be appointed.  During that time there was no one to explain the law to the peasants and settle the disputes between them and the proprietors; and the consequence of this was that many cases of insubordination and disorder occurred.  The muzhik naturally imagined that, as soon as the Tsar said he was free, he was no longer obliged to work for his old master—­that all obligatory labour ceased as soon as the Manifesto was read.  In vain the proprietor endeavoured to convince him that, in regard to labour, the old relations must continue, as the law enjoined, until a new arrangement had been made.  To all explanations and exhortations he turned a deaf ear, and to the efforts of the rural police he too often opposed a dogged, passive resistance.

In many cases the simple appearance of the higher authorities sufficed to restore order, for the presence of one of the Tsar’s servants convinced many that the order to work for the present as formerly was not a mere invention of the proprietors.  But not infrequently the birch had to be applied.  Indeed, I am inclined to believe, from the numerous descriptions of this time which I received from eye-witnesses, that rarely, if ever, had the serfs seen and experienced so much flogging as during these first three months after their liberation.  Sometimes even the troops had to be called out, and on three occasions they fired on the peasants with ball cartridge.  In the most serious case, where a young peasant had set up for a prophet and declared that the Emancipation Law was a forgery, fifty-one peasants were killed and seventy-seven were more or less seriously wounded.  In spite of these lamentable incidents, there was nothing which even the most violent alarmist could dignify with the name of an insurrection.  Nowhere was there anything that could be called organised resistance.  Even in the case above alluded to, the three thousand peasants on whom the troops fired were entirely unarmed, made no attempt to resist, and dispersed in the utmost haste as soon as they discovered that they were being shot down.  Had the military authorities shown a little more judgment, tact, and patience, the history of the Emancipation would not have been stained even with those three solitary cases of unnecessary bloodshed.

This interregnum between the eras of serfage and liberty was brought to an end by the appointment of the Arbiters of the Peace.  Their first duty was to explain the law, and to organise the new peasant self-government.  The lowest instance, or primary organ of this self-government, the rural Commune, already existed, and at once recovered much of its ancient vitality as soon as the authority and interference of the proprietors were removed.  The second instance, the Volost—­a territorial administrative unit comprising several contiguous Communes—­had to be created, for nothing of the kind had previously existed on the estates of the nobles.  It had existed, however, for nearly a quarter of a century among the peasants of the Domains, and it was therefore necessary merely to copy an existing model.