Chapter III · THE PRODUCTIVE FORCES OF THE PEASANTRY.
Reading edition
The old laws governing the State peasants, before the reform of 1866, fixed the normal size of the plots at eight dessiatines (about 21 acres) to each male “of the revision” (i. e., included in the last preceding census) for the “regions where land is scarce.”
By the reforms of 1861 and 1866, not a single class of peasants was granted the extent of land that the state of agriculture in the district under consideration called for,[24] and the average tract owned by the more comfortably situated State peasant is only a little more than one-half of this normal plot as it was empirically fixed; of course, the normal extent of a farm is subject to change through increase of population and progress of agricultural methods. Let us see how large is the extent of land actually required by, but not in the possession of, the peasantry of the districts under review.
The table on the top of the next page gives the total number of communities, in which all the householders were able to carry on farming with their own stock and implements.
The favorable condition of these few communities was due to the fact that the land rented and acquired as private property by the prevailing majority equalled in extent the communal tract. The communities in question occupied, as a whole, over one-half more land than the average.
Title of Possession. Communities. Revision males. Households. Land (Dessiatines).
Number Per cent. Total. To one revision male. To one household.
Communal land:
a. allotted2846515810011802.57.5
b. rented?314
Tenure from landlords107686666.2
Private property14914710.5
12177
In all2846515810023075.014.6
Total in the region (allotted land)65390031361262944433.38.1
Still land tenure is unequally distributed among the peasantry, thanks to legal discrimination. The main distinctions date from the reforms of 1861 and 1866. Here is the proportion of land to population in the several classes of the peasantry of our region:
Districts and Classes.In every 100.To each peasant.
Peasants.Dessiatines.
Ranenburg:
Former serfs59.945.41.0
Former state peasants39.954.41.7
Dankoff:
Former serfs64.150.01.1
Former state peasants35.449.41.9
That the disproportion is not the result of subsequent alterations in population or property can be seen from the comparison between the average lot fixed by law for the former serf in 1861, and that given to the former state peasant in 1866:
To each male of the Xth census:Ranenburg. Dessiatines.Dankoff. Dessiatines.
Former serfs2.42.7
Former state peasants4.34.6
This inequality is due to the influence of landlord interests upon the reform of 1861, considerable tracts of land having been cut off from the former peasant possessions and granted in absolute property to the masters.[25] It goes without saying that the free peasant must have sunk below the level of the serf. By the side of the former serfs even the state peasants appear as an “upper class.” And yet the average quantity of land held by the state peasants falls short of the extent proved by experience to be necessary for farming in the districts under consideration.
Want of land urged the peasant to convert everything into arable land, and that to such an extent that no improvements worth mentioning were left for the use of the cattle.
The total hay yield of the meadows belonging to the peasants who live under agrarian communism[26], is 458,000 poods[27], and this has to be distributed among 83,079 head of large cattle[28]. This makes on an average 5½ poods, i. e. 200 pounds to every head for the Russian winter, lasting at least half a year. In other words, there is about one pound of hay a day for every head of cattle.
Nor is the condition any better in the summer, since the pastures, where there are any, are very scanty; and this is due to conversion of pasture into arable land, as already mentioned, as well as into homesteads for the increased population. This reduces to a paltry figure the number of cattle raised by the peasants.[29] Two working horses to a farm can hardly be considered as representing, even for Russian agriculture, a particularly high standard. The actual extent to which stock-breeding is carried on by the peasants falls below even this minimum, save among the 415 quarterly proprietors in the Ranenburg district, who are a kind of peasant “four hundred” in their own way, owing to the extent of allotted land that they own.
The depressed condition of stock-breeding reacts in its turn upon agriculture. Apart from this there is another universal cause that diverts the cattle manure from its natural use. I refer to the lack of woods.
With respect to possession of forests, so necessary in a climate like Russia, most of the state peasants were originally in a privileged condition, compared with the former serfs, to whom, as a rule, no woodland at all was allotted.[30] However, time has effaced all distinction between the privileged communities and those less fortunate. Of the former forests there remain at present only shrubs, and young bushes, of no practical value. State peasant and former serf are equally dominated by the want of fuel, a want which must be satisfied with the only burning material at hand, viz: with dung. In many a community this precludes the fertilizing of the soil altogether; in a great many others it is but the land next to the homestead that is manured, and the poorest among the peasants have no manure at all worth carrying to their fields. It is needless to speak of the extent to which this contributes to the rapid exhaustion of the soil.[31]
Apart from these general conditions, we cannot pass by without notice certain special circumstances that continually depress the level of the peasants’ agriculture in a number of villages inhabited by former serfs.
The reform of 1861 was not carried out without serious troubles which in certain cases called for the intervention of armed force. As an example we may quote the village Speshnevo, bailiwick (volost) Hrushchefskaya, Dankoff district. We find the following in the Statistical Reports:
“In 1861 the peasants refused to accept the present tract, which was allotted to them in the place of one they had formerly held. The latter was far superior as regards both situation and quality. They stopped ploughing for seven years and finally agreed to accept the tract only after a detachment of soldiers had arrived at the village.”
“The village is now surrounded by property that is owned by strangers. The plots owned by the peasants begin at a distance of 1400 feet, and extend about 3½ miles. The peasants are very frequently fined for damage done by the cattle to the fields of the landlords of the neighborhood.”[32]
Behind this dry, matter-of-fact statement, is hidden the story of a system of trickery practiced, at the time of the emancipation, by the masters and the subservient officials. The land was, in some cases, purposely divided in such a way as to create for the peasants the necessity of an easement or servitude (servitus itineris, actus, aquæ etc.), in the master’s estate. The tract given in possession to the peasants is situated, at least in part, far away from their villages, sometimes without even a road for driving, and stretched in a long and narrow strip. Not to speak of the waste of time in going to and fro, it would not pay to manure the distant tracts. Thus in addition to the immediate injury to the peasants aimed at by this system, a large portion of land is lost to all rational culture.[33]
In short, the effects of the scarcity of land are summed up in the lack of animal power, which is no unimportant drawback to agricultural progress, and in the predatory character of the peasant farming.
This can be easily figured from the yields of rye and oats, the principal crops raised by the peasantry[34]:
Countries.Yield Per Acre.
Rye.Oats.
Bushels.Per Cent.Bushels.Per Cent.
Russia,[35] District of Ostrogozhsk, Gubernia of Voronezh, average for 10 years (1877-1886)8.910010.7100
United States, average for 10 years (1880-1889)11.913426.6249
Ontario, Canada (1889-1890)15.517430.7287
Great Britain (1889-1890)40.3377
France (1888-1889)16.118126.1244
Germany (1890)14.716530.1287
Austria (1889)14.516317.6164
Hungary (1889)13.815517.4163
Unless the small productivity of agriculture is made up for by the size of the farm, the balance must needs close with a deficit. This is exactly what has been stated in figures by the statistical investigation of the gubernia of Voronezh, where balances of all moneys received and expended were made out by the statisticians for each one of the registered families. The results are shown in the following table:[36]
Districts.Households.Receipts from sale of produce (rubles).Expenses (rubles).Deficit[37] (rubles).
ConsumptionRent.Total.
Zadonsk15,528390,178784,061239,0721,023,133632,955
Korotoyak20,2321,280,2061,017,727304,7891,322,51642,310
Nizhnedevitzk20,0511,326,1101,069,013327,2001,396,21370,103
If we examine the items of expenses, we find rye and flour among those necessaries which the farmer has to procure in the market during a portion of the year. The deficit of a peasant farm is consequently one of daily bread.[38]
To give some idea of the standard of life of the Russian peasant, we append a summary review of three peasant budgets of the gubernia of Tamboff.[39]
1. Gabriel, the son of Michea, surnamed Trupoff, who owns four horses and holds 15 dessiatines (40 acres) of land, is, in faith, one of the chosen ones among the Tamboff peasantry. Verily it is worth while going through the budget of these peasant “four hundred.” The total expenditure of a family of four adult persons and three children does not exceed 510 rubles a year, say (in round figures) $10 a week.[40] All the dresses of two rustic Lady Astors amount to the exorbitant figure of sixteen rubles a year, while the gentlemen are satisfied with one hat once in five years, and one girdle of the value of eighty cents once in a decade. To make both ends meet they have to content themselves with, upon an average, about one and a half pounds meat a day, for seven persons, and to do without tea, rejoicing over one glass of brandy a day, for the whole family. All the sundries expended make up the sum of ten dollars a year, or less than one cent a day to every grown up man or woman. This frugality enables them to add to their wealth 7.79 rubles in a year, when the harvest is 10:1 to the seed. Now this is about twice as much as the Ryazañ average, and exceeds by one-half the Ryazañ maximum. Should we reduce the yield from 10:1 to the average 6.5:1 for rye and to 6.8:1 for oats, as given in the Reports for the district of Borisoglebsk, it would cause a deduction from the income, as follows:
3.5:10 from 40 Russian quarters rye @ 2.00 rubles56.00
3.2:10 ” 60 ” ”oat @ 2.00 ”38.40
Total94.40
This would give a deficit of 86.61 rubles a year. To cover this deficit Gabriel Trupoff used to engage in various occupations besides his farming.
2. The second family is likewise one of the best off, since they can even allow themselves the luxury of consuming one pound of tea, and five pounds of sugar yearly. Their farm yields them however a total income of only 358.80 rubles and the balance, 660.45, must be provided from other sources.
3. Finally, the third family of “peasant-proprietors” draws a yearly income of 27.80 rubles from farm and house, while the entire expenditure amounts to 241.80 a year, or 20.15 a month for 8 persons. Although it causes a yearly deficit of 65.20, which must be covered through loans, and probably through the sale from time to time of their chattels, yet they are tax-payers, and contribute 8.00 yearly toward the expenses of the state.
In short, it is manifest that even the most favored classes of the Russian peasantry are hardly able to make a living, however moderate, by farming on their plots. Hence the economic dependence of the Russian peasant, evidenced in various ways.
There is yet another very important feature of modern peasant economy which is brought to light by the budgets. A by no means insignificant part of the entire peasant consumption is to be provided for in the market outside of farming,[41] and consequently a corresponding portion of the peasant’s labor must be spent in production for the market. Thus the archaic peasant husbandry based upon natural economy has been to a very considerable extent superseded by money economy.[42] In other words, Russian farming has developed from the production of use-values or utilities to a production of commodities.