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THE FIRST STEP

believe. To whom is it necessary for me to ramble among the cultured nations like a leper, to conceal my race and obtain the ironical bow so essential to my unacknowledged dignity, by means of exorbitant "tips" flung right and left? A barbarian, a barbarian! . . .

The war has opened our eyes to many things, and therein lies for us Russians the sad advantages of it. And now when Germany brands France and England for the union with "the Russian barbarians who . . .," when the allies, while relying on our elemental force, tremble with doubts and fear behind the screen of their noisy sympathies,—I begin to understand in whose interests it was, who needed it, that in the legion of European states we should remain all alone with our barbarism. Whatever is a misfortune for us is favourable for Germany, with her "well-tried" friendship for us, to which Wilhelm referred so loudly from the balcony of his palace. As barbarians we are only an excellent and indispensable market for the Germans' merchandise, a two-hundred-million flock of sheep ready for the shears. As a cultured nation we are a power dangerous to the Teuton's dream