The Commune has to pay into the Imperial Treasury a fixed yearly sum, according to the number of its "revision souls," and distributes the land among its members as it thinks fit.
How, then, does the Commune distribute the land?
To this question it is impossible to reply in brief, general terms, because each Commune acts as it pleases!* Some act strictly according to the theory.

These divide their land at the time of the revision into a number of portions or shares corresponding to the number of revision souls, and give to each family a number of shares corresponding to the number of revision souls which it contains.

This is from the administrative point of view by far the simplest system.

The census-list determines how much land each family will enjoy, and the existing tenures are disturbed only by the revisions which take place at irregular intervals.** But, on the other hand, this system has serious defects.

The revision-list represents merely the numerical strength of the families, and the numerical strength is often not at all in proportion to the working power.