ABSTRACT
A luggage truck rattled over the rough paving; two men with little tin cans ran to fetch water for their tea. A few soldiers of the Red Army in long greatcoats got out of the front coach. The level countryside was growing more distinct in the half-light. Ahead of people the sky began to be tinged with colour. The shortage of male labour is driving the women into the fields and, instead of freeing them from the “slavery of the household”, is imposing on them the double burden of house and land. The characteristic of the Russian that has changed least of all is his unusual hospitality. A succession of men and especially women brought forward their protests. Their demands culminated in the opinion that the harvest should not be carried out collectively, but that a strip of field should be allotted to each in order to prevent one idling at the expense of the others.
