333 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of the country, and that also, like our trusts, they can not be made 

 amenable to existing laws. An imperial circular directed to local 

 officials after the disorders of 1882 reads as follows: 



The proceedings at the trial of those charged with rioting and other 

 evidences bear witness to the fact that the main cause of those movements 

 and riots, to which the Russians as a nation are strangers, was but a com- 

 mercial one, and is as follows: 



During the last twenty years the Jews have gradually possessed them- 

 selves of not only every trade and business in all its branches, but also of a 

 great part of the land by buying and farming it. With few exceptions they 

 have as a body devoted their attention, not to enriching or benefiting the 

 country, but to defrauding by their wiles its inhabitants, and particularly its 

 poor people. This conduct of theirs has called forth protests on the part of 

 the people, as manifested in acts of violence and robbery. The government, 

 while, on the one hand doing its best to put down the disturbances and to de- 

 liver the Jews from oppression and slaughter, have also, on the other hand, 

 thought it a matter of urgency and justice to adopt stringent measures in 

 order to put an end to the oppression practised by the Jews and to free the 

 country from their malpractices which were, as is shown, the cause of the 

 agitation. With this in view, it has appointed a commission (in all towns in- 

 habited by Jews) whose duty it is to inquire into the following matters: 



I. What are the trades of the Jews injurious to the inhabitants of the 

 place? 



II. What makes it impracticable to put into force the former laws 

 limiting the rights of the Jews in the matter of buying and farming land, 

 the trade in intoxicants and usury? 



III. How can these laws be altered so that they shall no longer be enabled 

 to evade them, or what new laws are required to stop their pernicious conduct 

 in business? 



Give additional information on: 



(a) Usury practised by Jews in their dealings. 



(b) Number of public houses kept by Jews in their own names or in that 

 of a Christian. 



(c) Number of persons in service with Jews or under their control. 



(d) The extent (acreage) of the land in their possession by buying or 

 farming. 



(e) Number of Jewish agriculturists. 



Each line of inquiry directed therein had reference to some con- 

 dition which had been a specific source of trouble. To take one 

 instance which concerned the matter of land tenure, one of the most 

 perplexing problems with which Eussia, with its agricultural popula- 

 tion, is called on to deal. The fondness of the Pole and Russian for 

 drink served to make the liquor business particularly lucrative, and 

 the Jewish liquor dealer utilized it as a means of involving the peasant 

 in debt, and of finally securing from him the possession of his property 

 rights; and where there was an annual assignment of communal lands 

 the dealer with an eye to his own income saw that his best customers 

 got the most productive parcels. 



