19 AUGUST 1922, Page 25

In a Russian Village. By Charles Roden Buxton. (Labour Publishing

Co. 3s. 6d. net.)—It is a relief to find that Mr. Buxton's little book is not a piece of Socialist propaganda, repre- senting Bolshevik Russia as a kind of Paradise, but a pleasant narrative of his own experiences among the villagers of Ozero, in the Samara province, east of the Volga, in the summer of 1920. He left the British Labour delegation and spent a week by himself, talking with the peasants and priests as well as with the officials. As Mr. Buxton can speak Russian, his accounts of conversations inspire confidence. Even two years ago the villages were suffering from the great scarcity of necessaries and from the large requisitions of corn, sheep and hay enforced by the Red Army. Since then, the province has fallen a prey to famine.