Page:Emile Vandervelde - Three Aspects of the Russian Revolution - tr. Jean Elmslie Henderson Findlay (1918).djvu/172

 Buczacz. The country was entirely deserted, with its uncultivated lands and the immense plain without a tree, without even a shrub. As we reached a cross-road the Russian officer who accompanied us said: "Look!" We only saw two roads, and to the left of the principal one, a few hundred yards away from each other, two bits of ruined walls rising out of the brushwood, all that was left of a formerly prosperous little town. The walls indicated the sites of two churches, and had evidently been left there as signposts. As far as the houses were concerned, there was not the slightest trace of even their ruins. We got out of the motor-car to see if we could not discover some trace of remains. We looked in vain; there was nothing anywhere but a mass of weeds, which came up to our waists, wild flowers of a thousand colours, over which the butterflies were fluttering. From time to time we struck our feet against some bricks or against a little eminence that perhaps had been a wall. The only visible trace of habitation that remained was the wells, of which the little walls had been razed to the ground; the