FOOD OF RUSSIAN SOLDIERS 41 



quantity oLmeat. When I was at the Reserve depots, which 

 I shall describe later on, I was shown round the men's 

 barracks and cook - rooms, and must say that they are 

 comfortably lodged, and that every care is taken to make 

 their slender rations go as far as possible. The vegetable 

 soup, which is a national dish, is excellent in flavour and 

 most wholesome. In the making of good healthy soup, the 

 Russians are easily first. Their chief soups are stchi and 

 borsh ; the former being made with white-heart cabbage, the 

 latter with sliced beetroot. I learned that the soldiers get 

 once a fortnight a hot bath, to which admirable institution I 

 shall again allude. The men have well-managed canteens, 

 at which they can buy, if they have got the money, various 

 kinds of necessaries and small luxuries, not forgetting vodka 

 and beer, at very reasonable prices. The men get a free 

 allowance of uniform and 57^ kopecks every two months, 

 which amounts to about three halfpence a week. I have 

 often been told, both by officers and men, that soldiers 

 without private means have a hard time to live in that service. 

 The Government supply of food and clothing is in many 

 cases supplemented by remittances from home. As the ranks 

 are filled by conscription, there are many soldiers whose 

 friends are able and willing to help them. 



Army doctors and army veterinary surgeons occupy a 

 somewhat subordinate position, and a're looked upon as 

 doctors and veterinary surgeons, but not as officers. More 

 than once, on seeing a gentleman in uniform pass, I have 

 asked a military acquaintance what officer that was, and have 

 received the reply: "He's not an officer; he's a doctor." 

 In Russia, all the colleges, like everything else, are 

 Government institutions, and are conducted under a system of 

 strict military discipline. Consequently, professional com- 

 bination is impossible, and without combination, professional 

 advancement is out of the question. On the other hand, as 

 6 



