I recalled that some of my wounded girls had been sent to Moscow, to be quartered in the Home for Invalids, and I thought of looking them up. I took a walk to the city. When I approached the block in which the Home was situated, I noticed a crowd in the street, largely composed of soldiers, holding meetings of indignation. When I reached the Home I saw a number of wounded soldiers, some of them without legs or arms, dispersed about the front grounds. On inquiry I learned that the Bolshevist authorities had turned the hundreds of crippled inmates of the Home into the street. Many of them, including my girls, had already disappeared, some no doubt being forced to beg, others being cared for by charitable people and societies. But still a goodly number remained, crying, cursing Lenin and Trotzky, and asking passers-by for food and shelter. It was a pathetic sight. The cruelty of the order made one’s blood boil. It was evidently an act of wanton brutality. The excuse that the Government needed the building was certainly no justification for it. There were about two hundred soldiers in the crowd, and I stopped to listen to their conversation. All of them had been attracted to the place by the complaints of the ejected invalids. Their talk came as a revelation to me. They were in a mutinous spirit, stirred up against the régime of Lenin and Trotzky. For several hours I lingered round the various groups, sometimes taking part in the discussions. “See what you have brought about by your own acts. You have shamefully beaten and killed your officers. You have forgotten God and destroyed the Church. Now, this is the result of your deeds.” In some such manner I would address the men, and they would answer somewhat as follows: “We believed that by overthrowing our officers and the wealthy class, we should have plenty of bread and land. But now the factories are demolished and there is no work. We are terrorized by the Red Guards, who are recruited mostly from drunkards and criminals. If there are any honest soldiers among them, it is because hunger and poverty force them to enlist in order to escape starvation. If we demand justice and fair play, we are shot down by the Red executioners. And all the while the Germans are advancing into Russia, and nobody is sent to fight them, our real enemies.” At these words I crossed myself, thanking the Almighty for the deep change He had wrought in the minds of the people. The crowd became so excited that the authorities were notified and a detachment of the Red Guard was sent to suppress it. It arrived suddenly and warned us to disperse by firing a volley into the air. The gathering separated and vanished from the street. A group of about ten soldiers, including myself, rushed into a neighbouring courtyard and continued the conversation there behind the gates.