600 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



the differentiation of the different qualities of land. After that the 

 tracts are laid out, each one as nearly as possible approaching a square, 

 some perhaps entirely of plough land, some combining plough land with 

 pasture and woods. The peasants who are to receive tracts of exactly 

 equal value often draw lots for them. The assignment of other tracts is 

 ordinarily made by mutual agreement. 



It is difficult to comprehend what a vast amount of labor is involved 

 in these surveys. In the single year of 1912 nearly 9,000,000 acres 

 passed under the measuring-chain. More than five thousand surveyors 

 are employed and paid by the government. The commissioners in 

 charge of the so-called new land arrangements number seven thousand. 



Well laid-out tracts of land are not, however, an end in themselves. 

 They are simply the requisite for scientific farming that will yield the 

 largest returns. The peasants of Eussia must be taught how to manage 

 their soil to the best advantage. This instruction is being given them. 

 Agricultural experts have been stationed throughout the country to teach 

 the mujil's by counsel and example how to dress and till their fields, what 

 crop to plant. The number of these experts in the employment of both 

 the government and the zemstva increased from 2,541 in 1909 to 5,185 

 in 1911. Many model farms and testing-fields have been established to 

 make plainly evident the concrete results of better agricultural meth- 

 ods. The experimental stations increased from seventy in 1907 to two 

 hundred and ten in 1911. I can speak from personal observation of one 

 in the province of Samara. It is in charge of a gentleman who studied 

 agronomy for two years in the United States and is excellently man- 

 aged. Much should be said in praise of the work done by the zemstva. 

 That at Kineshma is engaged in a great variety of admirable activities 

 all looking toward the welfare of the peasant. I need only mention as 

 apropos of agricultural progress the placing of stallions where they will 

 help toward breeding finer horses and the furnishing at little more than 

 cost price of excellent seed and farm machinery of every kind practica- 

 ble and desirable in that part of Eussia. Many other zemstva are en- 

 gaged in the same work. Indeed these district and provincial councils 

 were the first to conceive the idea of teaching the peasants how to im- 

 prove their methods of cultivating the soil. That was twenty years ago, 

 more or less; now the government is co-operating with them and added 

 stimulus and strength have brought corresponding results. 



The new land policy of Eussia is scarcely known to the world at 

 large. Considering its magnitude and importance very little in the 

 way of a careful exposition of it has been written. Yet it has to do with 

 more than 100,000,000 people and with an area almost equal to the rest 

 of Europe. It endeavors to change in a decade or two the habits, cus- 

 toms, ideas and ideals of centuries. While the reforms of Peter the 

 Great were limited almost entirely to the upper classes, this concerns 



