The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1920-03-22
Shall Chaos or Reconstruction
in Europe Follow the Great
World War?
LAND QUESTION IN RUSSIA
Natural Desire of Peasants to Parti.
cipate in Ownership OF Soil
They Till Is Root OF the
Revolution.
Article XVII
BY FRANK coMERFoRD.

In talking with people about Russia, |
have discovered that most people in |
America have only a faint, uncertain, |
vague idea of the country. Car Mich |
olas, the last of the f-proclaimed au-
tocrats, was monarch Of S,660,0O0 |
square miles, one-sixth of the entire
land surface of the earth. The great
Russian empire is spread over part of
two continents, Europe and Asia. 1t is
almost entirely confined to the cold
and temperate zones.
Three seas bound it on the north
White, Barents and Kara of the arctic;
the seas of Boring, Okhotsh and Japan
of the northern Pacific bound 1t on the
east. The Baltic sea, the CULTS of
Bothnia and Finland limit 1t on the
northwest; two sinuouS lines of land
front separate it respectively from
Sweden and Norway on the northwest,
and from Prussia, Austria and Rou-
mania on the west. On the south and
east the frontier has changed frequent
", according to the expansion and con-
| traction of the empire under the pres
sure of political exigency and expedi-
ency. The Black sea is the princi-
pal demarcating feature on the south
| of European Russia. On the west side
| of that sea the south frontier touches
/ the Danube for some 40 miles; on the
| east side of the same sea ii ZigZags
from the Black sea to the Caspian.
/ utilizing the river Aras for part OF
| the distance. AS the Caspian Is vir-
| tually a Russian sea, Persia may be
said to form the next link in the south
ern boundary of the Russian empire,
| followed by Afghanstan. On the Pa
Mrs, Russia has since 1885 been CO.
terminous with British India, but the
boundary then swings away north
round Chinese Turkestan, and the
| north side of Mongolia, and since 1905
it has skirted the north of Manchuria,
being separated from it by the river
Amur
The total length of the frontier line
of the Russian empire by land is
$500 miles in Europe and nearly TO-
600 miles in Asia, and by sea, over
1900 miles in Europe and between
10000 and 10000 miles in Asia
frontier of 68.OO0 miles.
Empircro vast Population.
, The population OF the empire. ac-
cording to the 1915 census. was esti-
mated at 1S2, 49,, 900. According to the
same census this population was dis
, tributed as follows: In European Rus
STA, 131, 796,s00; in Poland, 12,125000
in Caucasus, 13.125,000; in Siberia, II,
337 900; in the central Asian provinces
11,125,0O0; Finland. 3125.000.
Over so per cent of the people OF
n Russia are peasants. The land is theil
problem. It means home to them
work, life. Their one dream has beer
$ to own the land Land ownership /!
e their definition of freedom, their idei
{ of happiness.
> The Russian peasant has been
= stranger in his own country. TIL
70 man who tills the soil and lives on th
II land and yet never owns an acre 0
he it is a foreigner, even though hi
e forbears may have been native to tn
t country for centuries. The Russian
s have felt this they are simple. HON,
:, loving people. From the conversation
~ ] have had with Russians of the peas
II ant class I believe that they have SUI
d fered more because they never had
h. chance to own their own homes, thei
IN own farras, than from the denial [
a them of political freedom. The Ian
er,l question is heart question, heart
rs question to them.
ne Crime in Land Distribution.
- Some idea of the land crime in Ru
70. sia is told Ia the startling figures SHOW
If ing the actual distribution of arab
of land, forests and meadows in Eur
he pean Russia. The following table
he only one count in the Indictment:
lis, Eurapean Russia