In the metal and machinery industry, on the other hand, the number of establishments which even to-day are privately owned is particularly great. There are together 601 establishments with 29,417 workers not nationalized. But these statistics cannot lay claim to completeness. I know of a foundry in Moscow which belongs to a private owner, Pirvitz, which I do not find included in the statistics. And still 106 workers are employed there. Against these private establishments stand 553 nationalized ones which employ 156,146 workers.
In the food stuff industry there are 638 establishments with 3,532 workers which are still privately owned. Against them stand 1,799 establishments with 151*699 workers that are nationalized. In the establishments for manufacture of animal products over one-third of the workers of that industry are still in private service. They number 10,711 workers, working in 2,226 establishments, while 32,979 workers are employed in 195 nationalized establishments. In the textile industry, which before the war belonged to the highest developed industries of Russia, there are now 232 establishments with 36,664 workers still in private hands, while 615 establishments with 337,346 workers are nationalized. To these belongs also the ready-made clothing branch.
According to the same statistics there are still in all Russia, 985,413 workers ivho work in 4,237 state establishments and 84,- 853workers who work in 4,609 private establishments.
From these statistics we can gather that the larger establishments are mostly nationalized while the smaller are still privately owned. These statistics, however, apply only to industry or production, but say nothing about the business houses. These were closed nearly without exception. To-day one may still see shutand-sealed stores in Moscow and Petrograd, in whose show windows everything still lies as it did before it was confiscated. The confiscation was so poorly organized that it is still not known exactly what has been confiscated. Frequently articles of clothing are booked as hardware, or kitchen utensils as furniture. But the worst is, that even in case of the most urgent necessity the people can get nothing. Thus a fellow worker in Petrograd asked me to get him a rubber nipple from Germany for his little daughter's milk bottle. He said: "We have this article in our confiscated stores but it is impossible to get anything. The mensheviks also reproach the bolsheviks that they undertook the so-called nationalization without thorough preparations. They say that the stores were closed before other organs were created which could have undertaken to supply the people. They themselves, the mensheviks, would have done this in a more deliberate and slow way. They are not so radical but more moderate.