The Revolution in the Factories
inevitably explode, and that we are on the eve of a formidable conflagration, one of those social upheavals that convulse and devastate a country? We must certainly be possessed of singular optimism if we can cast such a hypothesis disdainfully aside. But it would be equally rash to decide that the explosion is inevitable. Russia is manifestly exposed to a very grave industrial crisis, but it appears far from impossible to deal with it.
We wished to see the Petrograd workmen in their factories, where they spend the greater part of their laborious existence. We talked long with them, and conversed also with their leaders and organizers; we were present at their meetings and took part in their discussions, and the result of our inquiries, which were as comprehensive as circumstances and the lack of time at our disposal would permit, has been that we have carried away a very distinct impression of the extreme good-will on the part of the most intelligent and the most technically skilled members of the working classes. As far as the masses are concerned, they show a very deep "social
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