DESTITUTION AND RELIEF 39 



nate peasants were without cattle and had not 

 sufficient seed to sow their fields, and had nothing 

 for subsistence until the next harvest. 



The Vyestnik Yeoropy, a St. Petersburg periodi- 

 cal of March, 1892, attributed the droughts, which 

 had become chronic, to the destruction of the 

 forests, which has been going on during the past 

 fifty years. It said : ' ' The territory drained by the 

 Volga, Don, and Dnieper was formerly covered 

 with extensive forests, whose deep shades preserved 

 the springs from exhaustion. These forests have 

 disappeared. The Don is being gradually choked 

 with sand washed down from the desolated forest 

 tracts/ 1 The writer concluded therefrom that 

 the prevailing unfortunate conditions were the 

 result of slowly working climatic changes and 

 affirmed that no thorough attempt had been 

 made to strike at the root of the difficulty. The 

 application of our American system of irrigation 

 would be more efficacious than hundreds of ship- 

 loads of food, which at best can afford only tem- 

 porary relief. 



A Russian count, speaking on the subject, said : 



The moral and physical condition of the peasantry 

 has greatly deteriorated since their emancipation from 



