Page:Albert Rhys Williams - Through the Russian Revolution (1921).djvu/288

234 been for their enemies, constantly launching fresh attacks against the Soviet.

As soon as the shops were running well, the men would have to drop tools and take up rifles; the railroads, instead of carrying food and implements, had to carry ammunition and troops. The workmen, instead of strengthening the new institutions, had to rally to defend the ground on which they stood.

Raids were continually directed against the frontiers of the workingmen's republic. As soon as the enemy broke thru the cry went up "The Socialist Fatherland is in danger!" Into every village and factory hurried the call to arms. Each formed its little detachment, and along the roads and trails they marched up into the Manchurian Mountains, singing revolutionary hymns, and folk songs of the village. Poorly equipped and poorly fed, they advanced to pit themselves against a merciless, wellequipped foe. Just as Americans today cherish the memory of the tattered barefoot troops of Washington, who left their blood-stained prints on the snows of Valley Forge, so in the future Russians will thrill to the story of those first ragged groups of Red Guards who, at the call of danger, grasped their guns and went forth to the defense of the Soviet Republic.

Beside the Red Guards were rising the units of the