minute division of units of cultivation. The tremendous pressure of population accentuates this factor and heightens the intensity of cultivation.
Out of these factors has grown an exploitation of the masses of peasantry amounting to 70% or 80% of their produce in the case of the main bulk of tenants or semi-tenants.
These are the main outlines of the fundamental question of the Chinese revolution. While the "bolshevik" workingclass in the cities is leading the revolution, yet at the same time the peasantry relentlessly drives the revolution on and on, making it impossible to find a compromisethat will stabilize China short of a thorough-going transformation of its entire economic and social system.
China's socalled public lands are in effect though not formally absorbed into the system of private ownership. There are 3 main forms of public lands, ancestral lands, village lands, and scholar fields. The most important is the ancestral land, which in Kwantung province comprises 25% of all cultivated fields. Rich landholders many generations ago set aside portions of their holdings to be preserved from division or sale, the produce of which was to be devoted to ancestor worship. Many also provided that a proportion of the income must be used to purchase additional land. These areas also grew through descendants demonstrating their piety by adding to the ancestral land.
Practically all the ancestral land is rented out, mostly to landless peasants or to middlemen who sublet it. The rents amount to huge sums, which enable the "elders" of the family to form the principal portion of the ruling caste wherever the ancestral lands exist.
The village public lands are those which have been set aside for special village needs, such as upkeep of the village school, road building, maintenance of village temple, etc. Instead of being administered by the elders of a single clan or family, they are in the hands of village elders comprising several families.
The scholar fields are lands of which the incomes have been assigned to certain learned persons as a reward for
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