So the mob went to Visegrad Street, where Béla Kún and his friends stirred it up still more and finally provided it with arms. With wild screams the furious crowd thereupon poured out into the boulevard, armed women, young ruffians with hand-grenades. “Long live Communism,” rose the shout. Somebody exclaimed: “Let’s go to the ‘People’s Voice!’” And the crowd, which had learned from the Socialists how to sack the editorial offices of Christian and middle-class newspapers, went on to storm the offices of the all-powerful organ of Social Democracy. The destructive instinct knows no bounds. The alarmed secretariat of the Socialist party appealed for help to the police and the armed forces, but before the sailors and the people’s guard had reached the street its pavement was covered with blood. Fifty constables awaited the crowd in a street; shots fired by the mob were the signals for a mad fusillade; from windows and attics machine-guns were trained on the unfortunate police and a shower of hand-grenades fell on the building of the ‘People’s Voice.’ It was a well prepared battle, the first real test of the Communists’ power. It failed.... The Communist leaders remained in the background, and the rabble, left to itself without guidance, abandoned the field with such a bloody head that all desire for further fighting has gone out of it for the present. It is said that the dead in this street battle numbered eight, and that over a hundred injured had to be admitted to hospital. It was late in the evening and we could still hear wild firing going on in the direction of the fight. Even late at night occasional rifle shots were heard. Then came the news in Friday’s papers that at day-break the Communist leaders had been arrested. Szamuelly’s room was found empty; on the table lay a piece of paper and on it was written: “Dear Father, don’t look for me; there is trouble, I must fly.” Most of the others were captured: Béla Kún was taken in his flat, and at the prison the policemen, infuriated by the death of their comrades, beat him within an inch of his life, indeed he only saved it by shamming death, and the constables left him in his cell without finishing him off. In consequence of the attack on the ‘People’s Voice’ the Social Democratic party declared a general strike. All work was forbidden, the traffic stopped in the capital’s main streets, the shop shutters put up, and even the cafés and restaurants were closed. The town looked as if it had gone blind; all along the streets closed grey lids covered its eyes of glass. There was no traffic at all. All vehicles had disappeared, and nothing but machine guns passed along the roads. At the various corners of the boulevards soldiers lounged beside their piled rifles.