Page:Emile Vandervelde - Three Aspects of the Russian Revolution - tr. Jean Elmslie Henderson Findlay (1918).djvu/139

 were written in schoolboy German, destined from their sense as well as from their form only to evoke laughter among their readers.

The essence of the German propaganda is always the same; they try to convince the Russians that they are the victims of British and French imperialism, for which they are making a great mistake in allowing themselves to be killed. It is especially against England that their arguments are levelled. In this regard there is a curious coincidence between the German propaganda proper and the views that we heard expressed at Petrograd by certain pacifists—Bolscheviki, Menscheviki, and Internationalists: one of the latter, an influential member of the Soviet of Petrograd, who was wearing, moreover, the uniform of a Russian officer, and who could not, apparently, forget that he had had difficulties in obtaining a passport, from the English military authorities, after having for several years enjoyed the British hospitality that is granted to all political refugees, went so far as to affirm gravely that the real danger which threatens Europe