Cold Death

Nikolai Lenin died Monday, Jan. 21 (TIME, Jan. 28). On the following Sunday at 4 p.m. he was buried in Moscow. In the interval "the greatest number of people who had ever looked upon the same corpse" (exact number unspecified) passed before his body which lay in state. All of them had stood in line in the streets of Moscow for 10, 20, 30 hours, in inhuman cold, registered by the thermometer as 10, 20 and even 30 degrees below zero. During one of the five days of the All Russian procession, a blizzard raged. Sparrows fell frozen in the street. Ice covered the horses of the guards. Still the people came, from Moscow and from miles around.

When on Sunday cannons, sirens, steam-whistles, muskets sounded the burial-hour, the name of Lenin was-- to Russians--like the name of a new god.

Facts noted by the correspondents: P: Lenin's body, dressed in brown tweeds, hands crossed, Communist badge on the coat, lay in state in an open red coffin, at the Hall of Columns, formerly the Nobles' Club. The face was thin and worn, but all wrinkles were smoothed away.

P: Leon Trotsky's lament came by telegram from Teflis, whither he had gone for his health: "His death will seem for a long time like a monstrous joke of nature. The work of his blood vessels, following mysterious laws, had broken his life. Medicine was unable to perform what thousands of human hearts demanded. Multitudes would without a moment's hesitation have gladly given the last drop of their blood to revive Ilich's blood vessels, but no miracle happened." Trotsky does not believe in immortality.

P: Lenin's mausoleum, says Architect Schohuser, will be a marble cube, to symbolize eternity, rising 15 feet above ground and descending 5 feet below, 30 feet in width. The inside, black and red, will be lighted and kept at zero to preserve the embalmed body.

P: It is thought the coffin will be put under a glass case--so that the head will be visible. Health Minister Semashko, Lenin's friend and physician, spoke of future cremation. He says Lenin desired it. But there is no crematory in Russia. Professor Abrekosof, who injected six litres of embalming fluid, prepared by a special formula including alcohol and glycerine, into Lenin's veins, fears that the autopsy hindered the action of the preservative; but he is certain that the body will remain unchanged for four years.

P: Mme. Lenin sat by the body for most of the 80 hours of lying-in-state, while members of the Central Executive Committee stood, in turns, at each corner. "Never have I seen men so completely still," said Walter Duranty, correspondent.

P: Archbishop Evdokin, head of the Holy Synod, called a meeting of the Synod to pronounce that Lenin was a Christian and to propose mass for his soul in all the churches. "He showed a tender interest in the graves of his parents," said the Archbishop.

P: Three gigantic bonfires in Red Square melted the ice so that the burial could take place.

P: Lenin's last words were: "She is all right if you give her time and do not hustle her too much. She is young and stupid and still overeager, but she will learn if you give her time." Lenin had just eaten a hearty lunch with his wife, his sisters, Maria and Anna, and his comrade Bukharin. They were discussing the morning's sport they had watched. Lenin's words referred to a young bitch. They were later interpreted as referring to the new Russia. After these words he fell into a doze, then coma, then death.