The Barre daily times. (Barre, Vt.) 1897-1959, 1904-11-16


year 1t reanots tne mages. ana no
man knows IN September where be
will pillow IN March No one fertilizes
the ground he fills. ana rotation Of
crops is impossible The peasant,
therefore, has gained little in gaining
the thing named freedom Land be
cannot sell. for he owns none, nor buy.
for there Is none for sale He cannot
move from village TO village. The
old mir would refuse to let him 80,
and IN the new he would have no
share. lie does not improve his one
years holding. for it goes the next ia
another yillager IN consequence the /
land, naturally rich, has grown SO
poor that it will not support him. |
HALF the year be tills the poor soil;
the other half he seeks work III the
factories Of the cities. He seems eter
nally bound to the Increasing horrors
Of starvation. For ten years there has
not been a time when famine was not
ravaging some province Of the empire
Sad as the peasants lot is, it ISL
made unutterably worse BY the gov
eminent. The best Of the peasantIy
Il drafted off to the army The less
ablebodied who are left bear the
greater part Of the enormous financial
burdens Of the empire, Taxes have in-I
creased by leaps and bounds until they
have more than doubled in fifteen
years. The state now lays hands on
perhaps one.quarter OF the peasants
income. Meat he seldom tastes Even
cabbage he cannot afford His practii
caIly unchanglng diet consists of black
bread and the cheap tea that Is nodded
into bricks.
AS man the peasant Is dull brnt-
ish. nonresistant to the point of mar
tyrdom He cannot distinguish be-
tween mine and thine His Ignorance
passes definition
The peasant Is good natured and gen
tie but his gentleness has an odd mix
tire % unconscious ferocity In q re-
treat during tie Crimean war i wound
ed soldier was dragging himself along
a great pala Ills comrades ID deep
sympathy said. You are suffering too
much 40 sou want Us g end your
rain1 Shall we bury youg II wish
son wonid De answered. They set 70
wogs ana 3aa 4 grave Tie laid him.
SELF down sna WAS buried ALIKE The
| general who heard Of it afterward,
said to tile soldiers. He must have
| suffered terribly They answered,
\ "Oh. no. ws stamped the earth down
hard with our feet These are ex-
trenle Instances, but they mark depth
OF ignorance and fnsensibility impossi-
bic to ind IN any other civilized eoun-
try
Such is the Russian peasant. a
strange blending OF scythian and Mon.
col. such is his condition, his life, his
hope, and snch the hope of his sons
son. And the Russian peasant Is nine
tenths OF Russia What OF the restl
Greater Russia, its land and its PEG
Die exist solely for the profit Of tn
other tenth. Ii consists 81 three class
es landowners. merchants, the onl.
powerful nonofilcial class. and the hu
reaucrats. who are usually spoken 0
as the arlstocrats. for a landless nobl
amounts to 20 little that prince ma,
be a day laborer The car himself ha
only a slight trace of Russian blood i
his veins, and his arlstocraey is Xix
: him. Many of these bureaucrats AZ
foreigners.
The bureaucracy and the merchant
in collision have built up a perfect
organized system Of graft. It is open
2 IL recognized, treated with tolerance
even thought Of with respect There
. no parallel to the rapacity Of Ties
privileged and high placed thieves, No
only do admirals buying coal in foI
eign ports procure receipts for mucl
larger sums than they have paid, peck
citing the difference and dividing
with their under officers, but no cor
tract is let ut home which does not q
low liberal margin for rakeon
In this way Russia has paid for he
railroads two and half times th
amount which the minister of tinanc
estimates as their value, and by Amel
! lean standards his estimate is 50 pc
cent higher than the necessary cos
! | 1t is said that fully 20 per cent Of IL
= large Red Cross fund which was sul
! scribed ut home and abroad has bee
. stolen The magniticently equippe
s hospital train which the ezarina SCI
I to the east was looted between Sc. r
s tersburg and Moscow. Not a thing
value was left in It.
I Nowhere else has bureaucracy pro
4 ed such an enormous burden to IL
7 state. Department after departmeI
= has been created, and before the en-
{ Of the year another VIII be added
the long list. Block after block Of us
= less great office buildings has bee
Z erected 1t is seriously asserted TN
there are as many clerks on the pa,
roll of the office for dog licenses 1
\ there are dogs in ST Petersburg
Il This shameless system Of wholesa
Y thievery is supported BY the terrib
y power Of Tie autocracy. ITS chief i
+ strument is the police, which is n
tional force with its own minister Il
q minister Of the interior, Il is in u
q challenged control Of al the affairs
y life
Drink is the national vice. and 4
Russian must buy his vodka from
vender in the government emplo