Page:Morgan Philips Price - Siberia (1912).djvu/142

102 to hurt other people. We want to stay at home and live with our wives and cultivate our lands."

The distorted ideas about the yellow races in the minds of these peasants interested me not a little. It is clear that there would have been no Russo-Japanese War if the Siberians could have spoken in the matter, and indeed it was obvious that they had been kept in ignorance the whole time of what they were fighting about. Beneath all there was a vague feeling of fear of the yellow races, such as the Japanese and Chinese, which they never seem to bear towards the Finns and Tartars; but being true Russian peasants their first desire was for peace and good- will with their neighbours. I then questioned my companions as to what were their occupations during the year. They replied that for most of the year they were engaged in "growing bread for themselves and their families," which occupied them in the spring and autumn. In the winter they said they went into the forest to cut what timber they wanted, and remained there for a few weeks, returning to spend most of the winter at home in idleness. A few of them went off for expeditions each year into the forest, and remained away for months at a time. During the summer these more enterprising peasants spent their time in fishing on the rivers and lakes in the wild country along the frontier, salting their catch and bringing it home in the autumn. Some of them spent the summer seeking for gold, which they wash from the gravel in the upper reaches of these rivers, while others who are skilled in the chase go after the furs during the autumn, or find the encampments of the Finnish tribes, where they barter tea for fur and sable. Some of them, they