to the Russian Government,
which, fatuously believing that rule by the people could be carried
into war, insisted on her forming committees in her command and
allowing her soldiers a share in the administration of the battalion.
This she refused to do, declaring that she would resign her commission
first and disband her battalion. If men were difficult to control at
the front under the committee system, how much more would this be the
case with girls, unused to discipline and more prone by nature than the
men to give way to the difficulties and the temptations of war!

After several stormy interviews with the army chiefs and with Kerensky
himself, Yashka was allowed to have her own way, and in direct command
of her own battalion she set out for the front line. Already the
Battalion of Death had had a beneficial effect upon the soldiers at the
front, and she believed that when once her women went into action the
men would follow without question.

When the Battalion of Death was actually in the front line Yashka saw
very quickly, however, that things were far worse than she had
imagined, for in the time that she had been recruiting and training her
new force, the army had undergone complete demoralization. There was
now open friendship between the Russians and the Germans in many
quarters of the front, and fighting was unheard of, the soldiers'
committees refusing to give their consent to any proposal of that sort.
It was in the midst of such a situation that Yashka and her women
reached the line.

The Bolsheviki, as the revolutionists were called, had gained almost
complete control over the soldiers, and under their influence the army
had become a savage mob. Only a few loyal men remained. Soon after
Yashka's arrival the officers attempted to put her plan into operation
and launch an attack against the Germans, but the soldiers refused to
obey and the battalion of women moved out almost unsupported against
the enemy, who promptly opened a heavy fire. Their example was tardily
followed by the men and a general attack was delivered on a wide
portion of the line. After a severe fight, the women soldiers captured
the German trenches that lay in front of them, but only to be
confronted with a new and terrible difficulty,--for the supports that
they had relied upon refused to march any further, declaring that they
would defend what they had already gained from the enemy but that under
no circumstance would they attack agai