Page:Arthur Ransome - The Truth about Russia.djvu/4

 that moment on, the main object of the war should have been to save that victory. But, if the bourgeois classes in the Allied countries were a little troubled, their disquiet was as nothing in comparison with the helpless terror of the bourgeois classes of Russia. They had taken no part in the actual starting of the revolution. Miliukov, as he openly confessed to his party, had seen from his window the soldiers pouring out into the street with red flags to fight for the people instead of for their masters, and he said to himself: "There goes the Russian Revolution, and it will be crushed in a quarter of an hour." A little later, he had seen more soldiers in the streets, and decided that it would not be crushed so easily. It was only when the risks had already been taken by plain soldiers and workmen, by Cossacks who refused to fire on them; it was only when the revolution had begun, that the already existing organ of the bourgeoisie, the Duma, threw itself into line, and, foam on the crest of an irresistible wave, tried vainly to pretend that it had the power to control and direct the wave itself.

Already a newer, more vital organ was forming. While Miliukoy was formulating his ideas about the preservation of the dynasty, or, in other words, the transfer of the autocracy to the bourgeoisie, the Soviet of Workmen's Deputies, at first merely a small group of Duma Labour Members, had formulated quite other ideas, had declared that the revolution belonged to those who made it, not to those who stood aside and then sought to profit by it, and had stated that neither Miliukoy nor the outworn Duma had the right to decide their future for those who had won their freedom by risking their lives, but that that task would be undertaken by a Constituent Assembly which should represent all Russia. Subsequent history illustrated the necessary opportunism of all parties in a time of revolution, since within a few weeks Miliukov and his party had declared for a republic, and, when the Constituent Assembly met, it had already earned for itself a place like that of the Duma among the relics of the past, and was gently set aside by the Soviet, which had been the first cause of its summoning.

There were thus formed two bodies, each of which claimed to represent the revolutionary nation. The first of these was the Provisional Government, which was appointed by an executive committee of the Duma, and so did indirectly represent that body, which, never fully representative of the people, had lost in the course of the war any claim to stand for anything except the bourgeois and privileged classes. The second of these was the Soviet of Workmen's and Soldiers' Deputies. Each thousand workmen had the right to send one member to the Soviet, and each company of soldiers. From the very first there could be no sort of doubt in the mind of an unprejudiced observer as to which of these two bodies best represented the Russian people. I do not think I shall ever again be so happy in my life as I was during those first days when I saw working