62 SIBERIA 



or 14s. to 2 IS. per month. In times of famine 

 it barely pays to keep cows, but in ordinary seasons, 

 when food is plentiful, after deducting 7s. 6d. to 

 8s. 6d. per month for grazing, the peasant cattle- 

 breeder is able to show a profit of from 6s. 6d. to 

 I2S. 6d. per month on each cow. 



There are, however, peasants who, for one reason 

 or another, refuse to sell their milk or to turn jt 

 into butter. The owner of a farm not far from 

 the station of Tagai was asked by a Danish friend 

 why he did not sell the milk from his three hundred 

 cows to the neighbouring dairy. He replied that 

 his grandfather and his father had not sold milk 

 before him and that he saw no reason why he should 

 do so ; he was sure the Lord would not like it. 

 This is only one of a large number of similar cases 

 and enables one to imagine how great the output 

 will be when the peasantry are convinced that there 

 is no wrong in selling their milk, but rather that it 

 is to their advantage to do so. 



It is only two years since the farmers of the 

 Altai spoke of the separator as the " devil " and 

 blamed it as the cause of the famine. It had so 

 happened that the year in which the dairies were 

 opened and separators introduced was also the first 

 of the three years of famine. Towards the end of 

 that time the peasants broke into the creameries, 

 and, having captured the separators, threw them into 

 the nearest river or pond. Several of the Danish 

 dairy-men were obliged to defend their creameries 

 at the muzzle of the revolver. As is so often the 

 case, a coincidence helped to convince the peasants 

 of the justice of their accusations, for the year after 

 the crusade against the separators the harvest showed 

 a marked improvement. This is one of the factors 

 that has militated against the otherwise inevitable 

 large increase in the quantity of butter produced, i* 



