RUSSIA AND HER PEOPLE.

A SKETCH.

The outbreak of war in the east of Europe has directed the attention of the English people to Russia, with a pretty generally expressed desire to become more acquainted with a country which may be destined in the future to play a greater part than it has yet done in the history of the world. This desire is a commendable one, for when two nations shew a mutual longing to become better known to each other, the risk of quarrelling is eventually reduced to a minimum, and as in the case of England and France, a free, hearty, and unchecked intercourse removes in a wonderfully short time whole ages of prejudice and ill-will.

Russia is, however, a difficult country to become acquainted with, for the traveller finds himself in an unfamiliar land, peopled by a race of whose thoughts and feelings he knows as little as he does of their language; and the information he receives from the persons he questions is either meagre or untrustworthy.

Her police regulations are vexatious; and on entering an hotel the traveller is bound, under awkward penalties, to give an exhaustive account of himself in a book kept for the purpose, and not only to enter into intimate relations with the authorities, but to have his mind made up as to his plans, and to purchase a permis de séjour or de voyage for a certain number of days; and this leave must not be exceeded without an authoritative extension of it.

The travelling arrangements for those who choose to use rail or steamer are pleasant, if one does not object to a rather oppressive atmosphere in the carriages, for during the greater part of the year the Russian's chief idea is to protect himself against the inclement climate; and as he keeps the windows and doors of the public conveyances hermetically closed, involuntary contact with him becomes anything but agreeable. But if the traveller wishes to gain an intimate acquaintance with Russia, and to see what is the real life of the people apart from towns and highways, he must be prepared to take many a long and tedious journey in a kind of lumbering cradle on wheels, or peasant's springless cart; for in some vehicle of this kind he will have to be bumped and jolted the livelong day, plagued with dust and heat in the summer, and in winter liable to frost-bite and snow-blindness; while he will probably be unable to get any food beyond what he carries with him except black bread, pickled cucumbers, and sometimes eggs. He will also have to sleep at night in fusty rooms, which are often without beds, and are almost invariably teeming with insects.

The northern portion of Russia consists chiefly of forest-land and morass, plentifully supplied with water, and broken up by numerous patches of cultivation; and the villages are generally composed of gray huts built on each side of a straight road which at times becomes a river of mud.

The big white church with its fine pear-shaped cupolas rising out of a bright green roof; the meadow in the foreground, through which meanders a sluggish stream; the whitewashed manor-house, with a verandah in front, standing on a bit of rising ground, and half concealed by a cluster of old rich-coloured pines: none of these details are beautiful in themselves, but all combine to form a very pleasant picture when seen from a distance, especially in the soft evening twilight. Every little household in these villages is a kind of primitive labour association, the members of which have all things in common, and submit to the arbitrary will of the Khosain or head of the family; while the wife of the Russian peasant is a very unromantic style of female, with very little sentiment in her otherwise kindly nature; but she manages to bring up her children on what is the veriest pittance of a wage, in a manner that would do credit to many better situated English peasant-women. In the north-eastern provinces of Russia the peasant has an extremely hard fight to maintain against the hostile forces of Nature, his field-labour sometimes resulting in no gain at all. He makes a living in various ways; and for whole days he wanders through the trackless forests in search of game; or he spends a month away from his home, fishing in some distant lake; or else devotes the summer to deep-sea fishing, bringing home, if he is lucky and frugal, enough money to tide him and his family over the winter.

In the excellent work, 'Russia, by D. Mackenzie Wallace, M.A., 1877,' from which we derive many of our facts, the author presents us with a 'family budget,' which will give a good idea of the expenditure of a peasant household in the far north. Its income during a tolerably prosperous year was L.12, 5s., chiefly obtained from the sale of game and fish. The expenditure was L.7, spent on ryemeal (2240 pounds), to supply the deficit of the harvest; L.3 on clothes, tackle, and ammunition; and L.2, 5s. paid in taxes.

As the peasant family of the old type is a kind of primitive association in which the members have their goods in common, so the village may be described as a primitive association on a larger scale. It has an administrator at its head, whose power is limited by the will of the heads of households themselves, forming a kind of village parliament, which is directly responsible to the state for the due and timely payment of all tithes and taxes. Various are the matters with which this village parliament has to deal, from the election of office-holders and the periodical collection of the taxes up to the redistribution of communal land—a subject which is often the occasion of lively scenes. But when once a decision is given, it is respected as scrupulously as any of the 'Acts' of our own House of Commons.

Thus we see in Russia the 'commune,' or 'mir' as it is called there, in full working order; and in a country ruled over by a despotic monarch it is perhaps the nearest approach to municipal or constitutional institutions that can with safety be attempted. The mir was instituted by the present Emperor or Czar, when he carried out that wise and humane act which will for ever be associated with his name—namely the emancipation of the serfs; and it has scarcely been long enough in existence yet to predict what form it may ultimately assume.

The Russian peasantry are, for the most part, grossly superstitious, and this may be owing in no small degree to the very inferior religious teaching to which they are accustomed; for we are told that they have not the faintest conception of anything like an inner religious life, but are the slaves of mere rites and ceremonies. For example, though a robber will kill a peasant on the highway, such are his religious scruples, that he will not eat a piece of cooked meat which he may find in