RED RUSSIA.
Red Russia. By John Foster Fraser. (Cassell and Co. 6s.)— In his latest book Mr. Fraser presents the results of a sojourn in Russia during the recent disturbances there. The materials for his graphic picture of a country whose inhabitants have learne•l to look with indifference on assassination and outrage have not
been obtained without great personal risk, and the picture is the more interesting on that account. Mr. Fraser does not hazard a solution of the Russian problem. He considers that the aims of the various warring sections aro too divergent and their mot e3 too complex for the spectator from the West to foretell anything save more darkness and confusion in the future. But lie doubts whether a scheme of Constitutional government will ever be devised which will secure a lasting internal peace. " I am con- vinced," he says, " that in matters of Constitutional government the Russian lacks the essentials ; that public spirit does not exist, that compromise is not understood, but extremes always pressed, and that the only thing that the Russian, beneath his thin garment of civilisation, really understands is force That soldiers should fire into a mob of men, women, and children is no more to the Russian Government than a police intimation in England that order must be preserved. The throwing of bombs by the revolutionaries is regarded very much in the same light as en electioneering pamphlet would be in England." The book contains its full complement of the gruesome and heartrending incidents that wo have learned to look for in works on Russia, and these lose nothing under Mr. Fraser's dramatic treatment. But Red Russia is more than a mere chronicle of bloodshed, and chapters like that descriptive of the great fair at Nijni-Novgorod are as valuable an aid to a clear understanding of the complexities of the Russian problem as those which deal with riot and massacre. The book is admirably illustrated with a series of photographs.
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