By the District Department for Popinstruct [Footnote: That is "District Department for popular instruction"--in "Russian," _Uotnarobraz_.] provided with every commodity. --BATHS-- (former Church school in garden) for public use with capacity to receive 500 persons in an 8-hour working-day. Hours of baths: Monday--municipal children's asylums (free) Tuesdays, Friday, Saturday--males Wednesday, Thursday--females Price for washing adults--50kop.gold children--25kop.gold DISDEPOPINSTRUCT [Footnote: That is "District Department for popular instruction"--in "Russian," _Uotnarobraz_.] Times: Lent of the eighth year of the World War and of the downfall of European Civilisation (see Spengler)--and sixth Lent since the great Russian Revolution; in other words: March, Spring, breaking-up of the ice--when the Russian Empire exploded in the great revolution the way Rupert's drops explode, casting off--Estia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Monarchy, Chernov, Martov, the Dardanelles--- Russian Civilisation,--Russian blizzards--- --and when--- --Europe-- was: --nothing but one Ersatz from end to end-- (Ersatz--a German word --means the adverb "instead.") _Place_: there is no place of action. Russia, Europe, the world, fraternity. Dramatis personæ: there are none. Russia, Europe, the world, belief, disbelief,--civilisation, blizzards, thunderstorms, the image of the Holy Virgin. People,--men in overcoats with collars turned up, go- alones, of course;--women;--but women are my sadness,--to me who am a romanticist-- --the only thing, the most beautiful, the greatest joy. All this does after all make itself into some sort of sense, but the process by which this is at length attained is lengthy, tedious, and full of pitfalls to the reader who is unfamiliar with some dozen modern Russian writers and is innocent of "Soviet life." In the impossibility of giving an intelligible English version of the _Bare Year_ and its companions, the stories contained in this volume have been selected from the early and less sensational part of Pilniak's writings and will be considerably less staggering to the average English intelligence. * * * * * * *