FAMOUS SONGSTRESS OF LATVIA

Thus charmingly clad in a variety of the national costume, this daughter of Latvia holds thousands spell-bound by the rich beauty of her soprano voice

Photo, Press Section, Latvian Foreign Office, Riga

Thousands of Letts are still scattered over the vast spaces of Russia and Siberia; they have long suffered in silence the privations of exile, but when possible they make attempts to return home, and in recent months a regulated stream of these refugees has been flowing over the Soviet frontier.

The Letts are more tolerant than is generally supposed, but when local Germans or Russians insist on their national or "caste" privileges, enjoyed for centuries while the Letts were in bondage, they can be very vindictive indeed. With an age-long foe, it is not always an easy matter to forget or forgive, and the Letts have just cause for the antagonism that they bear in their hearts, which will take generations to eradicate. The Germans have to recognize the fact that they are in the Republic of Latvia, and not on German or Russian territory; then they and the Letts will harmonise quite well.

Little by little the land is being divided among its original owners, and many a peasant has now become the proprietor of a fair-sized plot of ground; and he will cultivate it with a will, for the ambition of a lifetime has been realized. Those who knew the unfair conditions that once prevailed will realize the significance of a newspaper paragraph, such as the following:—"In the district of X, on Dec. 5, 6, and 7 (1922), the Central Committee for the Distribution of Land divided the X estate, amounting to 14,000 desiatins (2.6 acres – 1 desiatin)1 among 700 new proprietors."

The German barons find the agrarian laws which have deprived them of much of their property an excuse for incessant complaint. They are to be compensated, but the compensation has not yet been fixed, and will not be high. The Letts consider, and with reason, that the barons should not feel hurt in thus bearing a share of the losses caused by the Great War. In comparison with the peasant who lost his solitary cow, his home, his ally the big landowner lost very little save his buildings and some of his cattle. The land remained. But if the government had not parcelled out the land, there can be no doubt whatever that Latvia would have become part of 3296 Soviet Russia, and the barons would have lost their all. The peasants absolutely demanded their share, and by acceding to this demand the Government kept out Bolshevism and, at the same time, saved part of the land for the barons.

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1A desiatin is an old Russian unit of measurement approximately equal to a hectare. The measurement itself is confusing without additional context—"treasury" desiatins being 3/4ths of a "prioprietor" desiatin.
PEOPLES OF ALL NATIONS: THEIR LIFE TODAY AND THE STORY OF THEIR PAST BY OUR FOREMOST WRITERS OF TRAVEL, ANTHROPOLOGY & HISTORY (in 7 volumes), editor J. A. Hammerton, published by the Educational Book Co., London, 1920. Subsequently published as both a 7 volume set (1922) and subscription series (1922–1923) by the Amalgamated Press, London.
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