"Many scientists and other intelligent people express opinions not to satisfy their self-respect but to satisfy the wishes of the higher circles of society."

But I think that the majority of our scientists, judges, and prosecutors who have been passing judgment on our Russian colonies in America have been doing it in good faith, though some of them make mistakes in their judgments. We all make mistakes. And those mistakes are caused by insufficient knowledge of the affairs of the Russian colony in America. It is true that the supposition is widely spread among us that all numbers of the so-called intellectual class are highly educated persons, whereas it is not so. Some of our intelligentsia have only a very superficial knowledge of the life and the affairs of our Russian colonies in America. For instance, the majority of our intellectuals have no knowledge at all of the critical condition through which the Russian colony now is passing. No doubt to such an 2intellectual group belongs also our countryman Mr. Kondratiev.

In the August 5 issue of Rassviet appeared an article written by Mr. Kondratiev, in which he complains to the whole Russian colony that he is ashamed to call himself a Russian. Of course no reasonable man will deny his liberty to do so. Mr. Kondratiev may call himself a Frenchman, an Italian, or whatever he wishes. But it is not enough for Mr. Kondratiev to be ashamed of being a Russian; he has taken a bucketful of mud and poured it out on the heads of the ill-educated sons of peasants, for whom he used to have some sympathy.

Why, then, is Mr. Kondratiev filled with disgust for those poor uneducated peasants' children?

He had believed that these ignorant people would build in America a few national homes, theaters, and colleges. This is what Mr. Kondratiev believed too firmly.

On the backs of these peasants' children he placed a whole wagon-load of straw, but he would not take any load on his own back. And further, Mr. Kondratiev asks a question:

"What has the Russian colony in America really accomplished?"

Why could not Russians build their national homes and their theaters like other national groups? And here perhaps is the reason. When a Norwegian, a German, or an Italian arrived in America, he considered it his country. But we Russians came to this country only for a short stay, not more than five years. Then the World War broke out, and the Russian revolution came.....And even now, though we live in America, we always think of Russia as our fatherland.

Mr. Kondratiev says that we are as little educated as we were when we came to this country. This may be only partly true.

Here is an example. On the same page of the same issue of Rassviet on which Mr. Kondratiev's article appears there was an article written by F. Chernovietz under the title "The Painful Truth". In it this undereducated peasant's son dissects to the bone one of the intellectuals, a certain Mr. Alexeyev. And in regard to Mr. Kondratiev's allegation that "these peasants' children do not read anything but small brochures and pamphlets written by Robakin and Linkevitch, let me state with pride that I have completed a reading course in all the natural sciences. Even in Chicago there are more than ten such peasants who possess their own private libraries, valued at more than five hundred dollars each.

Mr. Kondratiev is also wrong in stating that Russians do not attend concerts given by Russian artists. I personally attended the concerts given by Chaliapin, Stanislavsky, Pavlova, and other Russian artists when times were better, and almost always I heard Russian spoken among the audience. To my regret I 5was unable, for various reasons, to hear the concert given Maria Kurenko.

On the table before me lies a book written by a Bolshevik writer, F. Gladrov, entitled Cement. In this book the author depicts the horrible conditions under which Russian peasants now live in Communist Russia. But Mr. Kondratiev not only denies the existence of all this in Russia; he also wants to deprive all Russian immigrants of the name of sons of Russia.

He knows that the Russian colony is far behind other national groups, but instead of helping it to rise, he wants to press it down, so that it may not raise its head again. Instead of showing the way out of the present situation, he calls the Russian immigrants dwarfs, trash, etc. He reproaches these ignorant sons of Russia for not building their own national pavilion at the Chicago Century of Progress Exposition.

But this is an undeserved accusation. Is it possible for Russians to sing and 6dance at the Exposition at the time when their own mother is perishing? Mr. Kondratiev writes that we, the ill-educated peasants, do not experience heartaches in sympathy with our fatherland. But in this he is wrong. Almost every one of us has felt a heartache from the time when we left our country.

Mr. Kondratiev asks further:

"And what do you know about Russian culture, and what have you done to extend the glory and popularity of Russian culture in foreign lands? Do not dare to defile it!"

He likewise blames our colony for not answering the call of the newspaper Rassviet when it asked for aid for the starving masses in Russia. But the whole Russian population of America had answered the call like one man. Hundreds of 7thousands of dollars had been collected to save the people in Russia from starvation. And what happened? A gang of thieves masked as "Friends of the Soviets," headed by Marnens and others, stole the money, and the famished common people of Russia did not receive a single penny. When the scandal was revealed, the thieves escaped to Russia, where they continue to pillage and despoil the Russian peasants.

After that the Russian colonists in America no longer believed even honest men. That is how the ill-educated Russian people lost their faith in all calls for public action. Hence the mutual hostility and lack of co-operation among the Russian colonies in this country.

Now the Russian Ivans and Steves look with disbelief upon all calls for aid and enterprises, fearing that again the beast may emerge and swallow all.