In the Nicolai Hall there was barely room to stand. The Mayor announced that troops were stationed at all the doors, prohibiting all exit and entrance, and that a Commissar had threatened arrest and the dispersal of the Municipal Duma. A flood of impassioned speeches from members, and even from the galleries, responded. The freely-elected City Government could not be dissolved by _any_ power; the Mayor’s person and that of all the members were inviolable; the tyrants, the provocators, the German agents should never be recognised; as for these threats to dissolve us, let them try—only over our dead bodies shall they seize this chamber, where like the Roman senators of old we await with dignity the coming of the Goths…. Resolution, to inform the Dumas and Zemstvos of all Russia by telegraph. Resolution, that it was impossible for the Mayor or the Chairman of the Duma to enter into any relations whatever with representatives of the Military Revolutionary Committee or with the so-called Council of People’s Commissars. Resolution, to address another appeal to the population of Petrograd to stand up for the defence of their elected town government. Resolution, to remain in permanent session…. In the meanwhile one member arrived with the information that he had telephoned to Smolny, and that the Military Revolutionary Committee said that no orders had been given to surround the Duma, that the troops would be withdrawn…. As we went downstairs Riazanov burst in through the front door, very agitated. “Are you going to dissolve the Duma?” I asked. “My God, no!” he answered. “It is all a mistake. I told the Mayor this morning that the Duma would be left alone….” Out on the Nevsky, in the deepening dusk, a long double file of cyclists came riding, guns slung on their shoulders. They halted, and the crowd pressed in and deluged them with questions. “Who are you? Where do you come from?” asked a fat old man with a cigar in his mouth. “Twelfth Army. From the front. We came to support the Soviets against the damn’ bourgeoisie!” “Ah!” were furious cries. “Bolshevik gendarmes! Bolshevik Cossacks!” A little officer in a leather coat came running down the steps. “The garrison is turning!” he muttered in my ear. “It’s the beginning of the end of the Bolsheviki. Do you want to see the turn of the tide? Come on!” He started at a half-trot up the Mikhailovsky, and we followed. “What regiment is it?” “The _brunnoviki_….” Here was indeed serious trouble. The _brunnoviki_ were the Armoured Car troops, the key to the situation; whoever controlled the _brunnoviki_ controlled the city. “The Commissars of the Committee for Salvation and the Duma have been talking to them. There’s a meeting on to decide…. “Decide what? Which side they’ll fight on?” “Oh, no. That’s not the way to do it. They’ll never fight against the Bolsheviki. They will vote to remain neutral—and then the _yunkers_ and Cossacks—”