Each year they were able to add to their stock, to build a little more, and to do various things. As a result of good harvests Andray Dubovoy himself was able to go a-travelling, and to meet me and tell me his story. He had himself come to America when a little child, and did not know of his native land except by repute. He had not, however, had the advantage of education in an American school as a child, and so was as yet more Russian than American; but he was unlike the Russian type, he was clean of limb, clear of eye and of skin, calm—almost a Quaker in faith and morals. No one drank spirits or smoked tobacco in Kief, North Dakota, he told me with pride. The Russians there were living in a new way.
"Are the people as religious now as they were in Russia?" I asked.
"Not quite," said he, "they feel they don't need religion so much in America. At first the struggle for life was so hard, we had little thought for religion. It was only as we gained a footing on the land that we began to think of our religion seriously, and we built a chapel. We have a chapel of our own now."
"I suppose when you were no longer persecuted you did not need to affirm your way of religion so emphatically," I hazarded.
Andray did not know.
"Have you any bosses in Kief?" I asked.
Andray smiled.
"Our sheriff is a cabman."
"You feel no tyranny at all now?"
He was glad to say they never had need of a policeman; there were no robberies, every one lived in mutual love and kindness. Only, of course, they were heavily in debt to the companies, and felt they were never solvent.