At one moment a Cossack arrived, but an official came out of the house and told him he was not needed, upon which he went away amidst the jeers, cheers, hoots, and whistling of the crowd. The day passed off quietly on the whole, the only untoward incidents being the death of a woman and the wounding of a student and a workman while trying to rescue a student from the prisoners’ van. A veterinary surgeon called Bauman was also shot on this day. To-day for the first time I heard the phrase “Black Gang” used. I was standing on the doorstep of the Hôtel de France, when a woman rushed frantically up and said the “Black Gang” were coming. A student, belonging to a very good family, who was standing there, also explained that the “Black Gang” consisted of roughs who supported the autocratic cause. His hand, which was bandaged, had been severely hurt while he was in the act of taking off his hat that day, by a Cossack who had beat it with a whip, thinking he was about to make a disturbance. He came up to my room and from the hotel window we had a good view of the crowd which proceeded to— “attaquer la Marseillaise en _la_ Sur les cuivres, pendant que la flûte soupire En _mi bèmol_: Veillons au salut de l’Empire.” MOSCOW, _November 7th_. I went to see Maxim Gorki’s new play at the Artistic Theatre of Moscow, “The Children of the Sun.” It was the second night that it had been performed. M. Stanislavoshi, one of the chief actors of the troupe and the stage manager, gave me his place. The theatre was crammed. There is a scene in the play, where a doctor, living in a Russian village, and devoting his life to the welfare of the peasants, is suspected of having caused an outbreak of cholera. The infuriated peasants pursue the doctor and bash some one on the head. On the first night this scene had reduced a part of the audience to hysterics. It was too “actual.” People said we see enough of our friends killed in the streets without going to the play for such a sight. On the second night it was said that the offensive scene had been suppressed. I did not quite understand what had been eliminated. As I saw the scene it was played as follows. A roar is heard as of an angry crowd. Then the doctor runs into a house and hides. The master of the house protests; a peasant flies at his throat and half strangles him until he is beaten on the head by another peasant who belongs to the house. The play is full of interesting moments, and was played with the finished perfection which makes this theatre famous and unique. But M. Gorki has not M. Tchekoff’s talent of representing on the stage the uneventful passage of time, the succession of the seemingly insignificant incidents of people’s everyday lives, chosen with such skill, depicted with such an instinct for mood and atmosphere that the result is enthrallingly interesting. M. Gorki’s plays have the faults