It is all the same to you, I think, whether I was traveling in the summer or winter. Perhaps it was both winter and summer. This happens not infrequently with travelers: they go out on a sleigh and come back in a cart.—It is summer.—The road paved with logs wore out my sides; I got out of the carriage and continued on foot. While I was lying in the carriage, my thoughts were turned toward the immeasurability of the world. Detaching myself spiritually from earth seemed to alleviate the bumps of the carriage.—But spiritual exercises do not always distract us from corporeality; and for the preservation of my sides I went on foot.—At a distance of several paces from the road I saw a peasant plowing a field. It was hot out. I looked at my watch.—Forty minutes past noon.—I set out on Saturday.—Today is a day of rest.—The peasant at the plow surely belongs to a landowner who does not take quitrent from him.13—The peasant plows with great diligence.—The field is evidently not the landlord’s.—He turns the plow with unbelievable ease. “Godspeed,” I said as I approached the plowman who, without stopping, completed the furrow that had been started. “Godspeed,” I repeated. “Thank you, Master,” said the plowman, shaking out the plowshare and moving the plow over to a new strip. “You must be a Schismatic if you plow on Sundays.”14 “No, Master, I make the sign of the cross in the straight fashion,” he said, showing me three fingers held together.15 “But God is merciful, when one has strength and family, He does not will one to die of hunger.” “But can it be that during the entire week you have no time to work so that you cannot skip Sundays, not even during the hottest period?” “In the week, as it happens, Master, there are six days, and six times a week we go to work for the master;16 and toward evening we bring the hay left in the forest to the landowner’s courtyard if weather permits; and on holidays the womenfolk and gals go for walks into the forest for mushrooms and berries. May God grant (making the sign of the cross) some rain this evening. Master, if you, too, have peasants then they are praying for the same thing from the Lord.” “I have no peasants, my friend, and that is why no one curses me. Is your family large?” “Three sons and three daughters. Going on ten years is the eldest little one.” “How do you manage to provide their bread if you are free only on holidays?” “Not only the holidays are ours, since the night is ours too. If the likes of me are not lazy, then we will not die of hunger. Do you not see that one horse is resting, and when this one grows tired, I will then take the other; this way the work goes smoothly.” “Do you work this way for your owner?” “No, Master, it would be sinful to work the same way. At the plowing he has a hundred hands for each mouth, while I have two for seven mouths, you know how to count. Why, even if one busted a gut working for the landowner they’ll never say thank you. The landowner will not pay the poll tax17 for you; he will not let you off the hook for a single sheep or chicken; nor a piece of canvas or butter. For us it’s a good life when the master collects the quitrent, even better if he does not have an estate manager. It is true that sometimes even good owners collect more than three rubles per soul; but still, this is better than the corvée. Now a new arrangement has also come into use, it is called letting villages out for rent. But we call this ‘complete betrayal.’ A poor tenant skins the peasants alive, he even helps himself to our best season. In the winter he bars us from the carrier trade and from seeking work in the city. You work no end for him because he pays the poll tax for us. What a diabolical idea it is to lend one’s own peasants to another for work. At least you can complain about a bad estate manager, but to whom do you complain about a renter?” “My friend, you are mistaken, the laws prohibit the tormenting of people.” “Tormenting? This is true; nonetheless, Master, I venture you would not want to be in my skin.” Meanwhile the plowman harnessed the other horse to the plow and, after starting another strip, parted from me.
The conversation of this landworker aroused in me a multitude of thoughts. The first to come to mind were the inequalities within the peasant estate. I compared state peasants with serfs.18 Both one and the other live in villages; but one group pays a fixed amount, while the other must be prepared to pay what the owner wishes. One set are judged by their equals, while the others are dead in the eyes of the law except in criminal matters.—It is only when he breaks the social bond, when he becomes a malefactor, that a member of society acquires the recognition of the government that protects him! Such an idea made my blood boil.—Be afraid, hard-hearted landowner, I see your condemnation on the brow of each of your peasants.—Plunged into these meditations, I unwittingly turned my gaze to my servant who, seated in front of me in the carriage, was swaying from side to side. Suddenly, I felt coursing through my blood a rapid chill that, by driving the heat upwards, forced it to spread across my face. The shame I felt in my very innards caused me nearly to weep.—In your rage, I said to myself, you are fixated on the proud owner who wears out his peasant in his field. But do you not do the same, if not worse? What crime has your poor Petrushka committed so that you prevent him from availing himself of sleep, the sweetener of our woes, the greatest gift of nature to an unfortunate man?—He receives payment, is fed, clothed, I never whip him with birches or a truncheon (O moderate man!)—and you think that a piece of bread and scrap of woolen cloth give you the right to treat a being who is your equal like a spinning top, and the only thing of which you can boast is that you do not strike him so often as to make him spin faster. Do you know what is written in the first law code of all, in the heart of each person? If I strike someone, he too may strike me.—Recall that day when Petrushka was drunk and was not in time to dress you. Recall the slap you gave him. Oh, if he had come to his senses while drunk and answered you in proportion to your demand!—And who gave you power over him?—The law.—The law? And you dare abuse this sacred name? Unfortunate one! …—Tears trickled from my eyes and this was the state I was in when the postal nags dragged me to the next station.