Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 3 - From Marx to Mao

282
V. I. LENIN
farming and the deterioration of the peasants’ nourishment
(for the first time, I think, by Engelhardt). But it is precisely
this example that enables one to see the narrowness of
the Narodnik appraisal of the phenomena occurring among
the peasantry and in agriculture. They note a contradiction
in one form, in one locality, and do not realise that it is
typical of the entire social and economic system, manifesting
itself everywhere in different forms. They note the
contradictory significance of one “profitable industry,” and
strongly urge the “implanting” among the peasantry of all
sorts of other “local industries.” They note the contradictory
significance of one form of agricultural progress and do
not understand that machines, for example, have exactly
the same political and economic significance in agriculture
as in industry.
VI. THE FLAX-GROWING AREA
We have described the first two areas of capitalist agriculture
in fairly great detail because of their widespread
character and of the typical nature of the relations observed
there. In our further exposition we shall confine ourselves
to briefer remarks on some highly important areas.
Flax is the chief of the so-called “industrial crops.” The
very term indicates that we are dealing here with commercial
farming. For example, in the “flax” gubernia of Pskov,
flax has long been the peasants’ “first money,” to use
a local expression (Military Statistical Abstract, 260).
Flax growing is simply a means of making money. The
post-Reform period is marked on the whole by an undoubted
increase in commercial flax growing. Thus, at the end of
the 60s, the output of flax in Russia was estimated at approximately
12 million poods of fibre (ibid., 260); at the beginning
of the 80s at 20 million poods of fibre (Historico-
Statistical Survey of Russian Industry, Vol. I, St. Petersburg,
1883, p. 74); at the present time, in the 50 gubernias of
European Russia over 26 million poods of fibre are gathered.*
In the flax-growing area proper (19 gubernias of the
* The average for 1893-1897 was 26,291,000 poods, according to
the figures of the Central Statistical Committee. See Vestnik Finansov,
1897, No. 9, and 1898, No. 6. Formerly the statistics for flax produc-