Page:John Reed - Ten Days that Shook the World - 1919, Boni and Liveright.djvu/195

Rh Otherwise, troubles with the Right will follow troubles from the Left…

“The garrison of Petrograd cannot remain indifferent when citizens buying the Golos Soldata and newsboys selling the Rabotchaya Gazeta are arrested in the streets…

“The hour of resolutions has passed… Let those who have no longer faith in the Revolution retire… To establish a united power, we must again restore the prestige of the Revolution…

“Let us swear that either the Revolution shall be saved—or we shall perish!”

The hall rose, cheering, with kindling eyes. There was not a single proletarian anywhere in sight…

Then Weinstein:

“We must remain calm, and not act until public opinion is firmly grouped in support of the Committee for Salvation—then we can pass from the defensive to action!”

The Vikzhel representative announced that his organisation was taking the initiative in forming the new Government, and its delegates were now discussing the matter with Smolny… Followed a hot discussion: were the Bolsheviki to be admitted to the new Government? Martov pleaded for their admission; after all, he said, they represented an important political party. Opinions were very much divided upon this, the right wing Mensheviki and Socialist Revolutionaries, as well as the Populist Socialists, the Cooperatives and the bourgeois elements being bitterly against…

“They have betrayed Russia,” one speaker said. “They have started civil war and opened the front to the Germans. The Bolsheviki must be mercilessly crushed…”

Skobeliev was in favor of excluding both the Bolsheviki and the Cadets.

We got into conversation with a young Socialist Revolutionary, who had walked out of the Democratic Conference