WOMEN OF RUSSIA
In the dawn of recorded history woman on the great plains of eastern
Europe shared the lot of her western sisters. She was purchased into her
husband's family or carried away, she was sometimes only one of his many
wives, she took care of the household and helped him in the field,
participated in his manly sports, accompanied him in his military
expeditions, enjoyed full social freedom, was treated with respect,
ruled the state, and was sometimes burned on the funeral pyre with her
husband's body.
Russian annals have preserved for us a picture of one of the most
wholesome women of early, heathen Russia Princess Olga Igor. The Prince
of Kief, Olga's husband, lost his life while collecting tribute on the
upper Dnieper and left her a widow with a child in her arms. She avenged
her husband's death on his slayers in true heathen fashion. She
destroyed their ambassadors by burying alive some of them and burning
others. She besieged their capital, took it, and laid a heavy tribute on
them. Having thus performed her last duty toward her husband, Olga, as
princess regent, travelled over all her country and made every effort to
introduce a good system of government.
She defined the amount of taxes to be paid by the different provinces,
left her fiscal agents behind her, and established courts of justice.
Before her death Olga visited Constantinople and returned home a
Christian.
To the deep respect for Olga's wisdom a Russian annalist ascribes a
preponderating influence in the introduction of Christianity into Russia
from the Byzantine Empire rather than from Rome. The Christian clergy
immediately began a struggle against polygamy, deeply rooted in the
early Russian society, and endeavored to prevent the excess of parental
authority in the arrangement of marriages against their children's
wishes. Valuable civil rights were secured for women, such as the right
to inherit property and to bequeath it to their children at pleasure.
But together with the praiseworthy efforts of the clergy in regard to
women, there came, too, an undesirable influence. The Greek priests,
full of holy zeal, considered it their sacred duty to combat idolatry in
all its forms, and proscribed all ancient religious and semi-religious
observances as unholy and coming from the evil one, who deluded the
simple-minded and the uncautious into sinful practices and thus led them
to eternal damnation. The clergy put an end to many games and pastimes,
which formerly brought together persons of both sexes, and little by
little the church removed woman from male society. To eastern as well as
to western monks of ascetic aspirations woman was a source of evil, and
therefore had to be kept out of man's way.
[Illustration 5:
_PRINCESS SOPHIA AND THE OLD AND NEW SCHOOL RELIGIONISTS
After the painting by V. G. Peroff._
_The disorderly and unruly standing army of the Russian tsars, the
Strelets, sided with Sophia. Having secured the regency of Russia during
the minority of her brothers, Ivan and Peter, she soon acquired almost
absolute power. Slighting custom and tradition, she lost no opportunity
to appear in public. In the matter of religion, her advanced ideas led
her to support the orthodox or reform party. The conservatives or "old
believers," having challenged to a discussion the orthodox prelates,
Sophia convened a meeting, to be held in the Palace of Facets, on which
occasion she presided. The discussion was of such a stormy character
that violence was used, and the leader of the "old believers," Nikita
was afterward executed by order of the empress._]
During the epoch of troubles and confusion which followed the years
marked by the introduction of Christianity, the woman of the higher
class of Russians became more and more isolated from her former
surroundings. The Tartar invasion and domination only contributed to the
separatist tendencies in Russian society. Formally, woman retained her
old right of being her husband's friend, companion, and adviser; she
owned property in her own name, disposed of her dower at will, and was
entitled to a share of her husband's property on his death. But as a
matter of fact, the Russian woman was her husband's slave. She was
excluded from that part of the house where her husband received his men
friends.
Domostroi, the Russian domestic code, compiled in the sixteenth century
confines woman to the kitchen and to purely domestic occupations.
Woman's virtues are said to lie in silence and humility. She was to
speak only when spoken to. She was to ask questions and advice with
utmost deference. She was to have no secrets from her husband. Her
husband's will was her law and her guide in life. Her aim in life was to
save her soul, to please God and her husband. Her husband could even
apply the rod to her in case of a serious transgression on her part. In
her harem-like seclusion, Russian woman acquired a taste for luxury in
apparel and house decoration and developed many varieties of fine
handiwork.
This seclusion of woman and her separation from her husband's company
had as their result a general coarsening of social tastes. Men amused
themselves with bear hunting, pugilism, and other rough sports. When
engagements were arranged between persons totally unacquainted with each
other, when a wife was purchased, when another girl was substituted in
the place of the one bargained for, and when the engaged parties could
not see each other until the very wedding ceremony, marriages were often
a failure, and led to a mutual deceit, secret immorality, and not
infrequently to crime. Even one of the most enlightened Russian writers
and educators of the seventeenth century, Simen Polotski, advised that
woman should be kept like a slave or a wild beast. We read of many cases
where men chastised their wives with heavy whips.
One Russian woman is reported to have frequently cried over the fact
that her husband, a German by birth, would not whip her, which to her
was a sign of indifference. Men got rid of their wives by sending them
to a convent, or by poison. The code of Alexis Mikhailovich does not
even punish a husband for disposing of his wife in a criminal way. But
if a woman destroyed her husband, she was buried in the ground up to her
neck, and everybody had a right to abuse her until she died.
There was no education to be had for woman, and she grew up, lived, and
died in ignorance and superstition. The Russian Middle Ages have left to
posterity the memory of only one woman who took an active part in
history Martha Boretskaia, the wealthy _posadnitsa_ (mayoress) of
Novgorod the Great. The steady growth of the power of the Moscow princes
in the fifteenth century began to be dangerous to the independence of
the ancient northern republic. The intelligent, energetic, and
freedom-loving Martha became on her husband's death an active leader of
a powerful political party advocating union with Poland, a union which
was to save Novgorod from being subjugated by Moscow. Conscious of her
power, Martha often offended the Moscow representative in Novgorod, and
was slow to give satisfaction to Ivan III., whose life work it was to
unite all Russia under the sovereignty of Moscow and to throw off the
Tartar yoke.
In 1471 there was a stormy town meeting in Novgorod in connection with
the election of a Moscow partisan to the office of the Archbishop of
Novgorod. The adherents of Martha found themselves in a majority. An
embassy was immediately sent to the King of Poland, offering him the
supreme power over Novgorod if he consented to rule according to the
ancient liberties of the republic. Ivan III. tried to conciliate the
city by entreaties, but these failing with the proud posadnitsa, he
moved his army toward Novgorod, defeated the troops of the republic in
several engagements, laid a tribute on the conquered, exacted a promise
to discontinue all relations with Poland and Lithuania, and extorted an
oath from the Novgorodians by which they recognized him as their supreme
judge. Ivan did not dare as yet to meddle with Novgorod's local
self-government and political freedom. But Martha could not be subdued,
and soon the parties renewed their struggle. The sympathizers of Moscow
were persecuted and complained to Ivan. Under a flimsy pretext Ivan
again led his army to Novgorod, was admitted into the city without
resistance, and joined it to his domain. Martha was arrested and exiled
to a convent in Nizhni-Novgorod. Her spirited though unsuccessful
resistance to the growing power of Moscow gave her a lasting name in
Russian history. With the accession of the Romanoffs to the throne a new
and more promising era began for the Russian woman. Matveyeff, the
favorite _boyar_ of Alexis Mikhailovich, was an admirer of the culture
of western Europe and treated the women of his family with marked
consideration, freely admitting them into the society of his friends.
His clever ward, Natalia Kirillovna Naryshkina, attracted the widowed
tsar's attention and became tsarina and mother of Peter the Great.
In the palace of Alexis women enjoyed almost modern freedom. They were
allowed to go out of the palace, and to go to the theatre. A daughter of
Alexis by his first wife, Sophia Alexeyevna, received as complete an
education as could be had at that time in Russia. She grew up to be a
woman of unusual intelligence, energy, and ambition, and on her father's
death began a struggle with her stepmother, Natalia Kirillovna, for
political predominance. The disorderly and unruly standing army of the
Russian tsars, the Strelets, sided with Sophia. Having secured the
regency of Russia during the minority of her brothers, Ivan and Peter,
she soon acquired almost absolute power. Slighting custom and tradition,
she lost no opportunity to appear in public. In the matter of religion,
her advanced ideas led her to support the orthodox, or reform, party.
The conservatives, or "old believers," having challenged to a discussion
the orthodox prelates, Sophia convened a meeting, to be held in the
Palace of Facets, on which occasion she presided. The discussion was of
such a stormy character that violence was used, and the leader of the
"old believers," Nikita, was afterward executed by order of the empress.
She made peace with Poland and China. In 1689 Peter decided to rule
independently. The chief of the Strelets, being unable to raise his
troops in defence of Sophia's interests, decided to assassinate Peter.
The plot did not succeed: its instigators lost their lives, and Sophia
was immured in a convent. She caused a revolt of the Strelets during
Peter's travels abroad, but they were again subdued; many of them were
hanged under the very windows of Sophia's retreat. Sophia died in 1704,
leaving the memory of a rare intelligence and an indomitable energy,
overmatched only by that of her great brother.
Peter the Great found the Russian woman a painted doll, hung over with
pretty ornaments and trinkets, eating fattening foods and sleeping all
day long in order to get stout, for stoutness at that time passed for
beauty. Peter forbade the clergy to marry persons against their will,
and required a formal engagement six weeks previous to the wedding, so
as to give persons a chance to become acquainted before they were bound
to each other for life. He introduced public theatres, and compelled
persons of both sexes to attend them. Social intercourse of the sexes,
under modern and civilized restrictions, was forced not only upon the
Russian nobility, but upon the merchant class. Receptions were
compulsory functions; these were attended by both men and women. At
these receptions, and generally in public, Russians, particularly women,
were required to wear western European dress in public. This movement
toward the social emancipation of the Russian woman inaugurated by Peter
found a powerful support and development during the reigns of Peter's
female successors. During the eighteenth century, Russian women were
taking part in all the court revolutions. During that time, too, social
morality was at a low ebb, owing to a lack of moral restraint.
Peter died in 1725. After the weak reign of Anna Ivanovna (1730-1740)
and the unpopular one of her foreign successor, the supreme authority
passed into the hands of Peter's daughter, Elizabeth Petrovna
(1741-1762). She was skilfully kept in the background by the family of
her predecessor, spent all her time in amusements, and apparently took
no interest in state affairs and politics. As Peter's daughter, she was
adored by the people and by Peter's Old Guard, whom she attached to
herself by constant kindness and attentions. She was an embodiment of
unaffected simplicity, warmth, and sunshine, and her apparent
light-heartedness and gayeties put to sleep all suspicion of seeking to
gather the reins of power in her own hands. But on the night of November
25, 1741, after a prayer and a solemn oath never to sign a death
sentence, Elizabeth put on a cuirass, went to the barracks, led the
grenadiers to the palace, had the reigning family and their supporters
arrested, and was proclaimed empress in the morning, amid general
rejoicing.
Though not inheriting all her father's gifts, Elizabeth possessed a high
degree of intelligence and showed much wisdom and insight in the
selection of her assistants in the work of governing Russia. She was
deeply interested in state affairs, and established a special council
whose sessions she often attended. The people called her their "little
mother," and in her soul Elizabeth remained a thorough Russian, though
into her court a splendor equalling that of the French king was
introduced with her accession to the throne. She faithfully adhered to
her father's rule in life to do everything for Russia and through
Russians. The leading positions in all departments of government were
given to Russians, and Elizabeth consented to the appointment of
foreigners even to places of secondary importance only when no Russian
could be found with the necessary qualifications for the office. Peter's
reforms and the work of civilizing Russia by the introduction of western
culture and education were continued by Elizabeth. A new Russian
literature and a higher learning had their birth during Elizabeth's
reign. It is true that her wars weakened Russia, but they gave training
to Russian generals, and prepared the ground for Elizabeth's successors.
The favorites and assistants of the empress were mostly men of ability
and broad aims. They encouraged popular education and native literature,
fought indolence and corruption, which were deeply rooted in the
government, endeavored to do away with the abuses of the provincial
authorities, and to increase the government revenue, not by fresh
taxation, but by developing the natural resources of the country. A
better system of taxation was introduced, and Peter's idea of taking a
census of population from time to time was revived. The burden of the
compulsory service in the army was made lighter. A higher value was set
on the workingman, and capital punishment was entirely dispensed with.
Pioneer settlements were encouraged in the eastern part of European
Russia, beyond the lower Volga. Mines were opened and worked.
Russian commercial caravans began to reach Tashkent. Government banks
were established which lent money to merchants and landowners on easy
terms. A special "commerce commission" was created to look after the
welfare of the trading class. A general government survey put an end to
many territorial disputes among landowners. The internal custom duties
were abolished. A new system of public instruction was being gradually
built up. The first Russian university was founded in Moscow in 1755,
and the Academy of Fine Arts in Saint Petersburg two years later. Two
high schools were established in connection with the university, and
public schools were opened even in Orenburg and in far southern Russia.
Young men were encouraged to enter foreign universities. Efforts were
made to raise the intellectual attainments of the Russian clergy and to
make use of it toward the enlightenment of the people. The national
consciousness awakened. A new literary language took form and shape,
Russian satire began to deride the foibles and the shortcomings of
society. Lomonosoff acquired reputation as a scientist and a man of
letters even in western Europe. A national historian appeared in the
person of Tatishcheff. The first Russian daily paper, the _Moskavskiia
Vedomosti_, was published in 1756, and the first Russian monthly
appeared in the same year.
Elizabeth did not succeed in all her efforts to raise Russia to the
level of her western neighbors. There was much conservatism to overcome.
There were wars to pay for wars which exhausted Russia's resources. But
Elizabeth was preparing the way for her energetic successor, Catharine
II., who always held Peter the Great as an example before her eyes and
who continued his work of reform. During Catharine's reign a woman,
Princess Katerina Romanovna Dashkova, was put at the head of the Russian
Academy of Science. The princess was a phenomenal woman. She was an
accomplished linguist, an enthusiastic reader, an admirer of Bayle,
Montesquieu, Boileau, and Voltaire. She travelled abroad, made the
acquaintance of many great writers and philosophers, and became one of
the most enlightened women of her time. She early manifested a taste for
politics, and Catharine owed her a debt of gratitude in connection with
the revolution which overthrew the unpopular rule of Peter III. (1762).
The most important service, however, was rendered by Princess Dashkova
to her country not in the field of politics, but through her connection
with the academy. It was her aim that arts and science should not be the
monopoly of the academy, but "should be adopted by the whole country,
take root and flourish there." The public lectures established by her in
connection with the academy became very popular and drew large
audiences. She increased the number of fellowships given by the
institution and sent Russian students to Gottingen. A "Translator's
Department" was established which enabled the Russian society to read in
their own tongue the best productions of foreign literature. Several
periodical publications were started under the impulse given by the
princess, and the best Russian writers, even the empress herself, sent
literary contributions to them. One of the most important undertakings
of the academy was the publication of a dictionary of the Russian
language to which the princess copiously contributed. She wrote for
magazines, and translated from foreign languages. Among her works we
have poems in Russian and French, a number of speeches made before the
academy, one comedy, one drama, and interesting memoirs.
The great drawback to the social and intellectual progress of woman in
the Russia of Dashkova's time was the general lack of educational
facilities. In the early Russia only daughters of princes and of the
higher nobility could obtain instruction even in reading and writing,
though the importance of educating women was always appreciated. At the
end of the eleventh century a princess-nun founded a girls' school in
Kief. A Russian metropolitan bishop of the sixteenth century spoke in
his sermons of the value of the education of women. Beginning with the
first tsar of the house of Romanoff, the tsarevas were instructed in
reading, writing, and church music. The six daughters of Alexis
Mikhailovich received a good education. Peter the Great fully
appreciated the importance of schools for women, but did not establish
them. During his reign, however, as during that of Elizabeth, there
began to appear private schools, to which girls were admitted. A ukase
of Catharine II. laid the foundation of an Educational Society for noble
young women, and in connection with it a high school for the daughters
of town residents. The chief aim of Catharine's institution was the
formation of character, the development of good habits, good social
manners, and self-reliance in the pupils. Many other schools were opened
in Catharine's time, not a few of which were under her patronage, to
which children of both sexes and of all social classes were admitted,
though it was considered improper for girls to attend public schools.
Catharine sought to create a "new race" of men, as well as of women, by
offering the latter all possible advantages of education. The policy of
Catharine was dominated by her desire for the aggrandizement of Russia
and the extension of the central rule. One of the most striking results
of her active government is the extraordinary exodus of Kalmuck tribes
in 1771. These people are of Central Asian origin. Their incursions led
them early in the seventeenth century into Russian territory, where they
secured a foothold in the region east of the Volga. Other immigration
followed till the Kalmuck population and power became considerable.
Generally nomadic in their habits, they dwelt in circular felt tents,
and were impatient of government, but about the middle of the eighteenth
century they came into voluntary subjection to Russia. Their splendid
horsemanship and hardy character made the Kalmucks a most valuable
auxiliary force to the Russian army. But Catharine's measures proved
irksome to the independent spirit of some of the tribes, and an immense
number escaped from Russian despotism and resumed subjection to the less
active tyranny of the Chinese ruler.
After Catharine's death, the Empress Maria Teodorovna, wife of Paul I.
(1796-1801), continued her educational work, though abandoning the "new
race" idea, confining herself to more practical problems, and
recognizing the different needs of different classes of children. A
large number of schools was founded by the empress, the management of
which was after her time given in charge to a special department of
government bearing her name. The schools rapidly increased in number,
variety, and character, and gradually the ground was prepared for the
present system of public and high schools for girls, which, under the
auspices of the Department of Education and of the ecclesiastical
educational establishments, are to be found throughout the vast Russian
empire.
Long before public schools existed, and long after they were in
operation, there was another educational agent to which Russian woman
owed most of her accomplishments and to which Russia is indebted for
many of her most accomplished women. This is the private instruction in
the home, which was conducted by French, German, and English governesses
and tutors, when a family could afford them. This method has brought and
is still bringing the culture and the polish of western Europe to
Russia. It has made accomplished linguists of so many Russians, and has
opened to them the treasures of the world's literature.
The field of letters was the first in which Russian women distinguished
themselves. One of the brilliant women of the first half of the
nineteenth century was Princess Zenaide Alexandrovna Volkonskaya, who
devoted herself to literature. Having received a fine education at home,
she spent many years abroad, in Paris, Vienna, and Verona, during the
time of the famous congresses which met there to settle the fate of
kingdoms and empires. Returning home, the princess devoted herself to
the study of Russian antiquities. At one time her studies were treated
with such scorn among her circle in Saint Petersburg that she retired to
the more appreciative atmosphere of Moscow. She was much admired by the
leading men of letters of her time. To the life of the primitive Slavs
she devoted two of her most important works. A poet and a musician, she
wrote cantatas and composed music for them. She spent about one-half of
her life in Rome, where she died, a devout Catholic.
Beginning with the year 1860, women began to appear in the lecture rooms
of Russian universities. The attitude of universities to the presence of
women within their walls was not always the same, but their attendance
was generally discouraged. Finally, a lack of social and political
discretion and tact on the part of some women legally closed the
university doors to all, and Russian women were forced to seek higher
education abroad. A movement was started at home in favor of
establishing schools of higher learning for women, and resulted in the
so-called "higher courses for women" in Saint Petersburg, Moscow, Kasan,
Kief, and Odessa, which were conducted by the university professors of
those cities. The "courses" were not uniformly successful. Those of
Saint Petersburg have shown the greatest strength and vitality, having
been conducted with skill and having met with strong moral and financial
support on the part of Russian society. Professional schools for women,
medical schools, normal schools, and the like, have had a more uniformly
successful career. The status of education for woman is not so advanced
in Russia as it is in some countries, but the future is promising.
About the time of the emancipation of Russian peasants by Alexander II.
(1855-1881), Marko-Vovchok (Maria Alexandrovna Markovich) attracted much
attention by her stories picturing Russian life and advocating the
liberation of the serfs. Among the large number of Russian women who
have acquired reputation in Russian literature, special mention should
be made of Khvoshchinskaya. She received a fine preparatory training at
home; then in 1867 she began to study law in German universities, and
took her doctor's diploma in Leipzig. She spent several years studying
the Common Law of the Southern Slavs, and made several original
contributions to legal literature. In 1885 she began to publish a
magazine, _Severnyi Vestnih_ (The Northern Messenger), which had many
women among its contributors. It remained five years under her editorial
management.
During the nineteenth century many Russian women distinguished
themselves in the field of arts and science. Madame Kochetova may be
mentioned as one of the many gifted actresses. Madame Esipova has
acquired a world-wide reputation as a pianist. Marie Bashkirtseva found
her way to the French Salon, and left to the public a diary vividly
picturing her striking individuality. Born in Southern Russia,
Mademoiselle Bashkirtseva, when ten years old, settled with her family
in Nice. She began at an early age to show her gifted nature, her love
of knowledge and her lofty ambition. When only thirteen, she made out a
programme of her studies, in which were included mathematics, physics,
chemistry, Greek, and Latin. She spoke English, German, and Italian from
her childhood days. French was the language in which she did her
thinking and writing. She, too, was an enthusiastic student of music. In
1877, Mademoiselle Bashkirtseva settled in Paris and began to study
painting. After eleven months' work she received, at a general
competition in her school, a gold medal awarded by Robert-Fleury,
Bouguereau, Lefevre, and others. In 1880, when twenty years of age, her
first picture, _A Young Woman Reading 'La Question du Divorce'_ by
Alexandre Dumas, was admitted to the Salon. Her next picture in the
Salon, _Julian's Studies_, was spoken of by the Parisian press as a work
full of life, with firm touch and warm coloring. Two years later her
_Jean et Jacques_, representing two little schoolboys from the poorer
class of the Parisian population, attracted general attention and was
very highly praised by the press: the picture showed the artist's power,
boldness, and fine insight into the realities of life. In 1884 the
Meeting of Mademoiselle Bashkirtseva occupied the leading place in the
Salon, owing to its excellent delineation of figures, fine presentation
of types, and correctness of detail. That same year the young artist
died of consumption. An exhibition of her pictures made by the society
of French woman artists exhibited the great variety and productiveness
of her talent. Mademoiselle Bashkirtseva left about one hundred and
fifty pictures, sketches, and drawings. Some unfinished studies in
sculpture showed her great talent in that direction also. Her numerous
sketches manifest her warm love of humanity and the great depth of her
powerful talent. The French government purchased the best of
Mademoiselle Bashkirtseva's pictures for a national collection, while
the public throughout the civilized world have read in an abridgment of
the artist's diary the story of her life and of her struggle with
worldly temptations and vanities.
The end of the nineteenth century witnessed the death of a prominent
Russian mathematician, Sofia Vasilievna Kovalevskaya. She, too, received
her preparatory training at home, from foreign governesses and private
tutors, and early showed a taste for mathematics. Her conservative
parents would not allow her to continue her studies away from home, and
in order to obtain her freedom, she married early and went abroad to
study her favorite subject. For two years she attended lectures on
mathematical subjects in Heidelberg, studied in Berlin under
Weierstrass, and, in 1874, at twenty-four years of age, took her
doctor's degree at Gottingen. Seven years later, Madame Kovalevskaya was
elected a member of the Moscow mathematical society. In 1884, after her
husband's death, she received the chair of mathematics at the University
of Stockholm. She soon mastered the Swedish language, and began to
publish her mathematical works and contributions to literature in that
language. In 1888, the Paris Academy of Science awarded to Madame
Kovalevskaya a prize of five thousand francs for her work on the
rotation of a solid body around a stationary point. In the following
year she won fifteen hundred crowns from the Academy of Stockholm by a
similar work. In 1889, two years before her death, she was elected
corresponding member of the Academy of Saint Petersburg.
But mathematics was not the only accomplishment of Madame Kovalevskaya.
She was a woman of great depth of feeling and of keen observation, and
possessed, in a high degree, the ability to picture her inner life in
literary and artistic form. Her personal life did not give her all she
expected from it, and in her _Struggle for Happiness: Two Parallel
Dramas_, she tried to present the fate of a person from two opposite
points of view, how it was and how it might have been. She was a strong
believer in predestination, but at the same time she admitted in human
life the existence of moments when alternatives are presented, the
choice of which will shape human life in accordance with the path taken:
she saw a parallel to her theory in Poincare's work on differential
equations. Madame Kovalevskaya's literary career had just begun to
develop and her contributions to magazines to be universally admired
when pneumonia put an end to her work and to her abundant promise.
The field of the Russian woman's activity is as wide as it is in western
Europe or in America. In some respects there is in Russia less prejudice
against woman's adopting a professional career than is found in more
civilized countries. Women compose the ranks of the teachers in the
public schools throughout Russia. There are many women physicians and
registered minor medical practitioners and trained nurses whose services
are particularly valuable to the Mohammedan female population. Many a
Russian woman wears the uniform of the government telegraph operator.
She has legal right to practise law. She takes part in local government
on the same level as men when there is no one to represent her
interests. She has won her position by her energy and talents as well as
by her moderation, tact, deep earnestness, unselfishness, and readiness
to sacrifice herself for the welfare of her fellow men and women.
In Russia there are several business firms conducted wholly by women.
They once startled the former famous minister of finance, Witte, by
sending him a petition requesting him to allow them to do business on
their own account in the stock exchange instead of employing brokers.
The minister asked for time to consider the petition.
The change which has taken place in the condition of the woman of the
well-to-do classes during the last two hundred years has not affected
the most numerous class of the Russian population, the peasant woman.
For years, while special schools were being founded for the daughters of
the noble, the merchant, and the burgher families, she bore with her
husband and family the yoke of servitude, at times degrading and
intolerable, was the lord's property, body and soul, was worked like a
domestic animal, sometimes sold away from her family and otherwise
abused. When the emancipation came with the imperial decree of February
19, 1861, she began to breathe more freely. Now the elementary
education, at least, is accessible to her, and when means allow there is
nothing to keep her from obtaining the highest education to be had in
the country. Even in her modest station throughout the centuries the
peasant woman has not remained intellectually inactive. When students of
Russian literature became interested in the national folklore and began
to collect it, they found a large number of peasant women in the
northern provinces of Russia who possessed astonishing memories and who
dictated one long epic poem after another to the collectors. These
female Homers took pride in their accomplishment and were highly
respected for it in their neighborhoods. While the chief merit of these
poem singers lies in their highly retentive memory, women singers of
another type, the professional mourners at funerals, display creative
genius in composing and improvising songs. The names of peasant women
who composed some of the most popular Russian songs are known, and in
the latter part of the nineteenth century one of them was living in a
western province of Russia. In vocalization Russian women have few
equals among their class, both in civilized and uncivilized countries,
this owing to the richness and vigor of their voices, to the
characteristic fondness for music, and to the beauty of the national
music. Women sing their babies to sleep, sing at social gatherings in
and out of doors, sing while spinning and weaving, going to work and
returning from it.
[Illustration 6:
KALMUCK INTERIOR
After Racinet
The policy of Catharine was dominated by her desire for the
aggrandizement of Russia and the extension of the central rule. One of
the most striking results of her active government is the extraordinary
exodus of Kalmuck tribes in 1771. These people are of Central Asian
origin. Their incursions led them early in the seventeenth century into
Russian territory, where they secured a foothold in the region east of
the Volga. Other immigration followed till the Kalmuck population and
power became considerable. Generally nomadic in their habits, they dwelt
in circular felt tents, and were impatient of government, but about the
middle of the eighteenth century they came into voluntary subjection to
Russia.]
Russian woman has shown much artistic skill and taste in domestic
manufactures. Her crochet work, laces, and embroidery deserve high
praise and will doubtless be appreciated when they become better known
outside of the comparatively narrow circle to which they are now
confined. Russian peasant women have studied medical botany from time
immemorial. For centuries they were the only physicians within the reach
of the people. Even at present, when doctors with university training
are accessible to almost everyone, peasants frequently prefer the
ministrations of female herbalists.
In her home the Russian woman is a hard and steady worker. She gets up
at daybreak and tends her cows, cooks and serves the family breakfast
and the rest of the meals, keeps her house tidy, does the family sewing
and washing, is her family dressmaker and tailor. She transforms the
main room of the house into a factory in spring, and on her looms turns
into crashes and homespuns the result of a winter's work at the spinning
wheel. When the harvest time comes she does a good share of work in the
fields. A woman parasite is unknown to the peasant family and can have
no place in it. The Russian peasant woman earns her position in life
through honest, wholesome toil by her husband's side. Her reward is the
respect and consideration paid her. She is treated in the family as her
husband's equal. Under special conditions she has a voice in the village
folkmote, and has a right to a share in the village landed property on
equal footing with men. She is not debarred even from holding offices in
the village administration. Peasant women of ability have acted as
preachers and spiritual advisers among the Russian dissenters who do not
recognize the clergy of the established church. Through the woman school
teacher the Russian village girl now begins to learn in a wholesome way
of the wide world outside, and with ambition and means she will evolve
for herself a career full of interest and success. The future of the
Slavic race is the present world problem. It is a problem that becomes
more prominent with each decade. In the solution, whatever it may be, of
that problem the women of Russia will be a factor of tremendous
importance.