The charges made by the British that the American soldiers were unreliable and mutinous were founded correctly on the mental attitude of the American soldier and upon the things he said. He hated the expedition and its management. But those charges were not fairly founded upon anything that the American soldier did. There was an instance of one company refusing at one time to go to the front. It was but a temporary refusal. They went. There were several parallel instances when British and Canadian and French soldiers resorted to similar semi-mutiny. It was always momentary. They always eventually went forward with the unequal fight despite the inhuman conditions. The dissatisfied and unhappy soldier was not yellow. He may have had some sympathy for the Bolsheviki whose country he was unwillingly invading. He certainly felt that the invasion was a crime. But he was not yellow.[#] He obeyed orders. He fought splendidly. He went to his death. He held his post. He cursed the British and did his duty. He killed Bolsheviki, plenty of them, not knowing why. [#] The report of the Judge Advocate General gives a number of cases of American soldiers who were convicted by court-martial of having been guilty of self-inflicted wounds. The number accused of this was lamentably large. Even if larger in proportion, however, than in any other army in the world war, the reflective mind is forced to ask the question: Why? *VIII* *"AMERICA DOBRA"* There was one thing in North Russia that touched every American where every normal man is sentimental. There was a passion for America. In every log house there was love for America. In the hearts of the people in every village there was moving what Benjamin Kidd calls "the emotion of the ideal." We could not understand it at first. Every peasant greeted us with "America dobra," which is not good Russian, but a sort of slang phrase meaning that America is all right. And now and then one would step up a little nearer and in a more subdued tone say that some other country was not all right. We suspected at first that he was playing a double game. We remembered the man who walks like a bear. We smiled cynically and handed him a cigarette. But we did him an injustice. [Illustration: The church at Yemetskoye is visible for many miles up the Dvina. Shenkursk is a quiet and romantic spot on the Vaga River.]