Page:Morgan Philips Price - Siberia (1912).djvu/177

Rh I observed that although the family is to a great extent merged in the community, the functions and duties of the sexes seemed to be kept very strictly apart. To the man falls all the outdoor work—the management of the land, expeditions to the forest and general bread-winning. The women, on the other hand, although quite prepared to turn their hands to hard work such as haymaking and harvesting whenever special help is required, have their sphere in the house. Here they rule with a rod of iron. It is always pleasant to see an old Moujik returning from his day's work, seat himself down in his house and give himself over entirely to the cares of his wife. The Siberian peasant woman is a true matron of the finest type. I sometimes found two or three generations in one household, yet, as far as I could gather, no serious domestic quarrel seemed to arise. The fact that they were living there all together was an indication to me of the contented communistic character of the Siberian peasant. I cannot imagine such conditions existing in an English village.

At the same time no one can deny the fact that the life of the Russian and Siberian peasants tends to create a dead level of society, and a mental apathy and lack of enterprise among the individuals which compose the society. Whether the communal system creates these social and mental conditions, or whether these conditions create the communal system, is a subject that I will not enter into here. It is sufficient to note that, for those who remain in these villages, there is but little incentive to wholesome progress. Desire for change and material advancement does not seem to appeal to the majority of these peasants. So rich are the resources of the