In that great calamity the help given by the English Society of Friends was very remarkable. {127} After some preliminary enquiry, I was invited to attend a Committee Meeting. There were, I think, between twenty and thirty present, and I was the only woman. A series of questions was addressed to me about the state of things in Russia. I exaggerated nothing. I concealed nothing. I told them that an unforeseen blow had befallen sixteen of our provinces and found us unprepared to combat its effects. My son, Alexander Novikoff, was just organising a committee in the district of Kazloff (Tamboff province), and, thanks to him, I knew the question fairly well. "The Friends" listened attentively, but said very little. Mr. Braithwaite, the chairman, only expressed a hope that "God will help our efforts." Nothing more: but without losing a day they went to work, and worked splendidly. They not only collected about £40,000, but sent their delegates--Mr. Edmond Brookes and Mr. William Fox--to distribute their help on the spot amongst the famine-stricken peasantry. Do you know one of the results of such practical application of sympathy? It is now generally admitted in my country that unofficial Englishmen are "kind and generous," and, when left to their own true nature, are capable of being friends deserving trust and confidence. I also received, quite unsolicited, liberal subscriptions from friends in the City, which enabled me to send without delay much needed relief to the starving peasants in my district of Tamboff. The "English bread," as they called it, is remembered and spoken of even now. Perhaps the best description of that terrible {128} famine, and of the efforts to relieve it, is that recorded in an interview with me by the representative of _The Week's News_, which I therefore transcribe, the more so because that enterprising journal sent out a special Commission to our famine districts to report upon the situation there. Here is the interview: "NOVO ALEXANDROFKA, "12_th February_, 1892. "A beautiful night drive across the snow from Bogojawlensky brought me to Madame Olga Novikoff's estate during Wednesday night. The thermometer stood at 36 degs. Fahrenheit below freezing point, yet the air was so calm that the cold was scarcely noticeable. A heavy hoar frost covered the trees, and the slight mist gave a weird aspect to the desert of snow that stretched away on every side. Without a house on the horizon to direct him, the _jamschick_ drove out into the night, and the sledge glided along over the crackling snow. "Mr. Alexander Novikoff, the son of Madame Olga Novikoff, was at Novo Alexandrofka to welcome me, and put me in a position to judge of the state of things in his district of the Tambov Government. He is Zemski Natchalnick, and very popular amongst the peasants whose little differences he has to judge.