Page:Albert Beaumont - Heroic Story of the Czecho-Slovak Legions - 1919.djvu/34



The SibarianSiberian [sic] peasants were always very kind to our soldiers. They treated the Czechs well everywhere, and we had only to show ourselves to be received as friends. The mayor of Morsichinskoie Selo was and old man, the richest man in the place, but he could neither read nor write. A Siberian peasant who can write his name is looked upon as a great literary man! I got my soldiers at once to study Russian and learn also the Russian alphabet. They quickly learned, and one day when the paymaster of the disctrict came to give them their pay in the presence of the mayor he asked the men to sign the receipts. They all did so, both in Czech and Russian, just to show him that they had learned to write their names in both languages. They paymaster looked astonished and struck the table with his fist, saying to the mayor: „Look at these men, they are here only a few months and they can all write in Russian. You and the like of you are born and brought up in Russia and never learn to write even your names!“

Our time was not altogether lost in these villages. We made the acquaintance of the real Russian peasant, and it gave us confidence later on when we knew that they were unanimously favourable to us, We also learned how to treat them and what to expect from them when our troubles with the Bolsheviks started. The peasants were to a man on our side in every town, village, and country spot. They are also fond of going shooting game. We soon joined them in places where we had our freedom. I bought a shotgun with a single barrel, called Bardanka, for shooting ducks and hares. Game was abundant everywhere, and after a few hours I always returned with any number of ducks and three or four hares in my bag. Hares are plentiful everywhere, and the peasants despise them. They never eat them, and give them to their dogs. When at Kurgan we could buy hares at three kopeks each! Eggs we got at the rate of 100 per 60 kopeks! On one-and-a-half roubles a day we could live in plenty and luxury! Even clothes were cheap at first, and I could get a pair of trousers for nine roubles. The cloth seems to have come from China or Japan.

In the month of May, 1915, I returned with my men to Kurgan and to the Austrophile colonel. His connivance at all the doings of the German, Austrian, and Magyar prisoners was bearing fruit. I discovered something that explains many of the subsequent revolutionary events. Under the tolerant eye of the colonel, the Austrian, German, and Magyar prisoners had begun an open campaign against the Russian Government. The German prisoners, and the Poles were as active as