I remember that during the entire period of my unsuccessful efforts at
helping the inhabitants of the city, I presented to myself the aspect of
a man who should attempt to drag another man out of a swamp while he
himself was standing on the same unstable ground. Every attempt of mine
had made me conscious of the untrustworthy character of the soil on which
I stood. I felt that I was in the swamp myself, but this consciousness
did not cause me to look more narrowly at my own feet, in order to learn
upon what I was standing; I kept on seeking some external means, outside
myself, of helping the existing evil.
I then felt that my life was bad, and that it was impossible to live in
that manner. But from the fact that my life was bad, and that it was
impossible to live in that manner, I did not draw the very simple and
clear deduction that it was necessary to amend my life and to live
better, but I knew the terrible deduction that in order to live well
myself, I must needs reform the lives of others; and so I began to reform
the lives of others. I lived in the city, and I wished to reform the
lives of those who lived in the city; but I soon became convinced that
this I could not by any possibility accomplish, and I began to meditate
on the inherent characteristics of city life and city poverty.
"What are city life and city poverty? Why, when I am living in the city,
cannot I help the city poor?"
I asked myself. I answered myself that I could not do any thing for
them, in the first place, because there were too many of them here in one
spot; in the second place, because all the poor people here were entirely
different from the country poor. Why were there so many of them here?
and in what did their peculiarity, as opposed to the country poor,
consist? There was one and the same answer to both questions. There
were a great many of them here, because here all those people who have no
means of subsistence in the country collect around the rich; and their
peculiarity lies in this, that they are not people who have come from the
country to support themselves in the city (if there are any city paupers,
those who have been born here, and whose fathers and grandfathers were
born here, then those fathers and grandfathers came hither for the
purpose of earning their livelihood). What is the meaning of this: _to
earn one's livelihood in the city_? In the words "to earn one's
livelihood in the city," there is something strange, resembling a jest,
when you reflect on their significance. How is it that people go from
the country,--that is to say, from the places where there are forests,
meadows, grain, and cattle, where all the wealth of the earth lies,--to
earn their livelihood in a place where there are neither trees, nor
grass, nor even land, and only stones and dust? What is the significance
of the words "to earn a livelihood in the city," which are in such
constant use, both by those who earn the livelihood, and by those who
furnish it, as though it were something perfectly clear and
comprehensible?
I recall the hundreds and thousands of city people, both those who live
well and the needy, with whom I have conversed on the reason why they
came hither: and all without exception said, that they had come from the
country to earn their living; that in Moscow, where people neither sow
nor reap,--that in Moscow there is plenty of every thing, and that,
therefore, it is only in Moscow that they can earn the money which they
require in the country for bread and a cottage and a horse, and articles
of prime necessity. But assuredly, in the country lies the source of all
riches; there only is real wealth,--bread, and forests, and horses, and
every thing. And why, above all, take away from the country that which
dwellers in the country need,--flour, oats, horses, and cattle?
Hundreds of times did I discuss this matter with peasants living in town;
and from my discussions with them, and from my observations, it has been
made apparent to me, that the congregation of country people in the city
is partly indispensable because they cannot otherwise support themselves,
partly voluntary, and that they are attracted to the city by the
temptations of the city.
It is true, that the position of the peasant is such that, for the
satisfaction of his demands made on him in the country, he cannot
extricate himself otherwise than by selling the grain and the cattle
which he knows will be indispensable to him; and he is forced, whether he
will or no, to go to the city in order there to win back his bread. But
it is also true, that the luxury of city life, and the comparative ease
with which money is there to be earned, attract him thither; and under
the pretext of gaining his living in the town, he betakes himself thither
in order that he may have lighter work, better food, and drink tea three
times a day, and dress well, and even lead a drunken and dissolute life.
The cause of both is identical,--the transfer of the riches of the
producers into the hands of non-producers, and the accumulation of wealth
in the cities. And, in point of fact, when autumn has come, all wealth
is collected in the country. And instantly there arise demands for
taxes, recruits, the temptations of vodka, weddings, festivals; petty
pedlers make their rounds through the villages, and all sorts of other
temptations crop up; and by this road, or, if not, by some other, wealth
of the most varied description--vegetables, calves, cows, horses, pigs,
chickens, eggs, butter, hemp, flax, rye, oats, buckwheat, pease,
hempseed, and flaxseed--all passes into the hands of strangers, is
carried off to the towns, and thence to the capitals. The countryman is
obliged to surrender all this to satisfy the demands that are made upon
him, and temptations; and, having parted with his wealth, he is left with
an insufficiency, and he is forced to go whither his wealth has been
carried and there he tries, in part, to obtain the money which he
requires for his first needs in the country, and in part, being himself
led away by the blandishments of the city, he enjoys, in company with
others, the wealth that has there accumulated. Everywhere, throughout
the whole of Russia,--yes, and not in Russia alone, I think, but
throughout the whole world,--the same thing goes on. The wealth of the
rustic producers passes into the hands of traders, landed proprietors,
officials, and factory-owners; and the people who receive this wealth
wish to enjoy it. But it is only in the city that they can derive full
enjoyment from this wealth. In the country, in the first place, it is
difficult to satisfy all the requirements of rich people, on account of
the sparseness of the population; banks, shops, hotels, every sort of
artisan, and all sorts of social diversions, do not exist there. In the
second place, one of the chief pleasures procured by wealth--vanity, the
desire to astonish and outshine other people--is difficult to satisfy in
the country; and this, again, on account of the lack of inhabitants. In
the country, there is no one to appreciate elegance, no one to be
astonished. Whatever adornments in the way of pictures and bronzes the
dweller in the country may procure for his house, whatever equipages and
toilets he may provide, there is no one to see them and envy them, and
the peasants cannot judge of them. [And, in the third place, luxury is
even disagreeable and dangerous in the country for the man possessed of a
conscience and fear. It is an awkward and delicate matter, in the
country, to have baths of milk, or to feed your puppies on it, when
directly beside you there are children who have no milk; it is an awkward
and delicate matter to build pavilions and gardens in the midst of people
who live in cots banked up with dung, which they have no means of
warming. In the country there is no one to keep the stupid peasants in
order, and in their lack of cultivation they might disarrange all this.]
{94}
And accordingly rich people congregate, and join themselves to other rich
people with similar requirements, in the city, where the gratification of
every luxurious taste is carefully protected by a numerous police force.
Well-rooted inhabitants of the city of this sort, are the governmental
officials; every description of artisan and professional man has sprung
up around them, and with them the wealthy join their forces. All that a
rich man has to do there is to take a fancy to a thing, and he can get
it. It is also more agreeable for a rich man to live there, because
there he can gratify his vanity; there is some one with whom he can vie
in luxury; there is some one to astonish, and there is some one to
outshine. But the principal reason why it is more comfortable in the
city for a rich man is that formerly, in the country, his luxury made him
awkward and uneasy; while now, on the contrary, it would be awkward for
him not to live luxuriously, not to live like all his peers around him.
That which seemed dreadful and awkward in the country, here appears to be
just as it should be. [Rich people congregate in the city; and there,
under the protection of the authorities, they calmly demand every thing
that is brought thither from the country. And the countryman is, in some
measure, compelled to go thither, where this uninterrupted festival of
the wealthy which demands all that is taken from him is in progress, in
order to feed upon the crumbs which fall from the tables of the rich; and
partly, also, because, when he beholds the care-free, luxurious life,
approved and protected by everybody, he himself becomes desirous of
regulating his life in such a way as to work as little as possible, and
to make as much use as possible of the labors of others.
And so he betakes himself to the city, and finds employment about the
wealthy, endeavoring, by every means in his power, to entice from them
that which he is in need of, and conforming to all those conditions which
the wealthy impose upon him, he assists in the gratification of all their
whims; he serves the rich man in the bath and in the inn, and as
cab-driver and prostitute, and he makes for him equipages, toys, and
fashions; and he gradually learns from the rich man to live in the same
manner as the latter, not by labor, but by divers tricks, getting away
from others the wealth which they have heaped together; and he becomes
corrupt, and goes to destruction. And this colony, demoralized by city
wealth, constitutes that city pauperism which I desired to aid and could
not.
All that is necessary, in fact, is for us to reflect on the condition of
these inhabitants of the country, who have removed to the city in order
to earn their bread or their taxes,--when they behold, everywhere around
them, thousands squandered madly, and hundreds won by the easiest
possible means; when they themselves are forced by heavy toil to earn
kopeks,--and we shall be amazed that all these people should remain
working people, and that they do not all of them take to an easier method
of getting gain,--by trading, peddling, acting as middlemen, begging,
vice, rascality, and even robbery. Why, we, the participants in that
never-ceasing orgy which goes on in town, can become so accustomed to our
life, that it seems to us perfectly natural to dwell alone in five huge
apartments, heated by a quantity of beech logs sufficient to cook the
food for and to warm twenty families; to drive half a verst with two
trotters and two men-servants; to cover the polished wood floor with
rugs; and to spend, I will not say, on a ball, five or ten thousand
rubles, and twenty-five thousand on a Christmas-tree. But a man who is
in need of ten rubles to buy bread for his family, or whose last sheep
has been seized for a tax-debt of seven rubles, and who cannot raise
those rubles by hard labor, cannot grow accustomed to this. We think
that all this appears natural to poor people there are even some
ingenuous persons who say in all seriousness, that the poor are very
grateful to us for supporting them by this luxury.] {96}
But poor people are not devoid of human understanding simply because they
are poor, and they judge precisely as we do. As the first thought that
occurs to us on hearing that such and such a man has gambled away or
squandered ten or twenty thousand rubles, is: "What a foolish and
worthless fellow he is to uselessly squander so much money! and what a
good use I could have made of that money in a building which I have long
been in need of, for the improvement of my estate, and so forth!"--just
so do the poor judge when they behold the wealth which they need, not for
caprices, but for the satisfaction of their actual necessities, of which
they are frequently deprived, flung madly away before their eyes. We
make a very great mistake when we think that the poor can judge thus,
reason thus, and look on indifferently at the luxury which surrounds
them.
They never have acknowledged, and they never will acknowledge, that it
can be just for some people to live always in idleness, and for other
people to fast and toil incessantly; but at first they are amazed and
insulted by this; then they scrutinize it more attentively, and, seeing
that these arrangements are recognized as legitimate, they endeavor to
free themselves from toil, and to take part in the idleness. Some
succeed in this, and they become just such carousers themselves; others
gradually prepare themselves for this state; others still fail, and do
not attain their goal, and, having lost the habit of work, they fill up
the disorderly houses and the night-lodging houses.
Two years ago, we took from the country a peasant boy to wait on table.
For some reason, he did not get on well with the footman, and he was sent
away: he entered the service of a merchant, won the favor of his master,
and now he goes about with a vest and a watch-chain, and dandified boots.
In his place, we took another peasant, a married man: he became a
drunkard, and lost money. We took a third: he took to drunk, and, having
drank up every thing he had, he suffered for a long while from poverty in
the night-lodging house. An old man, the cook, took to drink and fell
sick. Last year a footman who had formerly been a hard drinker, but who
had refrained from liquor for five years in the country, while living in
Moscow without his wife who encouraged him, took to drink again, and
ruined his whole life. A young lad from our village lives with my
brother as a table-servant. His grandfather, a blind old man, came to me
during my sojourn in the country, and asked me to remind this grandson
that he was to send ten rubies for the taxes, otherwise it would be
necessary for him to sell his cow. "He keeps saying, I must dress
decently," said the old man: "well, he has had some shoes made, and
that's all right; but what does he want to set up a watch for?" said the
grandfather, expressing in these words the most senseless supposition
that it was possible to originate. The supposition really was senseless,
if we take into consideration that the old man throughout Lent had eaten
no butter, and that he had no split wood because he could not possibly
pay one ruble and twenty kopeks for it; but it turned out that the old
man's senseless jest was an actual fact. The young fellow came to see me
in a fine black coat, and shoes for which he had paid eight rubles. He
had recently borrowed ten rubles from my brother, and had spent them on
these shoes. And my children, who have known the lad from childhood,
told me that he really considers it indispensable to fit himself out with
a watch. He is a very good boy, but he thinks that people will laugh at
him so long as he has no watch; and a watch is necessary. During the
present year, a chambermaid, a girl of eighteen, entered into a
connection with the coachman in our house. She was discharged. An old
woman, the nurse, with whom I spoke in regard to the unfortunate girl,
reminded me of a girl whom I had forgotten. She too, ten yeans ago,
during a brief stay of ours in Moscow, had become connected with a
footman. She too had been discharged, and she had ended in a disorderly
house, and had died in the hospital before reaching the age of twenty. It
is only necessary to glance about one, to be struck with terror at the
pest which we disseminate directly by our luxurious life among the people
whom we afterwards wish to help, not to mention the factories and
establishments which serve our luxurious tastes.
[And thus, having penetrated into the peculiar character of city poverty,
which I was unable to remedy, I perceived that its prime cause is this,
that I take absolute necessaries from the dwellers in the country, and
carry them all to the city. The second cause is this, that by making use
here, in the city, of what I have collected in the country, I tempt and
lead astray, by my senseless luxury, those country people who come hither
because of me, in order in some way to get back what they have been
deprived of in the country.] {99}