WOMEN IN RUSSIA.

Auckland Star, Volume L, Issue 251, 22 October 1919, Page 12

WOMEN IN RUSSIA.

THEIR ROWER IN THE STATE '" I was in court.*' said Mr. Aubrey IWilliamgy " when Madame Breshkovekaya, the famous socialistic revolutionary, known as " the Orandmotlicr of the Revolution,' was tried for promoting sedition, and was sentenced to Siberia for the third time.'' •' What was she like?'" inquired the reporter. "She was a silver-haired old lady with a fresh complexion and very bright eyes," remarked Mr. Williams. " She denied nothing. This was in 11110, under the Czar's rule, and her sentence was only terminated by the revolution in 1017."' Mr. Williams was allowed to talk to her for a few minutes before she was removed. She spoke excellent English, and expressed her pleasure at hearing it spoken again. In reply to expressions of sympathy by Mr. Williams, she said: " Oh, it doesn't matter. I have been through it all before." Mr. Williams, who was formerly an Aucklander. and is a brother of the famous linguist, journalist and scholar, Dr. Harold Williams, has lived in Russia for live years, and has recently been again in Russia for six months. Questioned as to the difficulty of learning Russian, Mr. Williams said it was not at all difficult, and it was possible to get a good working idea of the language in a year. It is really a very fine language with a splendid vocabulary, and is very musical, like Italian. The Russians are born orators, and can make a lons speech, lie believed, at a moment's notice, because they have imagination, and a very live interest in cverythinsr about them. Asked if this also applied to the women of Russia, Mr. Williams said that the women were the .most fascinating conversationalists. The educated women were brilliant talkers. They are great students of mathematics, on which subject they become very proficient, and this, the traveller thinks, gives them a flexible brain. In talking to a Russian woman one would sometimes think that the conversation had been threshed out, when they would suddenly approach it from an entirely new angle, with remarkable results. The women are very accessible to new ideas, and they get a new point of view very quickly. They are also possessed ot very critical brains. Questioned as to the Russian home, Mr. 'Williams said it all centred round the samovar, or urn in which the water was boiled for the everlasting tea, wliich is served in glasses with a piece of lemon, but is not brewed as strong as we brew •it in New Zealand. 'Noisy conversation goes on round this centre of family life, often nearly all night, amongst the men and women who meet on an equal intellectual footing. Even before the war the women stood on an equal footing with the men in nearly everything except a passport. A wife's name had to be placet! on her husband's passport. Women had a great deal of freedom even before the revolution, and it astonished the New Zealander to find the numbers in the learned professions. Especially was this true of medicine, in which they were very successful. Women doctors were counted equal with men doctors in the Russian Army medical service before the Japanese War. and accompanied the troops to Manchuria. As women doctors are not yet given that status in England or New Zealand, it will be seen that Russia is in some ways far ahead of our own nation. Mr. Williams knew several women leaders in the movement to liberate Russia, and at their head stood Madame Filospha and her biographer. Madame Tyrkova Williams, wife of Dr.. Harold "Williams, and the Countess of Panina. This lady was head of the Welfare Department for the women and children under the Kerensky administration. Afterwards she was tried "by the Bolshevik revolutionary tribunal of workmen and soldiers for alleged appropriation of 7,000 roubles belonging: to the Oovernment. She explained that she held tlii« money in trust, and would only hand it over to a constitutional Government, as she refused to reeoznise the Bolsheviks. For many years she had supported a People's Palace in Petrograd to provide a better and larger life amongst the workers, and a feature of the trial was the testimony of one of these workmen, who said that he owed everything to Countess Panina. Women also occupied a prominent place under the Bolsheviks. Lenin's wife is a high official in the Commissariat.Department, and Madame Kolontai is the head of the Department of Public Welfare. She it was who instigated the first movement against the Church. Shortlyafter the Bolsheviks came into power, she, belonging to a noble Russian family,' was married to Dyhenko, a sailor, an action that gave rise to lots of headlines in the opposition papers, which had not then been suppressed. Such as - Marriage in High Life." It is sad to know that women have also been prominent in action during the " Terror." which has been so relentlessly applied by the Bolsheviks. Madame Yakovlevna was one of the most vicious heads of the •■ Extraordinary Commission.*' and that department was greatly enlarged wnile under her sway. Hundreds, nay thousands, were done to death under her order. Mr. Williams has much interesting information on the Bolsheviks which he will bring forward at his lectures in the Town 'Hall next week.