ODESSA. 327 



mense supplies of useful commodities, and articles of luxury, were sent from 

 England, France, and other countries. 



" The merchants lived in great splendour, and all went on prosperously 

 for a few years. During the long war, the merchants of Venice and Trieste 

 (which cities enjoyed the privileges of neutrality) enriched themselves ; for 

 they had agents at Odessa, who purchased and shipped corn for their ac- 

 count, which was sold to very great advantage, in Ttaly, Spain, and Portugal. 



" Odessa became also a place of resort for Polish and Russian families of 

 distinction, in the summer season, for the sake of sea-bathing ; and, it being 

 a free port, they were allowed to take away, without paying duty, as many 

 goods as they could stow in their carriages. So long as the produce of their 

 estates sold well, these wealthy proprietors spent their money freely. 



" A bank was established for discounts, and for making advances of 

 money on goods deposited as security. Merchandise continued to arrive 

 from all parts of the world ; Odessa was now a grand mart for barter and 

 it attained that precocious maturity which but too often precedes a rapid 

 decay. Like many other places, where an unexpected opening has presented 

 itself for commercial enterprise, this flourishing city soon felt the ill effects 

 of the ungovernable spirit of speculation ; for merchants, in England and 

 elsewhere, inundated the market with goods prices, naturally, fell sales 

 became dull the returns slow, and unsatisfactory. 



" The land-owners, too, rinding that their corn, &c. &c. no longer went 

 off freely at high prices, and that the privilege of rilling several carriages 

 with goods, and taking them home without paying duty, was abolished (I 

 am told it was quite a common thing to see the first people leave Odessa 

 with all their valuables, completely laden,) preferred obtaining supplies, as 

 they might require them, from places nearer to the chateaux ; say from 

 Brody, Balta, Tulezyn, &c. and, from these same causes, their personal 

 expenses, for some months in the year, ceased to flow through the channel 

 of Odessa. 



" To these considerations must be added the melancholy fact, that the 

 interests and property of foreign merchants were, in a great number of 

 instances, confided to unworthy hands. The most barefaced plunder has, to 

 my certain knowledge, been practised ; whilst the faulty system of jurispru- 

 dence, and the corruption of the judges, left the sufferers without any 

 remedy; and, at this moment, such is the deplorable decadence of Odessa, in 

 every way, that there is little left but false appearances, and bad principles. 



" Still there must be a good deal of local trade in a city containing a popu- 

 lation of forty thousand souls ; and there will always be considerable ship- 

 ments of corn, &c. for the Mediterranean, and of other produce for different 

 parts of the world : but there is nothing doing on a grand scale. The 

 supplies for Podolia and the Ukraine are now furnished, in a great measure, 

 by the Brody Jews, who attend the fairs at Leipzig, and forward their goods 

 by land carriage. 



" The Greeks are very intelligent and artful ; they have agents, of their 

 own country, in all parts to which they trade : they form, as it were, one 

 large family, and manage to lay their neighbours under contribution. They 

 ascertain when the landed proprietors are in want of money, and make ex- 

 cellent bargains, by advancing it at the critical moment. The Greeks are 

 the chief importers of wines from the Arqhipelago, grapes, and dried fruits ; 

 cotton and other stuffs from the Levant; perAimes, shawls, oil, coffee, 

 spices, soap, Turkish tobacco, pipes, amber month-pieces for pipes, &c. &c. 

 &c. The Armenians and Cara'ite Jews, traffic *\so in the above articles ; the 

 best attar of roses and balm of Mecca, are to be obtained from the latter. 

 France furnishes wines, brandy, oil, cloth, silks, all sorts of manufactured 

 goods, cambrics, and nouveautes, provisions, porcelain, engravings, books, 





