The Army Takes to the Countryside 291
All children were classified as 'military cantonists' and became legally the
property of the regiment in which their fathers served. Those aged seven or
under lived with their parents (or, if orphaned, were placed in the c::ire of
soldier-farmers). When they turned eight they donned uniform and went to the
school established in each district, where NCOs instructed them in the three Rs
and the Scriptures. Some of these teachers were trained. After four years'
schooling the boys formally entered the regimental reserve; the classroom was
supplemented by the parade-ground and the curriculum acquired a more
military flavour.^76 'Drill is as necessary as study', the tsar ruled.^77 In the Bug
settlements 'each boy learned the military statute with the aid of a wooden
sabre and carbine, [seated] upon a wooden horse, and there were sometimes
wooden cannon as well'.^78
This training, which continued until the age of 18, was more intensive than
anything available to civilian commoners, but its quality can only be guessed
at. On the positive side the boys learned useful craft subjects; but they were
also subjected to a good deal of bullying, and the discipline was unduly severe.
The administrators sought to produce a caste of thoroughly dedicated young
soldiers. Up to a point they succeeded. The defects-brutality, arrogance,
narrowness of vision, formalism, lack of initiative-were characteristic of
Russia's 'military culture' as a whole.
Unfortunately it was officers with this limited mind-set who were called on
to manage the settlements, and here lay their gravest failing. From the start
Arakcheyev insisted that they should be run as an independent organization.
The civilian authorities had no jurisdiction whatever within the areas that were
taken over; all administrative functions, including the maintenance of public
order, were exercised solely by army personnel. An astonished contemporary
remarked that 'no one can enter those parts of the country ... without a
special pass made out by some military authority'.^79 No outside agency,
whether military or civilian (least of all the Council of Ministers, which
rubber-stamped any relevant papers submitted to it), could supervise the
operations of the sizeable bureaucracy which Arakcheyev built up. The
Separate Corps had no fewer than 3,678 officers, including 28 generals, on its
staff,80 and was organized, as one would expect, on strictly hierarchical prin-
ciples without any real input from below. In theory peasants and others could
submit complaints, but if they were deemed to be unsubstantiated punishment
swiftly followed. st
For all his ferocity Arakcheyev was not cast in the mould of a modern
dictator. He was no more than a henchman of ft.is sovereign, and towards the
76 Petrov, 'Ustroystvo', pp. 109-10; Tanski, Tableau, pp. 124-5; Ferguson, 'Settlements',
pp. 188-9.
77 PSZ xxxvii. 28765 (29 Sept. 1821), § 10.
78 Lobachevsky, 'Bugskoye kazachestvo', p. 605.
79 Von Stork, Denkschrift, p. 77.
so Shchepetil'nikov (SVM iv) p. 114; Beskrovn}y, Potentsial, p. 37.
s1 Lykoshin, 'Voyennye poseleniya', p. 97.