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 Sviazhsky, who had been eating his curds, and smoking a cigarette, and now approached the two disputants. "All the needful forms are ready for use, and well learned. That relic of barbarism, the primitive commune where each member is responsible for all, is falling to pieces of its own weight; the right of holding serfs has been abolished; now there remains only free labor, and its forms are at hand,—the day-laborer, the journeyman, the ordinary farmer,—and you can't get rid of this."

"But Europe is discontented with these forms."

"Yes, and perhaps discontent will find new ones, and will progress probably."

"This is all I say about that," said Levin. "Why should we not seek for them on our side?"

"Because it would be much the same as our pretending to invent new methods of constructing railways. Our methods are all ready; all we have to do is to apply them."

"But if they do not suit us? if they are hurtful?" Levin insisted.

And again he saw the frightened look in Sviazhsky's eyes.

"Well! this: we throw up our caps, we follow wherever Europe leads! All this I know; but tell me, are you acquainted with all that is going on in Europe about the organization of labor?"

"No; I know very little."

"This question is now occupying the best minds in Europe. Schulze-Delitzsch and his school .... then all this prodigious literature on the labor question .... the tendencies of Lassalle, the most radical of all of them .... the Miilhausen organization .... this all is a fact, you surely must know."