148 APPENDIX 



MISCOLOURED RUSSIA IS A DEMOCRACY 



(By permission of the Public Ledger, I insert the 

 following.) 



(By Vance Thompson) 



I have no intention of writing an article on Russia. 

 That were absurd, when the subject howls aloud for 

 folios. But there are one or two misconceptions I 

 should like to knock on the head mildly. 



Democratic Tradition and Reality 



First of all, Russia is not a military nation. Its 

 government is not militarist. Its civilization is not 

 based upon a military conception of the state. It is 

 built upon an exactly different basis democracy. I 

 think it is the oldest democracy in Europe ; certainly it 

 possesses the oldest tradition of democracy. Russia 

 is not that girl in pink satin and chains, staggering 

 through a paper snow-storm; Russia is the peasant. 

 Bear in mind that the Russian peasants own a large 

 part of the arable land nearly three fifths of it. To a 

 great extent the land is held in common; that is, each 

 little community of farmers each mir is independ- 

 ent. The peasants work the land together or, more 

 often, divide it themselves, according to laws of their 

 own. 



I remember talking with an old peasant once. It 

 was at that famous first Duma. He was a calm old 



