Soil is a factor. If a peasant has only one dessiatine of ground, as is the case with thousands of peasants in the interior in governments like Saratoff and Voronezh, it is quite impossible for him to keep busy the year through. Especially if he has no knowledge of modern agriculture, as most of them have not. There are thousands of muzhiks who have not yet heard of intensive cultivation, who know nothing of the advantage of rotating crops, and who use wooden ploughs because they have always used wooden ploughs, or have not the money to buy iron implements when they learn that such exist in the world. Russia is not equally fertile throughout. In some of the districts where an annual famine is recurrent, one finds soil which should be rich and productive. It lacks only water, which could be managed by irrigation. But the government has never taken large steps to solve this difficulty. So the soil is subjected to abuse by peasants who know no better. Then when the crops become meager, the peasants are reduced to starvation. But the great point of all is that it is less than half a century since the shackles of bondage fell from them. Surely not one generation nor two must pass before these recent slaves shall be judged by the side of men who have been free for centuries. Under serfdom the obligatory duties of peasants were vague, ill-defined chores. And even these were prescribed by some one else--some one who said when it was time to cut wood for the master, when it was time to sow, and when it was time to reap. The problem of adjustment is only a little less real and formidable to these people than it was to the American negro-slaves, and the differences of opinion in Russia to-day are quite as great in regard to the relative advantages of the present condition as compared to serfdom, as in America in regard to the welfare of the negro now and before the war. But one thing I have noticed: no muzhik ever desires to return to serfdom. The twinkle in his eye is full enough of intelligence when this question is put to him. The muzhik is rarely indiscreet in his talk. This characteristic is noted by most travelers in Russia, and it is surely true. Not infrequently a man who has been talking most intelligently will give an answer to some simple question which is perfectly inane. He has suddenly become suspicious. So he shrewdly turns you so completely off the track that, metaphorically, you are ditched. This seems to be an instinctive ruse.