seldom, if ever, see the glorious
face of Nature and, when they do, gaze into it with blank unrecognising
eyes; whose whole life is one long round of monotony--monotonous toil,
monotonous amusements, monotonous clothes, monotonous bricks and
mortar;--until the very heaven itself, with its trailing cloud-armadas and
its eternal stars, is forgotten, and the whole universe becomes a cowl of
hodden grey, "where-under crawling cooped they live and die." And then look
at those other millions--the millions of Russia--look at the grand simple
life they lead in the fields, a life of toil indeed, but of toil sweet and
infinitely varied; Russia is their country, not merely because they live
there but because they--the peasants--now actually possess by far the
greater part of the arable land; God is their God, not because they have
heard of Him as some remote Being in the Sunday School, but because He
is very near to them--in their homes, in their sacraments, and in their
hearts; and so contentment of mind and soul is theirs, not because they
have climbed higher than their fellows, whether by the accumulation of
knowledge or wealth, but because they have discovered the secret of
existence, which is to want little, to live in close communion with nature,
and to die in close communion with God.

BOOKS

MAURICE BARING. _The Mainsprings of Russia._ 1914. Nelson. 2s. net.

This is an excellent introduction to the subject, recording as it does the
general impressions of an acute and sympathetic observer; it does not, of
course, pretend to be comprehensive, and says nothing, for example, of the
Jews, Poles, Finns, etc.

BERNARD PARES. _Russia and Reform._ 1907. 10s. 6d. net.

MILYOUKOV. _Russia and its Crisis._ 1905. 13s. 6d. net.

MAURICE BARING. _The Russian People._ 1911. 15s. net.

These three books may be consulted for the Revolution of 1905 and the
events which led up to it. Professor Milyoukov's book was actually
published before the Revolution, but its author was leader of the Cadet
party in the First Duma, and it is therefore something in the nature of
a liberal manifesto. Professor Pares' book, which is perhaps the most
penetrating and well-balanced of all and contains most valuable chapters
on the _Intelligentsia,_ does not, unfortunately, deal with the years of
reaction which followed the dissolution of the First Duma. Mr. Baring's
book may be recommended especially for the later chapters which deal with
the cause