1. The Black Earth Belt
Finally, the waterways. Russia's rivers run in a north-south direction; none of the major rivers runs east-west. However, the lateral branches of the great rivers do just that; and because Russia is flat (no point in its European part exceeds 1,400 feet) and its rivers originate not in moun- tains but in swamps and lakes formed by swamps they have gentle gradients. As a result, Russia possesses a unique network of navigable waterways, composed of large rivers and their numerous branches linked with one another by means of easy portages. Even with primitive modes of transport it is possible to navigate across Russia from the Baltic to the Caspian seas, and to reach by water a high proportion of the land lying in between. In Siberia, the water network happens to be so excellently meshed that in the seventeenth century Russian fur trappers succeeded in traversing in a very short time thousands of miles to the Pacific and inaugurating regular commerce between Siberia and the home country by means of river transport. Were it not for these waterways, life in Russia would have been hardly feasible above the mere subsistence level until the advent of railways. The distances are so great and the costs of maintaining roads under the prevailing extremes of temperature so high that land transport was practicable only in the winter, when snow provided a smooth surface for sleighs. This fact accounts for the great reliance of Russians on water transport. Until the second half of the nineteenth century the bulk of merchandise moved on boats and barges.
Like the other Slavs, the ancient Russians were primarily a pastoral people; and like them, upon settling down in their new territories, they slowly made the transition to agriculture. Unfortunately for them, the area which the Eastern Slavs penetrated and colonized happens to be uniquely ill suited for farming. The indigenous Finns and Turks treated farming as a supplementary occupation, concentrating in the forest zone on hunting and fishing, and in the steppe on livestock breeding. The Russians chose otherwise. Their heavy reliance on farming under adverse natural conditions was one of the constant problems underlying Russian history.
Some of these difficulties have been alluded to already: the indifferent quality of the soil in the north, and the vagaries of the rainfall, which is heaviest where it does the least good, and has a tendency to come down too late in the agricultural season. The peculiar topographical and seasonal distribution of the rainfall is a major reason why, over the course of its recorded history, Russia has averaged one bad harvest out of every three.
But the gravest and least soluble problems derive from the extreme northern location of the country. Together with Canada, Russia is the northernmost state in the world. It is true that modern Russia controls large territories with semi-tropical climates (the Crimea, the Caucasus and Turkestan), but these were acquired late, mostly in the mid-nineteenth century, in the course of imperial expansion. The cradle of the Russian state, that which Brandenburg is to Germany or the lie is to
5
France, lies in the zone of mixed forests. Until the middle of the sixteenth century, Russians had been virtually confined to this area, because the steppe with its coveted black earth was under the control of hostile Turkic tribes. Russians began to penetrate the steppe in the second half of the sixteenth century, but they became masters of it only towards the end of the eighteenth when they at long last conclusively defeated Turkish power. During the formative period of their statehood they had to live between 50 and 60 degrees of northern latitude. This is approximately the latitude of Canada. In drawing comparisons between the two countries, however, several differences must be kept in mind. The bulk of the Canadian population has always resided in the southernmost part of the country, along the Great Lakes and the St Lawrence River, i.e. at 45 degrees, which in Russia corresponds to the latitudes of the Crimea and the central Asian steppe. Nine-tenths of the Canadian population lives within two hundred miles of the United States border. North of the 52nd parallel Canada has little population and hardly any agriculture. Secondly, throughout its history Canada has enjoyed friendly relations with its richer southern neighbour, with which it has maintained close economic relations. (It remains to this day the largest single recipient of US capital investments.) And finally, Canada has never had to support a large population; those of its people whom the economy could not employ have been in the habit of moving, seasonally or permanently, to the United States. None of these advantages exists in the case of Russia: its neighbours have been neither rich nor friendly, and the country has had to rely on its own resources to support a population which already in the middle of the eighteenth century was larger than Canada's is today.
The principal consequence of Russia's location is an exceedingly short farming season. In the taiga, around Novgorod and St Petersburg, it lasts a mere four months in the year (frorn mid-May to mid-September). In the central regions, near Moscow, it stretches to five and a half months (mid-April to end of September). In the steppe, it lasts six months. The remainder of the Russian year is altogether unsuitable for agricultural work, because the soil is as hard as rock and the land is covered by a deep blanket of snow. In western Europe, by contrast, the growing season lasts eight to nine months. In other words, the western farmer has at his disposal anywhere from 50 to 100 per cent more time for field work than the Russian. Furthermore, in parts of Europe where the winter is mild, the winter months can be employed for occupations other than field work. The economic and social consequences of this simple climatic fact will be elucidated below. The brief growing season, and its corollary, a long and hard winter,
THE ENVIRONMENT AND ITS CONSEQUENCES
create an additional difficulty for the Russian peasant. He must confine his livestock indoors two months longer than the western farmer. His cattle thus misses out on the early spring grazing, and when finally set free in the meadow it is in a thoroughly emaciated condition. Russian livestock has always been of an inferior quality, notwithstanding attempts by the government and enlightened landlords to improve it; imported western breeds have promptly degenerated to the point where they became indistinguishable from the miserable domestic variety. The difficulties in raising livestock have discouraged efficient meat and dairy farming in the forest zone. They have affected adversely the quality of the draught animals and caused perennial shortages of manure, especially in the north, where it is most needed.
The consequence of Russia's poor soil, unreliable rainfall and brief growing season have been low yields.
Agricultural yields are most meaningfully measured in terms which indicate how many times the seed reproduces itself: when, for example, one grain cast at sowing time gives five grains at harvest, we speak of a yield ratio 115. The typical yield ratio in medieval Europe was 1:3 or at best 1."4, the minimum yields which make agriculture worth while and create conditions capable of sustaining life. A 1:3 ratio, it must be noted, means an annual doubling rather than tripling of tht sown seed, because each year one of every three grains harvested must be set aside for seed. It also means that one acre of arable out of every three has to be devoted to seed production. In the second half of the thirteenth century, west European yields began to experience a significant rise. The principal cause of this phenomenon was the growth of cities, whose trading and manufacturing population had given up growing food, buying it from farmers instead. The emergence of a rich urban market for cereals and other produce encouraged western landlords and peasants to raise a surplus by more intensive use of labour and heavier manuring. In the late Middle Ages, western yields rose to 1."5, and then, in the course of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, they improved further to 1:6 and 1:']. By the middle of the nineteenth century, countries with advanced farming, headed by England, regularly obtained yields of 1:io. Such a dramatic improvement had an even greater economic significance than might appear at first glance. Where the soil can be depended upon regularly to return ten grains for each grain sown, the farmer needs to set aside for seed only a tenth of the land and a tenth of the harvest, instead of a third of each, as he must do under a 113 yield. The net return on a 1:io yield is 4^ times what it is on a r:3 yield, making it theoretically possible to sustain in a given area that many more inhabitants. The cumulative effect of such a surplus over a number of years can be readily appreciated. It may be said that civilization begins only