Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1906-10-09
ARMY czAR MUST FEAR.

ARMY CAR MUST FEAR.
Five Million Wandering Peasants Who
Demand Land.
Further light upon the great tragedy
that is being enacted in Russia is
thrown by DR.. Mackenzie Wallace in
the London Times, where he discusses
the condition of the landless peasant,
says special cable dispatch to the
New York Sun. He Is now living In
the open air with company which Is
one contingent Of q vast host Of 5.Ooo.-
900 trekking agriculturists. He Is with
a band who left their homes months
ago. according to the annual custom,
to seek work on the crops In other
parts Of the empire. They are now
returning.
The lot Of these wanderers" says
DR.. Wallace, "is miserable enough.
God knows. Most Of them are from
Little Russia and the steppe provinces.
Some of them travel as far as 1000
versts. They are absent from their
villages from two to six months, and
their average wage is 3s rubles, Of
which they have q minimum outlay
OF 81 rubles for passport and food en-
route. This leaves II rubles, which
makes an average wage Of IL kopecks,
or cents day. Some travel by train
In fourth class or on the slowest Volga
boats part Of the way, but multitudes
go on foot. They spend the night
wherever they happen 70 be when
darkness falls. They suffer innumer-
able privations from hunger. cold, heat
and sickness, and finally, II they sur
viye, they reach their destination with
all their strength spent before they
have begun work.
Land; give US landi' these peas
ants cry. Nor do they dream Of COM
pensating any OF the present landown-
ers whom they may dispossess. At
the bottom of their hearts Is the ine-
radicable conviction that q man who
works on the land has natural right
to 1t, which II put In the balance
against all the positive laws Of prop
erty makes them kick the beam. We
are the Lords they say, and the
land is ours Yes; they still believe
in the Lord. and before they lie down
on empty stomachs on the steppe they
commit themselves by the sign OF the
cross to the divine care They believe.
too, in the Blessed Virgin and the
saints and in icons and heaven and
hell. This steppe over which they
wander loses itself In the dim horizon.
where the earth and sky mingie and
are lost, and there Is a, mystical back
ground encompassing these wanderers
lives, In the midst OF which are super
stitions and portents.
I'm the Russian revolution what Is
these peasants role? It was discov-
cred to me by a man who had been the
companion Of my journeyings for two
days. He forced his company upon
me, for while I was driving across the
country he sprang upon me from be-
hind q tree and made. the. demsnd
which. almost with impatience. had
long expected to hear, Hands up! ]
Even II had possessed a revolver I
should not have fired, for could have
blown the wretch out Of existence with
"a pun of smoke from my cigarette. I
have seen pitiable specimens Of hu-
manity in my day, but none ever STIR
red my compassion 80 profoundly as
this man, and cheerfully gave him
the few rubles had and some OF my
cigarettes.
"As he smoked he told me his his
tory. For a political offense he had
been provided by an administrative
order with what the peasants appro-
priately call VOLTS passport, which
forces him to be a perpetual wander
er on the face of the earth or such
part of It as is under the dominion Of
the czar, reporting himself at specified
police stations as he goes along, and
forbids all the czar's subjects to give
him shelter for more than one night.
It is the curse of Cain, and certainly
this mans punishment is greater than
he can bear, although his sin was not
murder, but merely completely in print
ing some illegal literature which the
government was making vain efforts
to suppress. I am told by this wolf
that he had met fewer Of his kind dur
ing the last four or five months than
In earlier times.
"But during many years the revolu-
tionary leaders have found use for
these men. although the government
has none. They have ordained them
peripatetic missionaries to the peripa-
tetic peasants. They supply the peas
ants with revolutionary pamphlets Tor
dissemination In their villages on their
return. They teach them the 'Marsel-
laise' and other revolutionary songs,
recount to them the heroic deeds Of the
revolutionary martyrs who by revolver
and bomb have executed Judgment
upon the oppressors Of the people and
distribute highly colored and still more
highly imaginative pictures OF the
French revolution to teach those who
cannot read how they ought to act.
This man Is himself a living picture
which no one who has seen 1t can cas-
lily forget.
Great numbers of these wandering
peasants are sometimes to be found
massed together. On May 8, for ex-
ample, $4,000 Of them gathered at the
st. Nicholas fair in Kahovka, and
where there are missionaries wolves
are also found Thus 100000 peas
ants are being made propagandists of
the revolutionary faith. BY the end Of
October they will have returned to
their villages with literature in their
wallets, songs in their memories and
bitterness in their hearts, flrebrand
every man."
JOHN OBEYED.-Mrs. F. was a very
stern woman, who demanded instant
and unquestioned obedience from her
children, says Chums. One afternoon
as she was working in her sewing room
q storm came ur and she sent her son