424 RUSSIA IN 1833. 



conceived in a spirit of military aggrandizement, but with the more 

 generous views of extending civilization. In admitting the incon- 

 testible power of Russia for defensive warfare, all writers who have 

 treated the question of her military resources, have over and over 

 again proclaimed, that from the penury of her exchequer she is 

 utterly incapable of maintaining, for any length of time, a large army 

 beyond her frontiers ; and that, in consequence, her military power 

 decreases in inverse ratio to the square of the distance, or in other 

 words, to the length of the line of operation. We admit the truth of 

 this proposition ; but allowing that the financial means of Russia are 

 in no ways proportionate to her military power, the opinion must 

 nevertheless be received with both caution and limitation, since, in 

 estimating pecuniary resources it has been too much the fashion to 

 base the calculation on the state of this empire half a century ago, and 

 without paying a sufficient regard to the prodigious development of 

 her industry and commerce that has since taken place. In order to 

 embrace at a single glance the rapid increase of these two branches 

 of political economy, we shall merely state, that the value of the ex- 

 ports of the whole empire, which in 1789 amounted to only 

 18,720,000, were in 1827, 234,770,423 silver roubles. 



Manufactures have increased in almost the same ratio, so much so, 

 that only so far back as 1788, Russia imported all her woollen goods 

 from England, while at present she manufactures sufficient for her 

 home consumption. The number of manufactories throughout the 

 empire are estimated at near 6000, and the value of their annual 

 production amounted in 1824 to 117*625,734 roubles; while the 

 value of the exportations, which only four years before amounted, 

 according to the official returns, to 58 millions of roubles, were in the 

 same year reduced to 26 millions. 



But a new element in the revenues of Russia has suddenly been 

 discovered : we allude to the gold and diamond mines in the Oural 

 Mountains. Previously to the year 1821, only two gold mines were 

 known in Russia (in the government of Tobolsk,) which yielded forty 

 pouds * of gold per annum ; but since the discovery of the great mines 

 in the Oural chain, in which was found a mass of pure gold weighing 

 251bs., these results have been considerably augmented. The pre- 

 cious metal is met with in the greatest quantity in the vicinity of Ca- 

 therenburg, (56. 10. 38. north lat., 30. 20. long, meridian of St. 

 Petersburg.) Between the years 1824 and 1827, these mines, to 

 the number of fifteen, produced 962 pouds 221bs., which at the 

 standard price of gold, would yield a sum equal to 2,500,000 ster- 

 ling ; a result far superior to what any of the South American mines 

 have produced since they have been worked by English Companies ; 

 independent of these there are gold workings on several points, 

 besides the silver and platina mines which are daily becoming more 

 productive. 



The discovery of diamonds is of a still more recent date. The 

 celebrated Humboldt, struck with the geognostical analogies that 

 subsist between the Oural formation and those situated in the diamond 



* One poud is equal to 40lbs. English. 



