Page:Emile Vandervelde - Three Aspects of the Russian Revolution - tr. Jean Elmslie Henderson Findlay (1918).djvu/53

 or even serious injuries, were fairly rare. If we believed the tales of some scared fugitives from the factories, we would imagine there must have been throughout Russia a veritable St. Bartholomew of overseers and managers, but we have already pointed out how rumour exaggerated to the point of ridicule even the smallest street brawls. We were told, for instance, that in a certain part of the Donetz thousands of victims had been slain. On making inquiry we learned that nearly all these supposed dead were still alive, and the real number of those murdered was something like eight or ten. It is difficult, even to-day, to give any accurate figure of the number of victims in Petrograd. There are many persons who have disappeared, but there is every reason to believe that most of these will turn up again when the present unrest has calmed down and they dare come out from their hiding-places.

It would prove our ignorance of the Russian workman did we represent him as thirsting for the blood of his employers. On the contrary, he has limited himself