THE CONDITIONS OF RUSSIAN AGRICULTURE 189 



more hardy crop, winter oats, does not seem to be grown, 

 nor is there any information to be had as to the reason. 



In remote districts where little beside grain is cultivated 

 it is almost impossible to picture what the effect of crop failure 

 must mean ; the distress must be awful. Even at the present 

 time the terrible calamity of six years ago is still felt by the 

 peasantry, many of whom sacrificed all their belongings and 

 pawned their future labour in the struggle against starvation. 

 So poor were the crops of that year (1906) that only about 

 one-half of the grain sown was recovered at harvest. There 

 was nothing wherewith to pay taxes and nothing to live upon 

 during the winter and no reserve stock of grain in the district ; 

 thousands of people and cattle died from starvation. 



Nearer to the Ural Mountains the country is far more 

 picturesque; it is undulating and well wooded, resembling 

 pleasant downland, affording a welcome contrast to the dreary 

 flat district to the immediate west. In the neighbourhood of 

 Ufa and Orenburg cattle-rearing has become quite an important 

 business and here again the organisation of co-operative societies 

 has proved a great benefit to the small farmers by enabling 

 them to export large quantities of butter. Villages are few 

 and far between ; indeed, in some parts, there seems to be 

 no population at all, though it is said there are about forty 

 inhabitants to the square mile. 



To the west the broad Volga flows slowly towards the 

 Caspian Sea, passing through richer soil than in its northern 

 course ; but apart from this very noticeable improvement, there 

 is little to be seen which is different from other districts. 

 Besides cultivating wheat and other grain, horses, cattle and 

 sheep are extensively bred and as might be expected agriculture 

 is not conducted on such poverty-stricken lines. There are 

 quite a number of private estates where up-to-date farming 

 is practised ; some of them are of tremendous extent, embracing 

 many thousand acres of land under wheat ; horses and sheep 

 are bred on an equally large scale. 



Continuing in a south-westerly direction, the renowned 

 Steppe region is reached, one might say the boundless Steppe, 

 because this rich band of soil stretches from the Carpathian 

 Mountains in the west far away eastward into Siberia ; in fact, 

 it is not quite known how far it does extend. The European 

 portion is a vast undulating plain, mostly covered by sweet 



