A Secret Agent in Port Arthur by Wirt Gerrare

The year 1903, whether reckoned by the Julian or by the Gregorian calendar, was ended before Russia realized that war was the only possible outcome of her protracted negotiations with Japan. It is the practice of diplomats to dissemble, and Russian statesmen, if they knew what the issue must be -- and in my opinion very few of them even suspected war -- hid it successfully from the Russian people. The Russian peasant neither knows nor is wanted to know anything of world politics or to take any interest in them; the military and civil officials have no voice in the direction of the foreign policy of their country and scarcely possess an opinion on the subject; Russian journalists are expected to express such declarations only as are indicated by official communications. The only articulate class, the only people in Russia who reflect the impressions produced by the absorption of news current in the world, is formed of those engaged in commercial and industrial pursuits. They are aware of the movements of the peace-barometer. To them the fluctuations in the stock markets, abroad and at home, showed the importance foreign speculators attached to the negotiations proceeding between Russia and Japan, but even the value of this indication was discredited by the great confidence the Russian merchant had in the ability of Russian statesmen to arrange with Japan, avert an immediate crisis, and force the issue at a season Russia would find favourable for war.

In European Russia I met no one who wanted war; many who were opposed to it. The merchants and manufacturers had Manchuria as a free market for their goods; imports from Japan into Manchuria, like all sea-borne goods, were taxed, and high duties were imposed on foreign goods brought into Siberian markets by way of the Manchurian ports and railways.

The state of affairs in the Far East was the chief, if not the only, topic of conversation. Moscow residents agreed that attention was riveted upon Manchuria, and they inferred that the trans-Siberian express trains were crowded with naval and military officers. They argued that although four trains ran every week, the three controlled by the State would doubtless be monopolized for Government servants, and that my best chance would be by the train of the International Sleeping-Car Company. I determined to leave Moscow by the first train, one of the State expresses. At the office of the Sleeping-Car Company I was informed that all trains were very full, and at the town office of the State Railways I was told the same, and that I could not book then by the next train, but might be able to do so at the station. I sent a messenger from the hotel to buy a through ticket at once, and he obtained it without difficulty. It will scarcely be believed that I was the only passenger going through to the Far East. A Jew merchant of Harbin was my only companion for days. He was utilizing the Christmas holidays to make his return journey, and had with him many of his purchases in Moscow, for he told me that although one should make the journey in less than a fortnight, the time required for the conveyance of goods was from four to five months, the average speed being less than 120 miles a day -- about five miles an hour. The third day we were alone I called his attention to the fact that on the train and engines there were upwards of twenty-five men all engaged in running the train; that at great expense and with special effort the scheduled time was being kept -- for one Englishman and one Jew! We represented the two races the Russian Government likes least; but for us the train would have been absolutely empty.

I have crossed Siberia by railway three times, each at a different season of the year, and not once without encountering a delay through some breakdown. On this occasion we had a broken rail, which made us nine hours late at Irkutsk; another in Trans-Baikalia, which delayed us hours before reaching the Manchurian frontier, and on the Eastern Chinese line, a military train ahead ran off the rails, blocked the line all day, and caused us to be twelve hours behind time again at Harbin.

The line is maintained regardless of cost, and allowance must be made for the many difficulties to be overcome. It is true that there is no need for so many miles of snow-sheds as the Canadian Pacific railway has found necessary, but for thousands of versts across the steppes snow-screens have to be set up parallel to the track, to keep the snow from drifting over the permanent way and blocking the line. In spring and autumn there are heavy floods, and not infrequently a "wash-out," in summer the unballasted track is blown away from the sleepers and must be constantly renewed. In winter everywhere, and in summer on many sections, the supply of water is kept up at great expense, and a drought would threaten the running of extra traffic.

Two engines are required on heavy grades, and special twenty-wheel locomotives are used on the hilly sections. Hot water is kept night and day at most stations, and the trains suffer severely from the inclement weather. The double windows are permanently frosted; often the vestibule doors become fast, great patches of frozen snow adhere to the roofs, the sides and panels are hidden under a thick white hoar, and long streaming icicles hang from the roof to the bogie truck where the water from the tank for the heating apparatus in each carriage has splashed over during the day's run. At every large station there is a special gang of attendants, who attack the train vigorously on its arrival; they use hammers and crow-bars, iron rods heated red, long flaming torches, scalding water, and even light fires of shavings under the carriages to free the breaks, and little by little thaw out the working parts of the frost-bound train, wringing, as it were, tears of anguish from the cold-hearted monster that has crossed the bleak plateaux of Siberia in winter.