Read Ebook: Siberia To-Day by Moore Frederick Ferdinand

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Ebook has 800 lines and 68548 words, and 16 pages

When will these accursed Japanese go away?

The weather is good.

I am very thirsty.

I have a lazy Chinese for a helper.

Ivan, who worked at Nikolsk, is sick.

Do you remember when Peter fell in the river?

The tea is good.

I will see my wife when I go back to First River.

My mother's mother had a boil ten years ago--she cured it with ashes.

What time is it? Never mind, what does it matter?

My brother's cow has a calf.

And the world shuddering about what would happen to the Russian people, groping amid the ruins of a shattered nation! Massacres in Petrograd and Moscow, in Samara and Perm, Vladivostok in control of Allied troops, wreck and ruin, refugees and desolation, unlimited numbers of factions quarreling to see who would pick the bones of the country, intrigue, murder and sudden death stalking through city and town, the very railroad on which they worked ready to lie down and die in its tracks, their wages six months overdue, and no telling what would happen to-morrow to themselves or their families--these people calmly discussed the birth of a relative's calf!

And I, with several thousand other American citizens, had cast aside all the things we held dear, to come half way round the world and fight to save Russia! The American people poured men and money, to help these people, and for a long time will be paying the bills. But the Russian worried only about the temperature of his tea, and wondered why we should worry at all about him or his affairs. And the railroad men in Siberia represent the best type of working men, far above the simple peasant in mental advancement.

With a similar state of affairs at home, can we imagine the crew of one of our passenger trains finding nothing to discuss but trivial personal affairs? Yet we persisted in considering the Russian people on a par with our own in seeking enlightened government and an orderly condition of life, once they had rid themselves of the oppressing Czar and his bureaucrats.

In due time, our train moved out. The car windows were sealed tightly against any outside air. The three decks of sleeping shelves were filled with men, women and children, so completely that from floor to ceiling there was a solid block of humanity. I managed to secure a shelf for my blankets, by watching those who prepared to detrain at stations ahead, and taking the space before the new passengers got in.

The narrow aisle was so piled with cases and bags of merchandise and personal effects, that it was almost impossible to get in or out of the car. And there were battles royal at every station, as one mob tried to get out while the other mob fought its way inside. There were many Chinese, peddling with packs, carrying salt, tea, sugar and such necessities, and selling them at exorbitant prices. Instead of sugar, there was also a cheap, highly-colored candy, used to sweeten tea--and give it most outlandish flavors.

These speculating Chinese were most rude and insolent to the Siberians. I saw a pair of them drive a woman and her two children from a seat, and leave them standing, in order to get the seat for themselves. A young Cossack officer hove them out bodily, but they ran after the train and rescued their baggage. They who had been so overbearing with a helpless woman, gave a fine exhibition of cringing when they in turn found themselves in the presence of a strong and ruthless personality.

The provodnik distributed candles as darkness came on, and we rattled along through the night at about ten miles an hour, slowing down discreetly to cross temporary bridges, which had been built where the Bolshevists, as they fled before the Allies, had blown out the original structures.

The candles increased the richness of our air-mixture, and as they burned low and guttered smoking tallow over bare feet of sleepers, the odor of the salmon-roe, cached in tin cans about the car, almost lost its lusty pervasiveness. I awoke at about midnight, and though the candles were still glimmering faintly and producing a nut-flavored smoke, the salmon-roe still held its own, and asserted its presence unmistakably.

The cause of my waking was a burly Chinese, who mistaking me for a peasant as I lay on my shelf rolled in my blankets, took the liberty of heaving several of his heavy boxes in upon me, in an attempt to discourage me from occupying so much space. My reading of Darwin made me realize that it was a case of the survival of the fittest. I felt particularly fit, and when that Chinese had eliminated himself from the car, along with his baggage, I went back to sleep. I forgot in the meantime the necessity for maintaining cordial international relations with China, and made it a purely personal matter.

Incidentally, it must be the boldest spirits among the Chinese who dared travel in that part of Siberia with anything of value. I was awakened later that night by a great to-do in the car, when Cossacks at a station went through the train and looked all the passengers over, including baggage. They took two Chinese out of the car, with some bulky bundles. The bundles proved to be full of packets of paper rubles. The Cossacks debated among themselves as to whether so much wealth was not in itself evidence of criminality, and favored confiscating the money. How much was given up, I do not know, but once more the Chinese came back, settled themselves for sleep upon their shelf and we rolled merrily on.

Toward morning I was awakened once more by a big peasant who stepped upon my face, in order to climb to the top of the car. I watched him mount upward, till he was in reach of a ventilator, and I came to the conclusion that I had misjudged peasants when it came to desiring fresh air--it was obvious that this man desired to tamper with the ventilator in the ceiling so that it would provide a better opening to let out our bad odors.

But instead, before my horrified eyes, he closed it! And not satisfied with its natural tightness, he stuffed into it a Russian newspaper in which had been wrapped salmon-eggs! I roused myself, dressed, and went out on the car-platform in the crisp, cool air where I waited for the sun to rise over the bleak hills.

Before long, we came to a small yellow depot, with this signboard upon it, as near as I can reproduce with Roman letters: "YXXYMYH"--it was Ooshoomoon, or Ushumun, the y's distributed through its system providing the oo sounds in Russian.

Not an American soldier in sight. We learned from the telegraph operator that Major Miller and his force had left the evening before in a troop-train, and had passed us during the night, going in the direction from which we came.

But my missing Major Miller was not vital, except in so far as I was concerned with the element of time. We got our baggage out of the car, and faced the prospect of spending the night and most of the next day in the primitive little station, waiting for the single train running daily, which would take us back toward Khabarovsk.

ON THE BACK TRAIL

The train which had brought us to Ushumun pulled out to the east, leaving me sitting on my bedding-roll smoking a cigarette in the frosty morning, while my interpreter went to the station restaurant to ask if they had any eggs, and if they had, would they please fry them "sunny side up."

Physically and mentally, inside and out, I was flat. My love for Siberia and the Siberians was at its lowest ebb--I would have sold the whole country to the Cossacks at a bargain price, if I had owned it that morning. I yearned for the trenches--any place, where if a man displayed a copious vocabulary, its full depth of feeling and expression might be appreciated.

A Japanese civilian, in a bluish sort of suit, which reminded me of chauffeurs in New York who buy cast-off livery to wear as a uniform, drew near, and, so to speak, wagged his tail. .

He spoke fairly good English, but managed to maintain an abject and apologetic manner. He informed me that he had been a barber in Vladivostok, the purpose of which remark I could not fathom--either he was attracted by the glamor of a two-day beard of reddish hue which I wore, or he mentioned Vladivostok to account for his having learned English. His progress in the language must have been rapid if he learned English there from the American troops, for up to about a month before, one might have as well gone to Timbuctu to acquire our language.

He squatted on his heels before me, and asked for a match. He being the most amiable object on the landscape, I did not resent his presence, but gave him the match, and he lit a limp cigarette with great solemnity. I could fairly hear him think of how to attack me as a problem and wring from me the most possible information.

Finally, after considerable discussion of the most commonplace weather, he got down to business. I must say that if he revealed the teachings of the Japanese military secret service, that organization is far behind the times. It was counter-espionage at its worst.

He wanted to know first where I was going. I told him that I intended to stay permanently in those parts, which put him in something resembling a panic. He recovered in time to ask me what part of town I intended to reside in. As I could see no town, I told him I intended to live in the railway station. He nearly fell off his heels, so overcome was he--for which I do not blame him, considering the station.

He assured me dismally that there was a Japanese officer, and several Japanese soldiers, already living in the station, and that there was not room left for so much as a flea's brother-in-law. I told him that my orders were to live in that section, and I intended to do so if I had to sleep on the counter where the samovar stood in the daytime.

Now orders to a Japanese soldier, are not merely orders as we understand them--they are sacred revelations emanating from the most holy place in Japan and the heavens above. He understood that I was going to live in that station, even if I had to pitch out a whole Japanese division. He almost wept over the prospect, but borrowing one of my cigarettes, which I had most carelessly exposed, he got off his heels, and departed sadly to that part of the station where the Japanese officer in charge cooked his rice.

Presently the "barber" was back, now with a Japanese captain, who approached me as if I were a divinity. I let him approach close before I "saw" him, and then leaped to my feet and came to a most dramatic salute. He beamed upon me, and after we had got done bowing and scraping, the barber announced proudly that the Japanese officer had come to pay his respect to the American officer. I acknowledged his kindness with a bow that near broke my car-stiffened back.

The barber, who refrained now from sitting on his heels, and betrayed a most suspicious desire to look military, said that he would be glad to interpret for us, and said that the Japanese captain was most sad over my fate--I must have the steel of Samurai in my backbone to face so calmly an existence which would undoubtedly wreck my constitution, if it did not result in my death. I replied that I was a soldier, and was tempted to say that so far as I could observe, the Japanese captain was bearing up most wonderfully under a similar mode of life. But one must be extremely careful in joking with Japanese.

But I knew that in order to save my face when I took the first train bound south, I had better not carry my simulation of a desire for permanent residence, too far. So I became disconsolate, as they went on to tell of the discomforts awaiting me.

The Japanese captain took me to the little shed adjoining the station, where he lived. He had improvised a shelf a few inches from the dirt floor, and with a fire in a bucket, called it home. He gave me saki, in a thimble-like glass, and some raw fish. And he smiled and smiled as I said I could never endure such quarters. No doubt he has made a report, in which he cites the fact that American officers will not willingly endure privations on campaign. Thus do the nations get false ideas about one another.

I expressed a desire to get out of Ushumun as quickly as possible. The Japanese captain beamed. He informed me that a Japanese troop-train was coming down the line, and would pass through there in a couple of hours. If I desired to travel away on it, he could probably arrange with the train commander for transportation. Which he did.

So when a train with a Japanese battery of artillery arrived, I saw my friend in serious consultation with the train commander, and I was invited to the fourth-class coach on the rear, filled with officers and soldiers, and given a section, the soldiers being put out in box-cars with the horses and other men.

I do not care to analyze the motives which led the Japanese captain to hurry me out of Ushumun. It was obvious that he desired me far away. And my expressed intention of staying there, only increased his worry. If I had told him I intended leaving by the next train, no doubt I would have spent that day and the next night in discomfort in Ushumun station. But it is not in me to look a gift-horse in the mouth.

The section in the car assigned to me and my soldier-interpreter provided wooden shelves for six persons, the upper ones so arranged that they could be folded up out of the way. I begged the train commander to put four of the six non-commissioned officers who had been ousted for my benefit, back in their quarters, but he replied through his interpreter, and with profound bows, that the entire section was mine. And the hospitality accorded me in that car will never be forgotten. On that trip I came nearer to being royal than I ever expect to be again.

Knowing something of the administration of a battery of light artillery, I was most interested in seeing how horses and men were cared for by the Japanese. They attended to their duties as if work were sacred rites. They messed their men, fed and watered their horses, not merely well, but as if the fate of the Japanese Empire depended upon the utmost efficiency of every cog in that particular machine.

The simplicity of their messing arrangements for the men, in comparison with our own army in trains, is remarkable. We have to provide kitchen-cars, fitted up with field ranges, meat, bread, potatoes, canned tomatoes, coffee, and provide buckets of hot water for washing mess-kits. It is like a primitive travelling hotel, and our men go to the car to have their meals dealt out by the cooks. And on the trans-Siberian line, the road-bed was so rough, and the cars so light and the wheels so flattened by bad usage, it was frequently impossible to boil water over our stoves while under way. This necessitated stops en route to prepare meals and serve them, and once a train has lost its right of way by stopping in a siding, it may mean hours before the line ahead is clear of regular traffic, so that the troop-train may go on.

The mess-kit of the Japanese soldier is a metal container, about the size and shape of a case for large field-glasses. The top clamps on so that it is water-tight. A handful of dry rice, a little water, a fire by the track, and the mess-kits are thrown into the blaze.

In a short time, the soldier's meal is ready, and after he has eaten as much as he wants, the remainder is kept hot by closing the lid. I have seen Japanese prepare their meals during a ten-minute stop by such methods. And each soldier, on the march, can carry enough dry, light rice, to last him several days. His columns are not hampered by the slow progress of heavy ration-wagons, his food is not in danger of being cut off by enemy, his service of supply presents no problem. The swift movements of the Japanese armies during the Russo-Japanese war were due to the simplicity of their transport.

On this trip I came to a full realization of the hatred held for the Japanese by the Siberian populace. It is hatred remaining as a result of the Russo-Japanese war; it is a hatred engendered by fear of the Japanese, and their ambitions regarding the future of Siberia; it is a hatred deeply-embedded in the hearts of the Russians, and of such intensity that the two races cannot hope ever to mingle with any amity.

I found it embarrassing, too; to stop in a station, and be recognized as an "Americansky" and receive the smiles and open admiration of the people, while my hosts were covertly, and sometimes openly, sneered at, and disrespectful and insulting remarks about "monkey-faces" came out of groups of peasants, made it apparent to my hosts that I was much in favor with the people, and that the Japanese were regarded as if they were rattle-snakes. It must have hurt the sensitive pride of the Japanese, but I must give them credit for good discipline, and splendid self-control, in the face of such treatment.

Had I not been present, it is likely that the Russians would have been more cautious; as it was, my presence only subjected the Japanese to insults which they might not have had to endure in the presence of a witness. But they went on about their business, as if their superiority to the Siberians was something which was beyond question--and perhaps their attitude held something of a "biding my time," for a suitable revenge.

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