The villages and adjacent properties of the inhabitants are all enclosed together. The Emperor accords to each village a certain portion of land, which is generally equally distributed among the male inhabitants. In the forest beyond the enclosure, they have the privilege of pasturing their flocks, but are not permitted to till the land. This apparent liberality has not much significance, on account of the immense extent of territory to the small number of inhabitants; the little plots, in comparison with the non-utilized soil, are mere minnows to a whale.
But this act of graciousness, on the part of the sovereign towards his subjects, is not admitted by the Baron de Haxtäusen, who maintains that the system had its origin in the natural development of the mode of life of the Russian people. “The Russian people,” he observes, “were nomadic, and among the nomads, there is no defined individual property—the land was utilized in common, for the benefit of the whole tribe. Then gradually these nomadic hordes, established in Russia, ceased their wandering life, and became fixed in permanent dwellings, and it was at this time that the pasturages became constant, instead of temporary, as they had formerly been. Then agriculture advanced, in combination with the pastoral occupation and breeding of cattle, the ordinary life of the nomad. But the old element of nomadic life was too deeply implanted in the existence and character of the people: it was a part of their nature, and could not be eradicated. Pasturage was carried on in common, and agriculture likewise was carried on in common; all the members of the tribe or of the community laboured together, and the harvests were gathered by their united work, and then distributed in equal parts to every member entitled to share. In Servia, Bosnia, and Sclavonia, villages may be seen having the same principle in practice. In Russia they have improved this organization without, however, attacking the principle. They have divided and distributed the land in equal parts between all the members of the commune, not in perpetuity, still for a period of many years.”
The same author shows all the advantages of such an organization: “It develops in the people the desire to remain in the country; it fortifies the sentiments of homogeneity, community, fraternity, and justice, and love of the country and attachment to a place. It strengthens the ties of family life, and in Russian villages, contrary to what is seen elsewhere in Europe, a great number of children are a source of riches.”
I have just mentioned that the Siberian peasants have the right of felling timber in the forests for their own use. Since they obtain their fuel gratuitously, they maintain in their houses an extremely high temperature. In elegant houses, constructed of stone, neither stoves nor open fires are there seen; the heating apparatus is between the two surfaces of the walls. The heat is transmitted by contact with the surface, and uniformly from the ceiling to the floor. This process has not the disadvantages of our system of closed stoves, and does not affect the head with carbonic gases diffused in the room. In the peasants’ dwellings the wooden walls do not admit of the same arrangement. In the centre of the habitation is raised a construction of stone or baked clay, and this, heated at the centre, throws off the heat from the surface.
The women seldom leave their houses; therefore they are loosely clad in no other garment than a kind of dressing gown, like the fellah women of Lower Egypt. This scanty clothing seems strangely inconsistent with the snow on the ground out of doors. So soon as the outer door is opened, the hot air in the interior, charged with vapour, becomes suddenly condensed, and forms a cloud around the entering visitor for a few moments so dense as to prevent his recognition. He makes his appearance, as in the stories of “The Thousand and One Nights,” wrapped in a cloud that has accompanied his passage, and which is dispersed so soon as its mission is accomplished. At one of the stages where I stopped, between Krasnoiarsk and Irkutsk, the heat was so great in the travellers’ room, that in spite of the season, a butterfly, some flies and mosquitoes were fluttering and buzzing around in full vigour.
I was informed that in this part of Siberia the mosquitoes form very formidable enemies to battle with. Constantine told me that during summer here one is obliged to put his head into a sack, and in spite of this precaution, is often a victim to these terrible insects. Madame de Bourboulon, who had passed there in the month of July, mentions these pests, and that travellers, and even horses, have perished from the effects of their stings.
After having been on the road eight days and eight nights, we penetrated at last into the valley of the Angara. This river proceeds from Lake Baikal, passes on to Irkutsk, and finally loses itself in the Yenissei. As the difference of level between Irkutsk and Lake Baikal is considerable, though the distance is only fifteen leagues, the current of the Angara is extremely rapid. The frost, consequently, does not succeed till very late and after great efforts in arresting its lively course. Nowhere else in Siberia does this struggle between a running stream and hibernal congelation—the arrest of motion and the transmutation of force—produce effects so remarkable. In order to become master of its adversary, the frost attacks the running water at first from below, beginning at the banks. It is in the bottom of the Angara and contiguous to its shores where the first solidifications appear. Whilst these are spreading, little blocks of ice form and float over the surface, and then these two opponents gathering force, seek to join their efforts in a simultaneous and combined attack. The river threatened to be stopped in its course struggles desperately. Pursued and being closed in, it rushes frantically onwards, and if it could thus break loose and carry its floating enemy with it, it would perhaps gain the victory. But these restless foes, increasing in size and number, maintain their hold and menace further retreat. The Angara has then recourse to a supreme effort. It changes suddenly its ordinary course, and leaping in torrents over the barriers, spreads out over the valley, scattering its force in every direction, as if routed by its implacable enemy. It is then that the victory is decided. The waters that have overflowed are speedily overcome so soon as they relax in their retreat, and are transfixed and congealed in an instant; and those also, retreating along the course of the river, weakened in body and velocity, yield too in their turn to a terrific conflict of eight or ten days’ duration, and there, at last, repose under a white shroud, vanquished and still, leaving monuments of might that strike the eye with astonishment.
These mountains of ice are heaped up on this river to a great height. They rise irregularly, sustaining huge, jagged blocks awry on their mass of contortions, presenting the most singular and grotesque spectacle of unaccountable disarray. The whole width of the valley, on account of the inundation, was filled with this startling convulsion of nature. When my eye first rested on this wondrous sight, the sun was shining through one of these blocks, pitched on one of the highest pinnacles, and produced a natural pharos of dazzling splendour; here its rays, refracted from innumerable icicles, coloured the valley with rainbows, or there fell on minute crystals of ice, formed from the watery vapour floating in the air, and with these depicted two luminous columns, that rose and melted away in the depth of the sky. It called up in my fancy that sun palace sung by Ovid, sustained by shining columns. Had the poet, when he described these marvels, already known the bitterness of exile in hyperborean lands? had he, like me, contemplated this strange phenomenon in the same latitudes?
My arrival at Irkutsk was accompanied by these grand fairy scenes of light, so startling in their novelty and splendour.
This city is built at the confluence of three rivers, the Angara, the Irkut, and the Küda. Instead of being perched on a commanding hill, like most other Siberian cities, it is, on the contrary, placed in the centre of a circus, formed between the mountains, that opens only on the side formed by the course of the Angara. Irkutsk is inhabited by the representatives of a great variety of races, who there retain not only their physical type, but their costumes and manners; the aspect of the streets is therefore extremely picturesque. At every moment you pass on the way Buriats, Tungus, Samoyeds, and then Chinese and Mongols, and Mantchous and even some Kirghiz, who have been permitted by the Government of Omsk to quit their districts. But I will first present to my readers the Russian society of Irkutsk and the Polish exiles.