RUSSIA BEHIND THE VEIL.
Russian Life in Town and Country. By Francis H. E. Palmer. With 15 Illustrations. (George Newnes. 3s. 6d.)—The out- ward humility with which Mr. Palmer has clothed his studies of Russian life in town and country must not be taken as a fair measure of the importance and interest of his matter. The novels of Turgenev and Tolstoy have made the English public familiar with many aspects of Russian life. Turgenev has taught us to sympathise with the devotion of the revolutionary class, and also to realise to the full the futility of its ideals; Tolstoy, more particularly to seize the contrast between the older tradition and civilisation of the landed nobility and the new civilisation of St. Petersburg and French fashions. Mr. Palmer takes us behind the scenes and shows us how intimate is the connection between the two worlds. "Nearly every Russian, whether a more or less permanent resident in town, or living altogether in the country, is either a landowner or has some family interest in land." The Russian workman, though he may generally live and work in towne, is most often of peasant origin, owning a peasant holding which the law will not permit him to sell ; and when work is slack in the cities, he goes home to his village and lives on his land. The shopkeeper and the shopkeeper's assistant, the wealthy and educated banker, are peasants also, though they hide the fact skilfully and carefully: ' The Russian noble whom you meet in the most fashionable society, who is educated, cosmopolitan, up-to•date, who talks art and literature and Court gossip, and never alludes to country life, has his estate far away in the provinces, where he is obliged by economic necessities to spend a good half of the year. But he is ashamed of his country life, and his silence about it expresses the corrupt bias of the modern Russian mind. Yet it is the Russia of the provinces that is the real Russia ; the wealth that the nobles spend in the cities is made on their estates, and the grit of the Russian character is the outcome of the life of practical adminis- tration the nobles spend during the summer months when they are away from the towns. It is in this country life that English students of the Russian social system find the elements most congenial to our own habits and traditions. But there is one element, omnipresent and apparently indigenous in Russian character and custom, which in England does not come naturally. Everywhere the principles of association and organisation dominate life. The Russian hates his land and is ashamed of it. But he only pretends to run away from it. When the right time comes, the time when the long frost breaks and summer leaps into sudden luxuriant life, the proprietor goes home as a matter of course and, with his whole family, sets to work to turn all the possibilities of the roil to the best account. Where there are several daughters, it is usual for each to undertake the super- vision of a special department of indastry,—one will govern the dairy, another the fruit-drying, another the preparation of the fermented cabbage on which the workpeople chiefly live through the winter, another will see to the making of fruit wines. All that is necessary for the household to consume during the winter must be prepared and laid in during the summer. And over and above the provision for home consumption there is much produced for the market, for the Russian estate is not chiefly for pleasure— it is a source of profit, the raw material out of which the owner's income is /made. The working hours of the Russian peasant are sixteen in the day, and the masters and mistresses work with them all the time. "In this long summer day there is but little time for family intercourse. Even meals must be taken on the wing. The head of the household is very probably driving over the estate, for there is much that demands his careful and incessant supervision, if he is not wealthy enough to delegate these duties to a land agent. His elder. daughters have very likely asked for their meals to be sent to them, if there is urgent work to be seen to that they dare not leave in in- experienced hands. The grown-up sons are probably far away, railway or mining engineers, or holding some Government appointment perhaps in Turkestan or Siberia. The younger sons would be still grinding at College. The younger children, their governess, and sometimes the Khazyaeeka herself, are frequently the only members of the family to assemble in the deserted dining-room during the working hours." The household is im- mense, and the relations between masters and servants are primitive and pretty. Girls are carefully educated to be not only good housewives but able industrial chiefs; and where there are
no daughters the several departments of estate management make professional openings for independent women. The position of the country priests is peculiar. Every priest is obliged to marry, and until quite lately the sons of priests were forbidden to under- take secular employment. The result is a separate caste, held in contempt by both peasantry and nobles. And this condition of the priesthood curiously colours University life. When the Uni- versities were thrown open to all classes, a very large number of
bourses were founded by the Emperor Alexander II. to help poor
students. Private persons followed the Royal example, and the result is that the Universities are flooded by very poor students, some of course coming of the humblest class, but a large majority being the sons of priests striving to escape by education from the stigma of their caste. It is impossible even to attempt to touch upon all the aspects of Russian life described by Mr. Palmer. _But we must heartily recommend his book. It is full of picturesque as well as practical detail, has a fair amount of statistics, and ex- plains the origins as well as the tendencies of the conditions it describes.
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