94 



RUSSIA - AGRICULTURAL ECONOMY IX GENERAL 



allotted — as that of contriving such a favourable division of the houtor and 

 otroub farms as will bring them nearest to a square form, and of providing 

 a water supply and rights of way. A valuation is undertaken in this case 

 with a view to establishing only the selling price ; and land settlement can 

 therefore be brought to a more advanced stage of completeness. 



The enquiry covered, as has already been said, 4,832 farms on bank 

 and crown lands, 2,566 of them being settlements on hoiitor and otroub 

 land and 2,276 otroub farms of which the owners had remained on their 

 nadiel lands. This property was taken over from the peasants by the fol- 

 lowing stages. 



Year of taking land over 



1907-08 



1909 



191 1 Total 



J 



Number of farms i.ogo 1,851 1,460 431 



Percentage of their whole number I 22.6 38.3 30.2 8.9 



4.832 

 100 



Thus at the time of the enquiry nearly 90 per cent. (22.6 -|- 38.3 + 

 30.2) of all farms had enjoyed the new conditions for more than three years, 

 and almost 60.6 (22.6 + 38.3) for four years and more. The farms alto- 

 gether comprised 77.7 per cent, of arable land, 6.4 per cent, of meadowland 

 and 15.9 per cent, of land otherwise employed. 



Holders to the number of 3,373, or 69.8 per cent, of the whole number, 

 were allotted land held in one piece; 1,377 "^^ 28.5 per cent, received land 

 divided into two pieces, and 82 or 1.7 per cent, land divided into three or more 

 pieces (i). Thus in settling these properties it was not alwa3^s found pos- 

 sible to give all the peasants land iield in one piece ; for the existing division 

 of woods and meadows necessitaxed sometimes the allotment of a second 

 or a third strip to a farm. In addition 37 per cent, of the peasant buyers 

 received a common meadow which comprised 11. 7 per cent, of the land 

 bought. 



The average size of the bought pieces of land was 20 deciatines, their 

 area varying from 8.3 deciatines in Bogoduchov province to 29.4 deciatines 

 in Nikolajevsk. These farms are thus twice as large as those on nadiel 

 land, a fact which must of course be carefully kept in mind if a comparison 

 between the farms of the two classes be made. 



The area of the leaseholds of farmers was equivalent to 32.3 per cent, of 

 their holdings of crown and bank lands, and therefore stood to these in much 

 the same proportion as did the leaseholds of the other peasant holders to 

 their nadiel land, the percentage in the latter case being 34.7 per cent. 

 (29.6 per cent, before the land settlement). Even in a province so rich iu 

 land as Nikolajevsk, where the average holding attached to a homestead is 



(i) The site of the homestead was when separated from the land of the settlement reckoned 

 as a separate strip. 



