Page:Albert Rhys Williams - Through the Russian Revolution (1921).djvu/244

194 steam is up in the engine of the Trans-Siberian Express, and it does not wait on sentiment. Every week it starts on its 6,000 mile journey to the Pacific, heeding only the clanging signal-bell, whether rung by order of the Czar or by order of the Bolsheviks. On the third stroke we climb aboard and are off on our long journey to the distant East.

What will this East unfold to us? Shall we find that the spirit of the revolutionary centres carries out far toward the circumference or not?

Already our fellow passengers are stretched out in their compartments, sipping tea and smoking cigarettes. In our car are about twenty landowners, speculators, war-profiteers, exofficers in mufti, evicted officials, and three overpainted ladies—all members or retainers of the old privileged class.

Their ancient privileges are gone. But life still has its glamor. Even now, are they not engaged in the thrilling adventure known amongst their fellow-emigres as "Escaping out of the bloody clutches of the Bolsheviks"? And before them, a few weeks hence, lies another thrilling adventure in the salons of Paris, London and Washington, recounting the terrors and perils of their escape.

That it was an escape de luxe in an International sleeper, with excellent beds, dining-car and porter inclusive, will be omitted from their tales. Other