SALVADOR. 



803 



powers. They simply resent as unfair and 

 unnatural all attempts at Russification ; they 

 stand up for their language, their creed, their 

 laws and usages, their traditional individuality. 

 They, above all things, resist, as uncalled-for 

 and needless, all interference of the imperial 

 administration, of the police, of the military 

 authorities, with what they consider absolutely 

 local and separate affairs. 



If self-government in every village, town, or 

 province were a reality ; if the various divis- 

 ions of the empire were assured of as large 

 an extent of autonomy as may really be good 

 for them such autonomy as is or was allowed 

 to the countries on the Baltic or to the Polish 

 kingdom before its final extinction in 1868 

 then, when all the members of the colossal 

 body had obtained their utmost natural devel- 

 opment, it might be found that vitality would 

 flow more spontaneously to the heart to that 

 Imperial Government and Council of " All the 

 Russias" which would then provide for the 

 general welfare and rule the common destinies. 

 The tendency of the Imperial Government has 

 always been in the contrary direction. It has 

 valued every conquest, not for its intrinsic 

 worth, but for any use it could be put to as a 

 stepping-stone to further conquests. It has 

 given foreign policy an undue preponderance 

 over all matters of mere home interest ; it has 

 trained a large school of crafty diplomatists, 

 but provided little or no instruction for able 

 administrators. It has made all peaceful insti- 

 tutions subservient to' the exigencies of the 

 war establishment, introducing even the ranks 

 and titles of military organization into every 

 branch of civil service. It has relied for in- 

 ternal order on that same array of bayonets 

 which was to open the way to foreign con- 

 quest, and made of the people an armed 

 nation ; and little respect for local rights, in- 

 stincts, or aspirations could be expected of an 

 autocracy determined to turn the country into 

 a barrack. But even in their foreign transac- 

 tions, even in their warlike enterprises, Russian 

 rulers were hampered by the baneful influence 

 of their artificial and improvident domestic sys- 

 tem. Their military successes have resulted in 

 small national advantage or prestige. On the 



side of Europe other nations present an irre- 

 sistible check to their aggressions, and the pos- 

 sible advantages to be gained from extended 

 possessions toward the south in Asia are sacri- 

 ficed by the lack of a progressive policy in 

 commercial and industrial affairs. Russia can 

 hardly aspire to be more than a second or third 

 rate naval power, and against the development 

 of her maritime commerce she has not merely 

 political but insurmountable natural obstacles 

 to contend with enormous distances, frozen 

 oceans, a scanty population, irredaimably bar- 

 ren solitudes. For her internal welfare, for 

 her pacific intercourse with her neighbors and 

 the interchange of commodities, both her posi- 

 tion and the progress of modern invention have 

 sufficiently provided. If her railways, her 

 roads, her harbors are in a backward state ; if 

 the wealth of her mines is in a great measure 

 unproductive and almost unexplored; if the 

 harvest of her rich black earth districts can 

 not withstand American competition Russia 

 has only herself to blame. Even the greatest 

 inconvenience with which the empire has to 

 struggle the scantiness of population is the 

 result of social more than of natural causes of 

 the crushing hard work to which the women are 

 doomed, of the cruel exposure of the children of 

 the poor in tender age, and especially in those 

 charitable institutions which take upon them- 

 selves the charge of vicarious maternity. The 

 country has been and is advancing at a rapid 

 rate in spite of the short-comings of the Gov- 

 ernment, and it can hardly be estimated how 

 much further its prosperity might be carried 

 by rulers who should give it a chance, who 

 should better inquire into its wants and satisfy 

 its wishes rulers who should give the country 

 peace and at least partial disarmament, and a 

 reasonable amount of freedom, self-govern- 

 ment, and sound education; who should equal- 

 ly consult the interests of every branch of 

 trade and industry on the principle of an ele- 

 vated commercial and economical policy ; who 

 should base sovereign authority on the people's 

 strong instincts of loyalty, and should not suf- 

 fer their devotional feelings to be misled by 

 the arts of a corrupt and tyrannical priest- 

 hood. 



S 



SALVADOR (REpfBLtcA DEL SALVADOR), 

 one of the five independent republics of Cen- 

 tral America. An official publication gives the 

 result of an incomplete census, taken in 1878, 

 at 482,422 (241,110 males and 241,303 females), 

 and estimates at 72,363 the number of the in- 

 habitants not absolutely counted, thus showing 

 a total population of 554,785. European sta- 

 tisticians regarded 450,000 as the maximum 

 number to be admitted for the year above 

 mentioned. In the Memoria laid before the 

 Legislative Assembly by the Minister of the 



Interior in 1878, the population of the capital, 

 San Salvador, stood at 14,059. 



The President of the Republic is Sefior Don 

 Rafael Zaldivar (May, 1876), and the Cabinet 

 of June, 1880, was composed of the following 

 ministers: Foreign Affairs, Justice, and Public 

 Worship, Sefior Don S. Gallegos; Interior and 

 Public Works, Sefior Don D. Angnlo ; Public 

 Instruction, etc., Sefior Don D. Lopez ; War and 

 Finance, Sefior Don P. Melendez. The legis- 

 lative power is vested in a Congress compris- 

 ing twelve senators and twenty-four deputies. 



