Resurrection
hands, but in the hands of those who, profiting by their rights to the
land, live by the work of these people. The land so much needed by men
was tilled by these people, who were on the verge of starvation, so
that the corn might be sold abroad and the owners of the land might buy
themselves hats and canes, and carriages and bronzes, etc. He understood
this as clearly as he understood that horses when they have eaten all
the grass in the inclosure where they are kept will have to grow thin
and starve unless they are put where they can get food off other land.
This was terrible, and must not go on. Means must be found to alter it,
or at least not to take part in it. “And I will find them,” he thought,
as he walked up and down the path under the birch trees.
In scientific circles, Government institutions, and in the papers we
talk about the causes of the poverty among the people and the means of
ameliorating their condition; but we do not talk of the only sure means
which would certainly lighten their condition, i.e., giving back to them
the land they need so much.
Henry George’s fundamental position recurred vividly to his mind and how
he had once been carried away by it, and he was surprised that he could
have forgotten it. The earth cannot be any one’s property; it cannot be
bought or sold any more than water, air, or sunshine. All have an equal
right to the advantages it gives to men. And now he knew why he had felt
ashamed to remember the transaction at Kousminski. He had been deceiving
himself. He knew that no man could have a right to own land, yet he had
accepted this right as his, and had given the peasants something which,
in the depth of his heart, he knew he had no right to. Now he would not
act in this way, and would alter the arrangement in Kousminski also. And
he formed a project in his mind to let the land to the peasants, and to
acknowledge the rent they paid for it to be their property, to be kept
to pay the taxes and for communal uses. This was, of course, not the
single-tax system, still it was as near an approach to it as could be
had under existing circumstances. His chief consideration, however, was
that in this way he would no longer profit by the possession of landed
property.
When he returned to the house the foreman, with a specially pleasant
smile, asked him if he would not have his dinner now, expressing the
fear that the feast his wife was preparing, with the help of the girl
with the earrings, might be overdone.
The table was covered with a coarse, unbleached cloth and an embroidered
towel was laid on it in lieu of a napkin. A vieux-saxe soup tureen with
a broken handle stood on the table, full of potato soup, the stock made
of the fowl that had put out and drawn in his black leg, and was now
cut, or rather chopped, in pieces, which were here and there covered
with hairs. After the soup more of the same fowl with the hairs was
served roasted, and then curd pasties, very greasy, and with a great
deal of sugar. Little appetising as all this was, Nekhludoff hardly
noticed what he was eating; he was occupied with the thought which had
in a moment dispersed the sadness with which he had returned from the
village.
The foreman’s wife kept looking in at the door, whilst the frightened
maid with the earrings brought in the dishes; and the foreman smiled
more and more joyfully, priding himself on his wife’s culinary skill.
After dinner, Nekhludoff succeeded, with some trouble, in making the
foreman sit down. In order to revise his own thoughts, and to express
them to some one, he explained his project of letting the land to the
peasants, and asked the foreman for his opinion. The foreman, smiling
as if he had thought all this himself long ago, and was very pleased
to hear it, did not really understand it at all. This was not because
Nekhludoff did not express himself clearly, but because according to
this project it turned out that Nekhludoff was giving up his own
profit for the profit of others, and the thought that every one is only
concerned about his own profit, to the harm of others, was so deeply
rooted in the foreman’s conceptions that he imagined he did not
understand something when Nekhludoff said that all the income from the
land must be placed to form the communal capital of the peasants.
“Oh, I see; then you, of course, will receive the percentages from that
capital,” said the foreman, brightening up.
“Dear me! no. Don’t you see, I am giving up the land altogether.”
“But then you will not get any income,” said the foreman, smiling no
longer.
“Yes, I am going to give it up.”
The foreman sighed heavily, and then began smiling again. Now he
understood. He understood that Nekhludoff was not quite normal, and
at once began to consider how he himself could profit by Nekhludoff’s
project of giving up the land, and tried to see this project in such a
way that he might reap some advantage from it. But when he saw that this
was impossible he grew sorrowful, and the project ceased to interest
him, and he continued to smile only in order to please the master.
Seeing that the foreman did not understand him, Nekhludoff let him go
and sat down by the window-sill, that was all cut about and inked over,
and began to put his project down on paper.
The sun went down behind the limes, that were covered with fresh green,
and the mosquitoes swarmed in, stinging Nekhludoff. Just as he finished
his notes, he heard the lowing of cattle and the creaking of opening
gates from the village, and the voices of the peasants gathering
together for the meeting. He told the foreman not to call the peasants
up to the office, as he meant to go into the village himself and meet
the men where they would assemble. Having hurriedly drank a cup of tea
offered him by the foreman, Nekhludoff went to the village.
CHAPTER VII.
THE DISINHERITED.
From the crowd assembled in front of the house of the village elder
came the sound of voices; but as soon as Nekhludoff came up the talking
ceased, and all the peasants took off their caps, just as those in
Kousminski had done. The peasants here were of a much poorer class than
those in Kousminski. The men wore shoes made of bark and homespun shirts
and coats. Some had come straight from their work in their shirts and
with bare feet.
Nekhludoff made an effort, and began his speech by telling the peasants
of his intention to give up his land to them altogether. The peasants
were silent, and the expression on their faces did not undergo any
change.
“Because I hold,” said Nekhludoff, “and believe that every one has a
right to the use of the land.”
“That’s certain. That’s so, exactly,” said several voices.
Nekhludoff went on to say that the revenue from the land ought to be
divided among all, and that he would therefore suggest that they
should rent the land at a price fixed by themselves, the rent to form
a communal fund for their own use. Words of approval and agreement were
still to be heard, but the serious faces of the peasants grew still more
serious, and the eyes that had been fixed on the gentleman dropped, as
if they were unwilling to put him to shame by letting him see that every
one had understood his trick, and that no one would be deceived by him.
Nekhludoff spoke clearly, and the peasants were intelligent, but they
did not and could not understand him, for the same reason that the
foreman had so long been unable to understand him.
They were fully convinced that it is natural for every man to consider
his own interest. The experience of many generations had proved to them
that the landlords always considered their own interest to the detriment
of the peasants. Therefore, if a landlord called them to a meeting and
made them some kind of a new offer, it could evidently only be in order
to swindle them more cunningly than before.
“Well, then, what are you willing to rent the land at?” asked
Nekhludoff.
“How can we fix a price? We cannot do it. The land is yours, and the
power is in your hands,” answered some voices from among the crowd.
“Oh, not at all. You will yourselves have the use of the money for
communal purposes.”
“We cannot do it; the commune is one thing, and this is another.”
“Don’t you understand?” said the foreman, with a smile (he had followed
Nekhludoff to the meeting), “the Prince is letting the land to you
for money, and is giving you the money back to form a capital for the
commune.”
“We understand very well,” said a cross, toothless old man, without
raising his eyes. “Something like a bank; we should have to pay at a
fixed time. We do not wish it; it is hard enough as it is, and that
would ruin us completely.”
“That’s no go. We prefer to go on the old way,” began several
dissatisfied, and even rude, voices.
The refusals grew very vehement when Nekhludoff mentioned that he would
draw up an agreement which would have to be signed by him and by them.
“Why sign? We shall go on working as we have done hitherto. What is all
this for? We are ignorant men.”
“We can’t agree, because this sort of thing is not what we have been
used to. As it was, so let it continue to be. Only the seeds we should
like to withdraw.”
This meant that under the present arrangement the seeds had to be
provided by the peasants, and they wanted the landlord to provide them.
“Then am I to understand that you refuse to accept the land?” Nekhludoff
asked, addressing a middle-aged, barefooted peasant, with a tattered
coat, and a bright look on his face, who was holding his worn cap
with his left hand, in a peculiarly straight position, in the same way
soldiers hold theirs when commanded to take them off.
“Just so,” said this peasant, who had evidently not yet rid himself of
the military hypnotism he had been subjected to while serving his time.
“It means that you have sufficient land,” said Nekhludoff.
“No, sir, we have not,” said the ex-soldier, with an artificially
pleased look, carefully holding his tattered cap in front of him, as if
offering it to any one who liked to make use of it.
“Well, anyhow, you’d better think over what I have said.” Nekhludoff
spoke with surprise, and again repeated his offer.
“We have no need to think about it; as we have said, so it will be,”
angrily muttered the morose, toothless old man.
“I shall remain here another day, and if you change your minds, send to
let me know.”
The peasants gave no answer.
So Nekhludoff did not succeed in arriving at any result from this
interview.
“If I might make a remark, Prince,” said the foreman, when they got
home, “you will never come to any agreement with them; they are so
obstinate. At a meeting these people just stick in one place, and there
is no moving them. It is because they are frightened of everything. Why,
these very peasants--say that white-haired one, or the dark one, who
were refusing, are intelligent peasants. When one of them comes to the
office and one makes him sit down to cup of tea it’s like in the Palace
of Wisdom--he is quite diplomatist,” said the foreman, smiling; “he will
consider everything rightly. At a meeting it’s a different man--he keeps
repeating one and the same . . .”
“Well, could not some of the more intelligent men be asked to come
here?” said Nekhludoff. “I would carefully explain it to them.”
“That can be done,” said the smiling foreman.
“Well, then, would you mind calling them here to-morrow?”
“Oh, certainly I will,” said the foreman, and smiled still more
joyfully. “I shall call them to-morrow.”
“Just hear him; he’s not artful, not he,” said a blackhaired peasant,
with an unkempt beard, as he sat jolting from side to side on a well-fed
mare, addressing an old man in a torn coat who rode by his side. The two