Tereshchenko has arrived from Kiev, where he’s been thick with Count Dolgoruky. There, in Kiev, the two friends pleasantly whiled away the time in the Continental Hotel, discussing current events. Tereshchenko took Count Dolgoruky to one side and informed him that he was leaving for Petrograd, where calls would start to be made for the Emperor’s abdication. The Empress, meanwhile, would be confined to a monastery. He told him, too, that officers from His Majesty’s Own Regiment and Convoy were implicated in the plot, naming names and even the name of one commander. The coup had been arranged for February 21. When asked by Count Dolgoruky what would be done if His Majesty refused to abdicate, Tereshchenko replied that he would be removed… Tereshchenko departed.
Ahh, why is it that Tolstoy is no longer among us these days?!
According to the facts, the distribution of bread to the localities will proceed go on schedule throughout February; the thaw begins in March and April, and it won’t be possible to bring bread to the stations; transporting grain to mills can only be expected in late April and early May. The mills, however, lack fuel. As a result, we should expect for at least three months should expect extreme crisis in the food market, verging on a nationwide starvation. The situation with fuel is no better. Almost all of Russia is experiencing an acute shortage of liquid and solid mineral fuels, firewood, and peat.
One of the saddest days of this terrible epoch. The United States has ceased negotiations with Germany. A neutral country has joined the funeral dance.
It hurts to feel this universal hatred towards Germany.
I’ve gone straight to the infirmary. Have written lots, sorted out the flowers, then had my medicine and been fed.
No nation is so easily influenced or so sensitive as the Russian.