It would be idle to criticise the Russian financial system from the standpoint of justice in taxation. The law of self-preservation is the first law of all being. To cover her nine hundred million budget, official Russia has got simply to take money wherever it can be found. Now where can it be found in Russia? The State can tax either the producer or the consumer, or both. Where is the producer to be sought for purposes of taxation? Is it in industry, which is being fostered by means of bounties and prohibitive tariffs? Is it the noble landlord, for whom State mortgage banks are established, and State lotteries issued, whose _solo_ notes are discounted by the State Bank, etc? Then there remains none but the peasant to pay the taxes. Should on the other hand the consumer be taxed, then again it is the 80 per cent. peasants who must pay the major part of the indirect taxes.[10] In a word, whether the burden weigh upon producer or consumer, it must needs be the Russian peasant to whom will fall the lion’s share--in paying the taxes. And truly the peasantry, like the “burghers,” are designated as a “taxable order,” but the burghers are too few to cut any figure as compared with the peasant. What follows? A great sensation was produced in 1877 by a book on Russian taxation by Prof J. E. Janson, of the University of St. Petersburg.[11] On the strength of the _Reports of the Commission of Inquiry into the Condition of Agriculture in Russia_, 1872, and of the _Proceedings of the Commission on Taxation_, he brought to light the startling fact that the amount of taxes paid by the peasant toward 1872 considerably exceeded the net income of his land.[12] This means that it did not pay for the peasant to own land, since he had to cover a part of the taxes from his wages, while, by deserting his plot, he would enjoy the whole amount of his wages with the exception of a small poll tax. And indeed many a peasant would be glad to run away from his farm, if he was only permitted to do so. But the fulfilment of the peasant’s obligation toward the State was secured by the curtailment of his personal liberty. In case of arrears he would get no passport, and no one is allowed in Russia to go farther from home than 30 _versts_ (about 20 miles) without a passport, under penalty of being imprisoned and forwarded home by _étape_. Should, however, the peasant renounce his right of locomotion, then public sale of his homestead and personal effects, and corporal punishment[13] inevitably follow arrears in the payment of taxes. Moreover all the members of the community are responsible, jointly and severally, for the exact payment of the taxes assessed upon the community as a whole. Therefore wherever, and so long as, the taxes exceed the rent brought in by the land[14] the ancestral tenet of communal supremacy is emphatically observed, and the most scrupulous justice and equality are maintained in the distribution of the land.