Democratic Sentinel, Volume 13, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 March 1889 — Russian Peasant Traits. [ARTICLE]

Russian Peasant Traits.

Quarrels prevail not only between different households but even in the - very midst of families livingunder one roof. Now in our house, for instance, the grandmother—a brisk and still lively old woman of 75—sided with one of her daughters-in-law against another, and they went so far that eventually nothing would do but they must divide all their possessions; even the ■ iron sheet serving to dry peas was cut in two—spoiled on purpose—so that it should not serve any one. If one party to the quarrel gets its peas burnt a . trifle, its opponents are happy; if a . young ox belonging to one dies, the others rejoice, saying, “See now how God chastises him !” Yet at the same time they are all of them really good and very considerate people.— Vassih Verestchagin , in Havper's Magazine .■