The Revolution at Petrograd
have been difficult to find anything in common between these exiles who were returning to their country after years of absence, some from Switzerland viâ Germany, others from France, Great Britain, and the United States: some of the latter—not all—were full of bitter resentment against the police surveillance of which they had been victims; whilst many of the former were strongly imbued with lessons learned in the school of German Socialism.
During the three days that the journey from Stockholm to Petrograd lasted—with a break of twelve hours to allow of the passage of the ice on the Tornea, in the middle of May—we had occasion to exchange views with one of the Maximalists, who was soon after to become, along with Lénin, the leading spirit of the risings of Cronstadt and Petrograd: citizen Trotsky, to whom the Provisional Government had generously granted passports to enable him to come and combat it.
He was coming from Canada, with a group of supporters, full of rancour and rage against the British who had interned him at Halifax during several days; against
15
