Still, that is the way of the world, and these people pass, whereas the work remains. All the autumn and possibly through the winter the work goes on again in the continuous darkness, with torches, under the supervision of fur-clad engineers and grim Cherkesses. Many will be the sufferings, though not greater than the sufferings on the field of battle. Many have died and will die in the building and consummating of the Murman railway. Still the railway will remain as a peaceful memorial, the great new railway from Petrograd to the dark haven. III THE NEW ARCHANGEL WHEN I last visited Archangel, six years ago, it was a dreamy, lifeless, melancholy port. One felt that, like its sister city, Kholmagora, it had once been great, but its greatness had finally set. You could feel the melancholy of Russia there, the sadness of material failure so characteristic of the Russian soul. But to-day! To-day the vision has fled, the _tempo_ has changed. All the ships of the world find anchorage in her harbour, and motley crowds throng her streets. That the war has brought about. A year before the war fifty vessels entered Archangel port. During the last twelve months something like 5000 have entered. Great liners and transports and weather-beaten tramps and three-deck river boats stand in majestic pride. Their smoke and steam make a dome over the city of Archangel when you approach it from the north. There are Norwegians and Yankees, with their colours flamboyantly painted on their bows to warn the submarine off; Russians and French, with their tricolours streaming; but most of all English ships, with their proud rain-washed Union Jacks lolling in the wind. I was taken through the whole harbour in a little, arrow-like steam launch--from the Thames! How often it had shot under the arches of our little bridges, and now it was puffing and panting on the vast brown Dvina, be-dwarfed by huge ships, driven by a Lett from Riga, and constantly going short of steam and getting becalmed far from either shore.[1] Besides troops, the French are taking great quantities of alcohol used in the manufacture of high explosives, and I saw many barges heaped up with barrels of spirit and wondered if there were many leaks. The Russian manufacture of alcohol has probably not diminished as a result of the prohibition of the sale of intoxicating liquors in Russia, but has proved to be a valuable war export. This fact is especially important to take into consideration with regard to Russian temperance reform. When the war is over and the market for this alcohol is partially lost, will there not be another movement of resistance on the part of the manufacturers? [1] Thirteen lines excluded by British Censor. Not to be published. I saw all manner of crates with machinery, parts of aeroplanes, and the like, and British vessels discharging these things, and I saw grain and flax and timber going on for us from Russia.