At Houdinka

Last week was celebrated the first anniversary of the establishment of the Union of Socialist, Soviet Republics (U. S. S. R.*).

The place chosen for this celebration was the famed Houdinka Field, near Moscow, now used as an aerodrome, where in 1894, at the coronation of Tsar Nicholas II, thousands of people were accidentally trampled to death as they scrambled for free food and wine. A Bolshevik, glowing with pride, said that "our organization is perfected to prevent a repetition of the disaster." An elderly woman nearby shuddered and crossed herself.

Assembled upon this field of sad memories were half a million souls. Red officers and soldiers in many uniforms; workers in white and blue blouses; Communist athletes, male and female, the former naked except for a pair of trunks, the latter clothed in white shirts and short blue knickers; English Communists from the Clyde, dressed in sombre Sunday-go-to-meeting garments; Communist boys and girls, "sweating in black leather suits with red badges", skinny members of the "Young Pioneers," Bolshevik Boy Scouts, attired in skin-tight red bathing suits; girls in cotton frocks; Cheka battalions, for protection, whose blue helmets added yet another splash of color. And last, but not least, Mohammedans from Turkestan and the Tartar Republic, draped in multicolored flowing robes, and a great Caucasian tribesman in an ample gray cloak over which were slung cartridge bandoleers, a sword-belt holding many silver knives and supporting a wicked-looking scimitar.

Centre of attraction was a three-storied, wooden pyramid "40 feet high." Here soldiers stood in lines to form pathways to the pyramid. A shout was heard; then gathering force, like a mighty wind lashing itself into a tornado, the shout increased to a dull reverberant roar; along the pathways came the leader of Russia. Then deal silence. Suddenly a score or more of bands struck up the Internationale and down one of the aisles came some French Communists from the Department of the Seine to present to Peasant Kalinin, Chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committe, one of the original flags of the Paris Commune (Europe's first encounter with Karl Marx Communism)--the last to go over the barricades when the French regulars from Versailles crushed the Reds. In the centre of the delegation fluttered from a pole the faded red flag; on the top of the pyramid Kalinin received it and it found its way to a deputation of Moscow workers waiting to receive it. Then there were a number of speeches followed by an awkward skit on recognition of Russia, which attempted to show, not without much buffoonery, how anxious the foreign Powers were to accord recognition.

Under the fading light of a July day, 500,000 thronged back to the ancient city of Moscow, scene of a thousand historical acts.

*The U S. S. R. was established by Treaty of Union signed in 1922 by the Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic (Russia proper, Turkestan, Kirghiz, Tartar, Bashkir, Mountain Republic, Daghestan, Crimea, Votiak, Mari, Chuvash, German Volga areas, the Far Eastern region), the Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic, the White Russian S S R. and the Transcaucasian Socialist Federal S. R. The Treaty was ratified last January.

With reference to the initials U. S. S. R., certain Frenchmen have recently advocated calling Russia "Ussar" and dropping forever the word Russia, pointing out that it is of comparatively recent origin. Russia was known until the 18th Century as Muscovy.