Page:Emile Vandervelde - Three Aspects of the Russian Revolution - tr. Jean Elmslie Henderson Findlay (1918).djvu/211

 versation some remark revealed the fact that we were Belgians. Immediately their faces lit up with smiles. They rose to their feet and insisted on calling for wine to drink to the health of the defenders of Liége. We realized that our little country of Belgium held a big place in the heart of great Russia, and this first impression was daily strengthened.

We have already spoken of the welcome of the masses given us at Petrograd. We have told of the extraordinary enthusiasm that the presence of the Belgian Labour and Socialist delegates aroused at the front. We can still recall the touching reception that we received at Moscow from the members of the Municipal Douma.

But nowhere, perhaps, were we made so aware of the depth of this sympathy as on the day of our departure, when we were bidding farewell to the Congress of Soviets.

The assembly was being held on the left side of the Neva, in the Cadet School, with which Kropotkin's Memoirs had made us familiar. The heart of the working population of Russia was there, six hundred delegates representing their different bodies