[20] Op. cit., page 27. The figures show the number of population in villages where the land is owned quarterly. The population of 1849 is given according to the ninth revision (of 1846), and the population of 1882 according to the tenth revision (of 1858). The extent of private property would be exaggerated were the comparison made with the census of 1882. By overlooking the increase of the population between the ninth and the tenth revisions, the results of the comparison are but emphasized.
[21] Cf. Mr. Greegoryeff’s Report to the XVII. Assembly of the Gubernia of Ryazañ, p. 5. Cf. also Emigration among the Peasants of the Gubernia of Ryazañ, by the same author, which I have not now at hand. In Eastern Russia the subdivision of the arable land is but of very recent date. In Siberia it cannot be traced farther back than two generations, and there are even now a great many districts in which no limitations are imposed by the community on the free use of land by every one of its members. Nevertheless the poll tax was applied to these districts also for about two centuries. It seems to prove that the imposition of the said tax did not necessitate subdivision except where land was scarce. It may consequently be inferred that it was not the poll tax, but the scarcity of land in the most crowded provinces, that prompted the subdivision. In this view the subdivision of the land appears to be a natural phase in the evolution of communal landholding. (With reference to this point cf. Prof. W. J. Ashley’s remarks in his introduction to Fustel de Coulanges’ The Origin of Property in Land, pp. xlvii-xlviii.)
[22] Mr. Pankeyeff makes in one passage an allusion to the analogy between the development of quarterly landholding into agrarian communism and the transformation of the right of first possession into communal ownership in New Russia and in the gubernia of Voronezh (Cf. op. cit., book III., p. 35). The analogy, however is not further worked out.
[23] The extent of the three forms of possession to-day is shown in the following table:
| Forms of possession. | Communities. | Households. | Inhabitants. | Extent of land. | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Communal proper. | Quarterly. | ||||||
| Dessiatines. | Per cent. | Dessiatines. | Per cent. | ||||
| Quarterly | 33 | 2,180 | 15,071 | 3,754 | 11 | 29,598 | 89 |
| ” and Communistic | 12 | 1,639 | 11,037 | 9,210 | 45 | 11,213 | 55 |
| Communistic proper | 45 | 9,319 | 62,114 | 99,493 | 99.5 | 493 | 0.5 |
[24] Cf. Table of the Distribution of Land and Population, in the Appendix.
[25] The appendices to the Statistical Reports contain some figures for the comparison between the extent of land formerly held by the serf and now owned by the free “peasant-proprietor.” In 117 out of 562 communities of former serfs, there were held by the peasants:
| Dessiatines. | Per cent. | |
|---|---|---|
| Before the emancipation | 53870 | 100 |
| After ” ” | 40537 | 75 |
| Cut off for the nobles | 13333 | 25 |
It must be remembered that besides these 25 per cent., the nobles cultivated, before 1861, large portions of land on their estates by means of forced labor.
[26] Uniformity and equality being the law of the distribution of land in these communities, the income of each share is controlled by everybody, which makes it easy for the statistician to estimate. Those communities of quarterly possession constitute but 8.4 per cent. of the entire population of the district of Ranenburg and 15.2 per cent. of that of Dankoff.