538 539
here. Your and our general dissatisfaction with the system shows that
either we are to blame or the laborers. We have gone our way—the
European way—a long while, without asking ourselves about the quali-
ties of our labor force. Let us try to look upon the labor force not as an
abstract force, but as the Russian peasant with his instincts, and we
shall arrange our system of culture in accordance with that. Imagine, I
ought to have said to him, that you have the same system as the old
peasant has, that you have found means of making your laborers take
an interest in the success of the work, and have found the happy mean
in the way of improvements which they will admit, and you will, with-
out exhausting the soil, get twice or three times the yield you got be-
fore. Divide it in halves, give half as the share of labor, the surplus left
you will be greater, and the share of labor will be greater too. And to do
this one must lower the standard of husbandry and interest the labor-
ers in its success. How to do this?—that’s a matter of detail; but
undoubtedly it can be done.”
This idea threw Levin into a great excitement. He did not sleep
half the night, thinking over in detail the putting of his idea into prac-
tice. He had not intended to go away next day, but he now determined
to go home early in the morning. Besides, the sister-in-law with her
low-necked bodice aroused in him a feeling akin to shame and remorse
for some utterly base action. Most important of all—he must get back
without delay: he would have to make haste to put his new project to
the peasants before the sowing of the winter wheat, so that the sowing
might be undertaken on a new basis. He had made up his mind to
revolutionize his whole system.
Chapter 29.
The carrying out of Levin’s plan presented many difficulties; but
he struggled on, doing his utmost, and attained a result which, though
not what he desired, was enough to enable him, without self-decep-
tion, to believe that the attempt was worth the trouble. One of the
chief difficulties was that the process of cultivating the land was in full
swing, that it was impossible to stop everything and begin it all again
from the beginning, and the machine had to be mended while in mo-
tion.
When on the evening that he arrived home he informed the bailiff
of his plans, the latter with visible pleasure agreed with what he said so
long as he was pointing out that all that had been done up to that time
was stupid and useless. The bailiff said that he had said so a long
while ago, but no heed had been paid him. But as for the proposal
made by Levin—to take a part as shareholder with his laborers in each
agricultural undertaking— at this the bailiff simply expressed a pro-
found despondency, and offered no definite opinion, but began imme-
diately talking of the urgent necessity of carrying the remaining sheaves
of rye the next day, and of sending the men out for the second plough-
ing, so that Levin felt that this was not the time for discussing it.
On beginning to talk to the peasants about it, and making a propo-
sition to cede them the land on new terms, he came into collision with