He
hadn't the least desire to return to Russia, he was very happy where he
was, he had forgotten all his Russian; I can see him, saying very
little, looking like a sulky child and kicking his heel up and down
across the carpet.
"Just the man we want out there, Lawrence," he told me somebody said to
him; "keep them in order."
"Keep them in order!" That tickled his sense of humour. He was to laugh
frequently, afterwards, when he thought of it. He always chewed a joke
as a cow chews the cud.
So that he was in no pleasant temper when he met Bohun on the decks of
the _Jupiter_. That journey must have had its humours for any observer
who knew the two men. During the first half of it I imagine that Bohun
talked and Lawrence slumbered. Bohun patronised, was kind and indulgent,
and showed very plainly that he thought his companion the dullest and
heaviest of mortals. Then he told Lawrence about Russia; he explained
everything to him, the morals, psychology, fighting qualities,
strengths, and weaknesses. The climax arrived when he announced: "But
it's the mysticism of the Russian peasant which will save the world.
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