THE DECENTRALISATION OF INDUSTRIES. \J 



now in improving the woollen industries and the pro- 

 duction of machinery ; while Belgians are rapidly im- 

 proving the iron trades in South Russia. There is now 

 not the slightest doubt and this opinion is shared, not 

 only by economists, but also by several Russian manu- 

 facturers that a free-trade policy would not check the 

 further growth of industries in Russia. It would only 

 reduce the high profits of those manufacturers who do 

 not improve their factories and chiefly rely upon cheap 

 labour and long hours. 



Moreover, as soon as Russia succeeds in obtaining 

 more freedom, a further growth of her industries will 

 immediately follow. Technical education which, 

 strange to say, has been systematically suppressed until 

 lately by the Government would rapidly grow and 

 spread ; and in a few years, with her natural resources 

 and her laborious youth, which even now tries to com- 

 bine workmanship with science, Russia would soon see 

 her industrial powers increase tenfold. She farb da si 

 in the industrial field She will manufacture all she 

 needs ; and yet she will remain an agricultural nation. 

 At present only 1,000,000 of men and women, out of 

 80,000,000 population of European Russia, work in 

 manufactures, and 7,500,000 combine agriculture with 

 manufacturing. This figure may treble without Russia 

 ceasing to be an agricultural nation ; but if it be trebled, 

 there will be no room for imported manufactured goods, 

 because an agricultural country can produce them 

 cheaper than those countries which live on imported 

 food 



The same is still more true with regard to other 

 European nations, much more advanced in their indus- 

 trial development, and especially with regard to Ger- 

 many. So' much has been written of late about the 

 competition which Germany offers to British trade, even 

 in the British markets, and so much can be learned 



2 



