- Project Runeberg -  In the Land of Tolstoi /
259

(1897) [MARC] Author: Jonas Jonsson Stadling Translator: Will Reason With: Gerda Tirén, Johan Tirén - Tema: Russia
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property. The intellectual conception of land to be found among
economists of every school, as the source of all material, without
which no one can produce anything whatever, and which no one
has produced, is with the mushik a deep-rooted moral conviction.
It is not “my land” in his mouth, but “our land,” and this
refers not only to his own holding, the communal land, and
what is rented from landlords, but also that on which he
works for a master. Centuries of slavery, during which both
they and the land became the private property of the great
lords, could not beget in them any other idea than that private
ownership of land was a mere accident of unrighteousness,
destined, with other unnatural conditions, to pass away when
the true state of things should become known to the “little
father” in St. Petersburg. “We are yours, but the land is
ours” (mi vashi, zemlja nasha), they said to their masters. The
only ownership, in their eyes, is that of the actual cultivator,
and he has no rights in it but that of cultivation.

Under serfdom it was the function of the mir to allot the
lands held for their own use under the lords. This, of course,
did not apply to the “barskije,” or personal slaves, but to
the serfs on the land, who in this respect occupied a position
somewhat analogous to the English villani. After the abolition
the mir became responsible as a whole to the Government for
the regular payment of the redemption money, as explained in
a former chapter. It then became its duty to allot the land to
the several members, who received their share, and with it the
proportional liabilities. The adult working male formed the
unit of calculation, but if in a household the working power
was increased by the presence of a number of women or boys
able to assist, this was taken into account. The division was
revised yearly, and any alteration of conditions allowed for.
This is still the practice in connection with the lands thus held
in common.

The jurisdiction of the mir is far-reaching, embracing all
civil and a great many criminal matters. Ten village judges
are elected by the volost, or group of villages; these must all be
members of some mir or other in the group, and they decide all
matters by their sense of right, without law-books, rules, or any

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