[112] Gleb Oospensky stood alone in his skepticism, opposing his ironical smile to the universal illusion. With his perfect knowledge of the peasantry, and his extraordinary artistic talent that penetrated to the very heart of the phenomena, he did not fail to see that individualism had become the basis of economic relations, not only as between the usurer and the debtor, but among the peasants at large.--_Cf._ his _Casting in one mould (Ravnenie pod odno), Russkaya Mysl_, January, 1882. [113] In the _Reports for the gubernia of Ryazañ_, column 36 of the General Table, states “the area of land held in property by every 10 shareholders of the communal land,” and column 42, the respective data with regard to lease. The figures have no practical value unless it is assumed that all members of the community have their shares in the land acquired in property, or held under lease. In reality, however, the contrary is the case. [114] +-------------------------+--------------+--------------+--------------+ | | Zadonsk. | Korotoyak. |Nizhnedevitsk.| | Classes. +-------+------+-------+------+-------+------+ | | House-| Per | House-| Per | House-| Per | | | holds.| cent.| holds.| cent.| holds.| cent.| +-------------------------+-------+------+-------+------+-------+------+ |Employers | 609 | 4 | 829 | 4 | 1067 | 5 | |Employees (farm | | | | | | | | laborers engaged | | | | | | | | yearly or per season) | 2733 | 17 | 1891 | 9 | 2313 | 12 | +-------------------------+-------+------+-------+------+-------+------+ |Total peasant population | 15704 | 100 | 20282 | 100 | 20072 | 100 | +-------------------------+-------+------+-------+------+-------+------+ [115] Households with 2 and those with 3 horses are counted together in the tables; yet given the number of horses, the membership of every group, is found by solving two equations with two unknown quantities. [116] There are, all told, 103 households of traders who do not work on their farm, _i. e._, 8 per cent. of all the traders, or 0.5 per cent. of the total peasant population of the district of Korotoyak. [117] We find among the traders a large minority whose farms do not exceed the average; still the lack of communal land is made up by the greater development of tenure, as shown in the following table: