166  the  socialism  of  to-day.
tutions,  based  though  they  are  on  family  ties  and  immemorial
traditions.  When  what  we  call  progress  comes  to  shake  this
patriarchal  life  from  its  torpor,  and  new  wants  come  into
being,  the  associates  no  longer  care  to  labour  for  the  common
weal  ;  they  demand  a  partition.  Little  by  little  the  spirit  of
individualism  is  destroying  the  Slavic  zadruga,  as^  before,  in  the
seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries,  it  brought  about  the
disappearance  of  the  communities  of  ancient  France.  hen
isolated,  are  the  families  happier  ?  Far  from  it.  Often  they
have  to  sell  their  properties  and  lapse  into  poverty.  Still
they  wish  for  freedom  and  independence,  even  at  the  price  of
the  responsibilities  and  disappointments  thereby  engendered.
Before  another  half-century,  when  railways  and  modern  industry ­
  shall  have  developed  the  wealth  of  Southern  Slavonia,
the  ancient  equality  will  have  given  way  to  the  opposition
between  capitalism  and  wage-earning,  as  in  our  western
countries.  We  may  regret  the  fact,  but  it  cannot  be  denied  j
existing  tendencies  seem  fatal  to  rural  communities.  They
endure  only  when  they  rest  on  a  religious  sentiment  of  a
perfervid  type,  as  at  Oneida  or  among  the  T  rappists.
During  the  year  1869  the  International  spread  with
extraordinary  rapidity.  There  was  a  great  ferment  among
the  working  classes  throughout  Europe,  and  particularly  in
France,  where,  after  the  May  elections,  the  Government,
doubtless  with  the  object  of  rallying  the  middle  classes  to  its
side,  had  given  complete  liberty  to  the  violent  language  of
the  clubs.  Strikes  took  place  all  over  Europe,  and  in  many
parts,  notably  at  Seraing  in  Belgium,  and  at  Creusot  in
France,  they  ended  in  skirmishes  and  bloodshed.  All  these
strikes  brought  recruits  to  the  International  in  the  hope  of
getting  aid.  Usually  they  did  not  succeed,  for  the  great
association  was  not  rich  ;  but  in  the  early  days  of  excitement
it  was  supposed  to  be  powerful,  and  it  caused  employers  to
make  concessions,  just  as  if  it  were  really  so.
How  adhesions  to  the  International  were  made  may  be  clearly
seen  from  the  answer  of  the  prisoner  Bastin,  at  the  time  of  the
trial  of  May,  1870.  “  I  am  accused,”  he  said  to  the  president,
“  of  having  joined  a  secret  society.  I  deny  it  expressly.  1  rue,