Although in the 19th century Russians often blamed England in the world of political intrigue, a ady cordiality to English-always alive. A well-known humourist, Mme. Tet, recently depicted a Russian citizen of St. Petersburg who, for reasons unknown, was in love with everything English. He studied the English tongue and'was the constant customer of an English store. Now he bought a travelling rug, now a London tie, now a Harris tweed jacket. The cost of these articles was very high, but even that fact seemed to please him greatly; and he consoled himself with the aphorism: "I am not so rich that I can afford to buy cheap things." For Andrei Andreievitch the store's chief allurement was that he could talk in English to the salesman. "Such a cultured English face." he would say. "and such a wonderful Oxford accent!" Every Russian kno all accents the Oxford accent best, and that if one should talk in English, it should be only in the Oxford' accent. Andrei Andreievitch asserted that it should not be thought that the average Englishman is a fair-haired, ruddy-cheeked, stalwart clod with protruding teeth; that, on the contrary, the average Englishman is somewhat small of: stature, slightly snub-nosed, if anything, lean—but totally lacking in that English phlegm matism which we Russians have invented. All that is stuff and nonsense! A real average Englishman, he used to aver, is no different from us mortals, He can be seen excited and irritated—in short, he is a man and not a machine. Russian Anglophiles frowned on the French and German manner of dressing. "Everything fitted tightly," they complained. "everything loud-coloured and gaudy. Now the English style. that's different. Dark coloured suits, coloured ties, socks..." s@pue that later Andrei Andreihaving become an emigrant, came across (in a Paris store) that same salesman who before the revolution used to arouse his admiration: and discovered to his surprise cially enthusiastic over the fact that Tolstoy spoke fluently—and with that same Oxford accent—with a group of Englishmen who recognized and approached him on a ship at Crimea. It was well-known in Russia that Emperor Nicholas LI and Empress Alexandra, niece of Queen Victoria, corresponded in English. No wonder, then, that when in 1914 Russia and England became brothers in arms, in Moscow and St. Petersburg the most popular of all the allies turned out to be Englishmen. In the same way, during the tragic rule of Admiral Kolchak in Siberia. the most popular figures in Omsk were Sir Alfred Knox and Colonel Ward, member of Parliament for the Labour Party.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.