The Russian Revolution/Chapter 11
XI.
FOOD, CLOTHING AND SHELTER.
As all the world knows, the food situation in Russia at present is exceedingly bad. A great famine has come upon the country. Throughout the Volga Valley, ordinarily one of the banner grain growing sections, the crops have failed almost completely. The unprecedented drought literally burned them up. And what little the dry weather did not ruin were devoured by the myriads of locusts that descendd upon the land. The district affected stretches almost from the Caucasus to the Ural mountains and encompasses a territory about as large as France, Germany, and Spain put together.
At least 20,000,000 people are faced by actual starvation. Great armies of them are wandering away from their homes to more favored localities, often dying by the road. Multitudes are living upon roots, herbs, and all sorts of impossible things containing even a trace of nourishment. Where the peasants have not eaten their work animals they are feeding them the straw from the thatched roofs of their houses in a desperate effort to save them. Thousands of parents have abandoned their children to the Government in the belief that it will find food for them somehow, while they themselves wander off to they know not what fate. Grim cholera is raising its head and wiping out great numbers of the famine-stricken. Altogether it is a desperate situation and one which Russia cannot conquer alone. The assistance of the civilized world is necessary. If it is not forthcoming the famine will surely develop into one of the greatest calamities of modern times. Plagues, always the companion of famine, will sweep over Europe, probably destroying millions.
An unfortunate feature of the situation is that the food question in Russia was already acute before this famine developed. There were little or no food reserves on hand to meet such a crisis. This shortage was caused by the general breakdown of industry, which reacted unfavorably upon agriculture, and especially because of the crop failure last year. It is said that every thirty years or so Russia experiences a series of consecutive drought years. The present is one of such periods. I remember the last one vividly through seeing, when a bit of a boy, the flag-bedecked wheat ships steaming down the Delaware River bearing America's gifts to starving Russia. Two years ago the harvest was a bountiful one, but it was practically destroyed by the white-guard invaders of Kolchak and others, and no reserves were left over from it.
So serious was the crop failure last year that Ballod, an eminent German economist, declared it to be many times worse than during the famine period of the early 90s, above referred to. He prophesied that millions would die from starvation and that the Soviet Government probably would not survive the winter. But these dark forebodings did not come true. Had there been in force the usual capitalistic grab-all-he-who-can system, with some getting too much to eat and others too little, no doubt great numbers would have actually perished from hunger. But with the prevailing rigid method of food rationing the crisis was safely gotten over: famine was averted and the Soviet Government did not fall. Nor is it likely to fall in the present critical period; the same rationing system that pulled it through before will do so again.
In apportioning out the food supply to the people in the cities several classes of rations, or "puyoks," are used. These are calculated according to the needs of respective industrial and social groups receiving them. There are rations for children, the aged, the sick, manual laborers, brain workers, diplomats, etc. The children, the manual laborers, and the diplomats get the most of the best food: the children because they need it to build their bodies and to lay the foundation for future rugged constitutions; the manual laborers because they burn up more food fuel in their work than do people in other walks of life; and the diplomats, which include foreign delegates to the congresses, etc., because they are physically and psychologically unable to subsist upon the slim fare on which the gallant Russian working class are fighting their way to freedom. Everyone adds as best he can to his Government rations by buying food in the open markets or from the peasants in the country.
The following is the regular monthly "puyok" for manual workers, scaled according to the kind of work they do, and stated decimally in pounds:
| Extra Strong. | ||||
| Normal. | No.1 | No. 2 | No.3 | |
| Bread | 30. | 45. | 60. | 60. |
| Meat and fish | 4. | 7.50 | 7.50 | 15. |
| Fats | .50 | .75 | 1. | .75 |
| Sugar | .50 | .50 | 1. | 1.50 |
| Vegetables | 20. | 20. | 30. | 30. |
| Sale | 1. | 1. | 1. | 1. |
| Coffee | .25 | .25 | .25 | .25 |
Just now, because of the severe food shortage, the workers are receiving considerably less food from the Government than even this modest scale calls for. It is marvelous, nevertheless, how healthful the people keep. For this much credit is due, no doubt, to the black bread which is the foundation of the national diet. If the Russians were eating the denatured white bread that Americans poison themselves with, they would have died out long ago. The women seem to prosper even better than the men upon the restricted diet. They look wonderfully rugged and rosy-cheeked, whereas the men seem rather thin and pale. During my four months' stay I did not see one Russian who might be considered even moderately stout. To be fat in Russia during these days of food shortage is to openly bear a badge of unsocial hoggishness. Once I saw this spirit neatly expressed: a robust foreign delegate was making a speech about unemployment and stated that in his country women and children were starving. "No wonder," piped up a Russian kid used to the rationing system, "with fat guys like you eating up everything in sight."
One thing that strikes the foreign visitor in Russian cities is the comparatively well-dressed appearance of the people. As a rule their shoes are sound, and their clothes clean, neat, and trim looking. How this can be in the face of the practical stoppage of the garment industries, at least so far as the making of civilian clothes is concerned, is a mystery to all newcomers. A manager of a big garment shop told me that last year 95 per cent of the whole nation’s clothing industries went to fit out the Red Army. And since 1914 the condition has been the same, there being few clothes left over for the mass of the people after the needs of the military were met. Yet the dwellers in the big towns remain fairly well dressed—though, of course, the peasants do not cut quite so slick a figure.
Various factors contribute to the explanation of this standing riddle. Part of it is due to the remnants left over from the great stores of clothes it was customary for Russian families to keep on hand before the world war; part of it to the very good quality of these clothes; and part to the marvellous care the people are taking of what few clothes they have. Americans, accustomed as they are to all sorts of rotten shoddy goods, can hardly conceive of anyone wearing a pair of shoes three or four years and a suit of clothes six, and still have them looking well at the end of such long periods. But this is what is being done in Russia. I met some people there who had not replenished their wardrobe by a single garment since before the revolution. On Moscow's streets one can still pick out members of the ex-bourgeoisie, especially the women, by means of their faultless raiment, made up of left-overs from old-time stacks of clothes. The Russian women's hats are wonderful works of art. Feathers, beads, artificial flowers, and the other usual trimming materials are not to be had, because the blockade prevents their importation; but resourceful woman has been able to find substitutes in all sorts of strange cloth combinations. Some of the hats thus trimmed are beautiful enough to pass muster even on critical Fifth Avenue. With the easing of the military situation there is a great falling off in the demand for Army garments, and it is hoped that at least some of the urgent needs of the people for clothes may be satisfied soon.
Rent is one thing that Russian workers do not have to worry about. In the big cities they pay none at all. The Government owns all the houses and furnishes them to the people free of charge. The distribution of rooms, apartments, and houses is carried out by special committees attached to the local Soviets. Nearly everywhere, and especially in Moscow, a severe housing shortage exists. In this situation the prevailing method of parcelling out the habitations has at least one virtue: it solves the vexatious problem of house-hunting. All one has to do is to go to the housing committee, make his application, and then, if he is lucky—take what he gets. It is very simple.
The nobility and bourgeoisie have been long since chased out of their palaces, mansions, villas, club-rooms, hotels, and apartments. These have all been turned to practical uses. For the most part the Government is using the great palaces for museums, special assembly halls, and offices. Thus the magnificent Kremlin, with its dozens of palaces and churches, is being preserved just as it was under the Czars, as a sort of gigantic national monument of the old regime. The Czar's palace itself was used by the III International to hold its recent congress. The same organization makes its headquarters in the former German Embassy, which still bears the marks of the bomb that killed Mirbach. In Petrograd the unions have their home in a magnificent palace, while those in Moscow occupy what was formerly a gorgeous club-room for the nobility. The Red Trade Union International has its main office in the former swell Elite Hotel.
Thousands of splendid country villas, scattered around the various cities have been turned into summer colonies for children and rest homes for industrial workers. Great numbers of town mansions have been changed to schools and hospitals; while others are used to house visiting foreigners—for three months I lived in a magnificent mansion formerly owned by a rich sugar king. The big former hotels are devoted chiefly to Government offices of various sorts, although three or four of the best of them were used to accomodate the crowds of delegates during the recent world congresses. As for the many fancy apartment houses, they have fallen to the lot of the workers, furniture and all. Many of them are occupied by the employees of single large factories and are run upon a communal basis by committee systems,