The fair young English girl who came to beg us to help her and her baby to her friends in England, told us calmly but pathetically that her husband had been shot in prison. “I do not know why,” she said. “He was not political. He never talked politics to me. He translated for the Russians in the army of Judenitch. But he was sent there by the Government.” Poor thing. Her husband was possibly guilty. But he had had no trial. She had lost him by violence. And she herself was threatened with starvation and was refused permission to leave the country. Two hundred and forty-one anarchists we heard were shot out of hand in Petrograd, the new order against capital punishment being kept back until this had been done. We were very glad of an opportunity of meeting those who claimed to speak authoritatively for the Commission, for the confession of shooting without trial ten thousand persons admitted in the Government’s organ, _Isvestia_, had been deeply distressing to us. “Is it true,” the chairman was asked, “that the Extraordinary Commission has shot ten thousand people without trial?” “No, it is not true. The number is exaggerated. Only eight thousand five hundred were shot, and not without trial. They were brought before the Revolutionary Tribunals and examined.” This answer was said to be quite untrue by credible persons to whom it was reported. Not only was a much greater number than ten thousand put to death without trial, but many were shot in their cells in circumstances of cruelty, and their relatives were refused information about them. I met one woman whose husband had disappeared from prison in suspicious circumstances and who was afterwards discovered to have been shot for selling something at a profit of a few shillings in English money. This private trading is what is meant by “speculating.” The chairman of the Commission had said in his opening address that there was perfect liberty of speech and action in the country. As I knew that a real terror existed I suggested to him that, in all probability, the arrest of certain persons for imagined or trivial offences was due to the exaggerated zeal of ignorant minor officials working under the Commission. The reply was that this could not be so, since the agents who behaved like this would be punished very severely. I did not consider the answer conclusive, nor an explanation of the terror. “Why,” I asked, “have many people expressed a fear of coming to see us? And when they come, why are they afraid to speak with perfect confidence?” “Because,” said this clever person, sarcastic and evasive, “English people have been here before and have tempted our people into counter-revolutionary activities which have got them into very serious difficulties. They do not want to be caught again.” I ventured to ask one more question. “Does the Extraordinary Commission maintain spies and _agents-provacateurs_ for its work?”