The open ground before Kasan Cathedral is the historic spot for protests and, true to tradition, the first demonstration against the bread shortage began there Thursday morning toward noon. There were not more than a dozen men speaking to groups of passing citizens. Each gathered a constantly changing audience, like an orator in Union Square, New York. But the Nevsky is always a busy street and it does not take much to give the appearance of a crowd. Examining that crowd, I could see it had not more than a hundred or two intent listeners. A company of Cossacks appeared to disperse it, but they confined themselves to riding up and down the curbs keeping the people on the sidewalks. The wide street was, as usual, full of passing sleighs and automobiles. Even then, at the beginning, it must have occurred to the military commander, General Khabaloff, that the Cossacks were taking it easy, or perhaps the police acted on their own initiative; at any rate the scene did not become exciting until mounted police arrived, riding on the sidewalk and scattering the curious onlookers pell-mell. By one o'clock the Nevsky was calm again, and the street cars, which had been blocked for an hour, started once more. [Sidenote: Duma discusses food situation.] [Sidenote: The first snarl of the mob.] That afternoon I went to the Duma, where the mismanagement of the food situation throughout Russia was being discussed. I had a glass of tea with a member of the liberal Cadet Party, and he seemed more concerned with the victualing of the country than with the particular situation in Petrograd. Toward evening I drove back along the Nevsky and my 'ishvoshik was blocked for a few minutes while a wave of working people, in unusual numbers for that part of town, passed. They were being urged on by Cossacks, but they were mostly smiling, women were hanging to their husbands' arms, and they were decidedly unhurried. It was not a crowd that could be in any sense called a mob, and was perfectly orderly, but it did not go fast enough to suit the police and a dozen of them came trotting up. Their appearance wiped the smile away, and when they began really roughing I heard the first murmurings of the snarl which only an infuriated mob can produce. I wondered what the police were up to. They were obviously provoking trouble. I felt then we might be in for serious difficulties--and the attitude of the police gave me the fear. [Sidenote: Watching for the Cossacks to act.] [Sidenote: A red flag.]