, Mr. Bornholdt, insisted on their having a relief of twelve hours, and when the twelve hours were up they were all in their places again, and remained until the cargo was out, declining to take any pay for their labor. Twelve women worked along with them, in the same spirit, in the ship and on the dock, with needles, sewing up the rents in the bags to prevent waste in handling.

Only a part of the "Tynehead's" cargo was in bags; hence for convenience and economy in handling and the final distribution, we purchased in St. Petersburg and Riga 43,000 additional bags to sack the rest of the cargo, which in all amounted to nearly 117,000 bushels of shelled corn, 11,033 bags of flour and meal, besides small amounts of wheat, rye, bacon, canned goods, drugs, etc., requiring 307 Russian freight cars for its transportation. Some of this was reshipped on steamboats sent up the headwaters of the Volga, reshipped again on cars nearly to the foot of the Ural Mountains, a distance of 3,000 miles from Riga. Notwithstanding our declaration while in St. Petersburg that neither the Red Cross nor the American people desired any public ceremonies in the way of acknowledgments: dinners, excursions and public demonstrations and illuminations were planned, which we felt ourselves obliged to decline on the ground we had first taken, that any effort and any money proposed to be used in this manner would be most acceptable to all Americans if turned into food for the hungry, whom we had come to help.

At our hotel the Russian and American colors were crossed over the entrance; in the shop windows were the American colors, and in other places, where it seemed that these were not easily procured, title-pages of American sheet-music were displayed--such as "America," "Hail Columbia," "Yankee Doodle," "Star-Spangled Banner," etc, and little boys in the streets carried American flags of their own make. One little fellow had made the Russian flag on one side and the American on the other side of his device. The telephone office was kept open all night, to be ready for any possible want, and the locomotive with steam up for any possible service. The Custom House floated on its main staff only the American flag during the entire time of the unloading of the "Tynehead," from Saturday morning until Tuesday noon--three days and a-half. When all was finished at Riga, the last train on its way, all had been so well planned, so well done in every particular that we felt there was not the least necessity for any further attention on our part in looking after this charge. But to the donors at home Russia was a long way off; they had no personal knowledge of the people they were trying to help, and some critics had circulated misgivings about the gifts reaching their intended destination. Hence, that we might be prepared to give a report from personal observation for the satisfaction and the gratification of the people at home, who had contributed these stores, it was decided to see how some of the final distributions were made.

Our first objective point in the famine district was the Province of Nijni Novgorod. But we must go by Moscow, where by the courtesy of Count Bobrinskoy a telegram was received, stating that his brother would pass through the city to the famine district, and his company could be made available, if desired. Such an opportunity was not to be lost, and our course is changed to the south, first by rail to Bogorodizk, thence by droschky to Michailovskoi, to the house of Shestoparoff, manager of the beet sugar mills of the Bobrinskoys. Here the home taste and appearance of everything inside make one feel as if he were in his own New England home, although not a word of English is heard. After breakfast the next morning we go to the distributing station, which is supported by the Bobrinskoy family in one of the sugar mill buildings. Here we find the doctor, the baker, the soupmaker, several of the first ladies of the place, great cauldrons of excellent soup, tea, milk, Nestle's food, rye and corn bread--the tea and milk are for the sick and for the children--and the doctor, who is familiar with every family, directs who shall receive and what. The bread and the soup are served on regular account, the houses and families all having been visited and the condition of each carefully recorded. As soon as one is able in part to care for himself the bread is sold at a moderate price.

A number of villages are supplied from this bakery and kitchen, and this is but one of nine carried on by this family entirely at their own expense. In the afternoon we visit different villages, some twenty houses or more. We find two Red Cross nurses from Moscow, who are at work and have their home with the peasants. In four months one has lost but four cases; the other but two; and the average number of sick in the past four months by the doctor's report is three hundred. The peasants say they would rather do without the doctor than be without the nurses in the village.

The peasants' home consists of one or two square rooms, built of logs, stone, or mud bricks, with floor of earth, and furniture of boards. One quarter of the room is given up to the brick oven, which is so constructed that it serves not only for a stove, oven, cupboard, and bed in cold weather, but the chickens and small animals find protection from the cold underneath during the severe cold weather. Usually a large horizontal pipe of terra cotta passes overhead and out through a thatched roof of straw, which is often two feet thick. The fuel may be wood, straw, or dry dung; fuel is scarce. A deep cellar, well covered, outside, may hold potatoes, roots, etc. The cattle and other animals find shelter in a room adjoining the family. At Bogorodizk another royal family, in addition to work similar to the above named, supplied the peasants with raw material for spinning, weaving and making of native goods and garments both for themselves and for the market, which the countess found either at home or by sending them to the larger cities. Through letters of introduction we had the good fortune to find Count Tolstoi on his estate at Yasnia Polonia.

When the count was asked his opinion of the cause of the existing conditions, he said the government might not like to have him say that the peasants should have more land and own it themselves--that now they have only enough in the best seasons to give barely food for their support, and when a year of scarcity comes, they cannot help being destitute. When asked if there had been improvement in their conditions since the emancipation, he said if that meant in the way of property, financially, no, but mentally there had been progress and development.

One of the first questions Count Tolstoi asked was, "What do you think of most? I would excuse him for such a question; but he always liked to get into sympathy with the person he was talking with and to know how to understand him. What subjects occupied my mind most when going to sleep?" etc.

At night I slept in the library surrounded by English and American books and magazines.

When asked about the demoralizing effect of giving free help to the peasants, as said by many, he thought that an excuse of those who did not want to help. The peasant was never so unhappy as when out of work and had nothing to do. Even a day's idleness was tiresome to him, and he did not think that a people who had been worked to their full endurance for a generation were going to be demoralized by giving them soup when they were hungry.

Peasants were coming at all hours of the day to see the count. At dinner time two had been waiting several hours. The Count let the dinner go on, and stopped to read a long paper they had brought; read it through carefully; had a long talk with them; unfolded the paper again to look over passages more carefully; after further talk he read again, and told me after they were gone, for I remained with him, that they were having a law suit and had come to him for advice, and so far as he could judge, the peasants were in the right.

When I bade him good-bye he said, from what he had heard of Miss Barton, he felt that she must be a very near relation, and wished me to give her his love.

Starting again for Nijni Novgorod we meet at Moscow Mr. Frank G. Carpenter, the writer and lecturer, who accompanied us through the Volga and southern districts. Leaving Moscow in the evening by the fast express, we reached Nijni the next forenoon at ten. Here we were entertained by the governor. The city of Nijni Novgorod has a population of about sixty thousand ten months of the year; during the other two months its population is increased to six hundred thousand. This extra population from the twenty-seventh of July to about the fifteenth of August inhabit the "dead city" in which not a single family lives the rest of the year. Yet it contains one of the largest and finest buildings in Russia, and not a match nor a cigar can be lighted at any time under penalty of twenty-five rubles. The "dead city" is built at the junction of the Oka River with the Volga, so that it is yearly inundated to the ceiling of the first stories, when the spring rise of forty feet or more comes with the melting of the snow. Here, too, is located one of the largest churches of Nijni, and on the Volga side the Siberian wharves.

In the living city is the residence of the governor on a clay bluff four hundred and seventy feet above the river, with the business part at the foot of the bluff adjoining the river. Nijni being in direct line of free river transportation as well as railway connection between St. Petersburg, Siberia, China, and the Caspian districts, the Caucasus, the oil region of southern Russia, with its wine, grain and fruit districts, make this city a great commercial centre. And the pulse of famine or plenty is probably felt here as soon as in any part of the empire.

In the two months named, traders from nearly every European and Asiatic country gather here with every variety of goods and product that can be carried by rail, water, or caravan: grains, hides, leather, teas, metals, precious stones, fish, meats, cloths, silks, peasants' works and weavings; and the great sandbar in the river Oka of several hundred acres is covered with Siberian iron. Electricity furnishes light where needed, for it will be remembered that it is light enough in this latitude to read at midnight in summer time. Here are also royal quarters for the governor and State officials, whose social and executive residences are in the "dead city" during the entire time of the fair, in which time the governor is an absolute czar in power. To give briefly a Russian view of the famine and how it was felt in a single province and the Russian manner of dealing with it I give the following abridged account:

Nijni claims to have been the first provincial government of Russia to take active measures to relieve the sufferers by famine. The first news came to the governor from reports of dry weather in his province in May, 1891, for the crops of the three preceding years had been short, and at this time the peasants had begun to ask for bread, having already sold a part of their horses and tools; and only two of the eleven districts had sufficient bread for their people.

Without waiting to consult the general government, in order to save time, the governor took the responsibility upon himself of immediately purchasing one hundred and twenty-five thousand poods (a pud is about forty pounds), or twenty-two hundred tons of grain, and sent this in the early part of June to the districts most affected by the drouth. He used his influence to stop speculation in grain, Nijni being a great grain centre, and formed a commission from all the districts to carry out relief measures. It was after this that the Department of the Interior appropriated one million rubles ($550,000) to buy bread.

It has been a custom in Russia that when a loan is made to the _poor peasants_ that the _rich_ peasants of the community are held equally responsible for the payment; hence _they_ have fallen into the habit of claiming an equal apportionment whenever loans have been made for relief measures in times past. Thus the Zemstvo (the elective magistrates of the village) have the power in themselves to say that they had not ordered nor asked for the grain, and refuse to receive it for those really needing it. Hence the governor of Nijni ordered that only those receiving should be charged with the loan.

The whole loan here received was 6,350,000 rubles, all of which except 150,000 rubles had been distributed when we visited the district.

In the nine needy districts of Nijni Novgorod Province there were 587,000 persons needing assistance that were excluded from the government loan as being between the ages of fifteen and fifty-five--"therefore able-bodied and able to work." The Nijni governor followed his judgment rather than the instructions of the Minister of the Interior, and seeing that this amount was insufficient and that no provision had been made for cattle and horses, he tried to get permission to begin public works in order to furnish labor and pay to those needing it; but this was not secured until December, when 3,000,000 rubles were appropriated for roads, 420,000 rubles for town improvements, 40,000 for schools and churches. From eight to ten thousand men were given work in the woods at fifty kopeks, 27 cents, per day, and one ruble and fifty kopeks, about 77 cents, per team.

To secure a general interest of the people the governor made every public commission (boards of directors, trustees, etc.), take an active part in the relief work. He created commissions among the nobility to superintend relief work, combining the Red Cross, the churches and other individual organizations all into one committee, so that when the Crown Prince's committee was formed on the twenty-eighth of December 341,550 rubles had been received and distributed besides 52,020 poods, 2,080,800 pounds, of bread which had been given to those who had no right to the governmental loan.

By contributions three hundred and thirty-one kitchens were established in villages, giving meals for one-half to two kopeks per meal. Nijni, with a living population of sixty thousand, contributed one hundred and ninety thousand rubles. Places were established in Nijni where twenty kitchen meal tickets may be purchased for one ruble. The citizens buy these and give to such as they desire to help.

From Nijni we take steamer down the Volga, and through the kindness of Mr. Zeveke, owner of the American Steamboat Line, so called because American names are given to all of his twelve large steamboats, we are allowed time to visit each town on the Volga, as we pass down the river. At each place the grain has been received and being used. At Samara we find Mr. Bezant, one of our consignees, just recovering from the typhus which was contracted in his relief work. And we get direct reports from Count Tolstoi, Junior, whose work is in this province farther to the east, and Prince Dolgoruhow, another consignee in the district of Burulich; these have ten carloads of the "Tynehead's" corn, and are saving the lives of many. At this time the Province of Samara alone had lost five hundred thousand cattle, as many horses and 1,500,000 sheep from the famine.

At Volsk we saw many people around the church. The bells in a dozen different towers all ringing; from another church a large procession of a thousand people were coming, bearing on high poles crosses and banners and icons. They are joined by the people from the first church, with their crosses and banners which are not raised till the first procession is joined, and all march in their variegated red and yellow and bright colored dresses, with bare feet and uncovered heads in the broiling sun, miles away to the open fields to pray for rain, which has still been withheld from this section of Saratoff Province.