... Against them not only the organised
bourgeoisie, but all the other Socialist parties except the Left
Socialist Revolutionaries, a few Mensheviki Internationalists and
the Social Democrat Internationalists, and even they undecided
whether to stand by or not. With them, it is true, the workers and
the soldier-masses-the peasants an unknown quantity-but after all
the Bolsheviki were a political faction not rich in trained and
educated men....
Riazanov was coming up the front steps, explaining in a sort of
humorous panic that he, Commissar of Commerce, knew nothing whatever
of business. In the upstairs cafe sat a man all by himself in the
corner, in a goat-skin cape and clothes which had been-I was going
to say "slept in," but of course he hadn't slept-and a three days'
growth of beard. He was anxiously figuring on a dirty envelope, and
biting his pencil meanwhile. This was Menzhinsky, Commissar of
Finance, whose qualifications were that he had once been clerk in a
French bank.... And these four half-running down the hall from the
office of the Military Revolutionary Committee, and scribbling on
bits of paper as they run-these were Commissars despatched to the
four corners of Russia to carry the news, argue, or fight-with
whatever arguments or weapons came to hand....
The Congress was to meet at one o'clock, and long since the great
meeting-hall had filled, but by seven there was yet no sign of the
presidium.
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