XUV INTRODUCTION. 



is about right for Great Britain, the result will be about 1 tou or 4.5 roubles per 

 workman a day, that is, in Great Britain the workman gets in annual wages two 

 and one-half times, and in day wages, about twice as much as the Russian miner: 

 and this is so, although the prices of machinery and capital expended are indisput- 

 ably higher than in England. The cause of so great a difference lies only in this, 

 that the payment of workmen by the day or piece in Russia is about half of that 

 paid in England. 



A number of most profitable and important industrial undertakings may be 

 founded upon the cheap labour of Russia and may freely compete with the corres- 

 ponding industries of the west upon the condition, of course, of their attaining com- 

 plete development and sufficient industrial and commercial credit. The attainment of 

 this result is the more likely, the greater the degree in which wages enter into the 

 price of the product. Competition and economic and social progress tend to reduce 

 the price of all goods to such an extent that it may approach the sum paid to the 

 workmen. As capital cheapens and may be directly or indirectly lowered in its value 

 by state enterprises, it follows then that the industrial future on its external aspect, 

 that is, apart from the development of the spirit of industrial enterprise, belongs 

 beyond doubt to the countries possessing the conditions of cheap provisions and, 

 therefore, comparatively cheap wages. Russia is assured these conditions not only for 

 the present but for the far distant future. If this shall once be understood in all 

 its integrity by the Russian people in the same measure as it is by the Government, 

 the industrial success of Russia must follow rapidly, and there are many grounds 

 for thinking that the present represents the stage of transition to this future epoch 

 of the life of the Empire. 



It must now be seen, and the same conclusion is to be deduced from the more 

 minute estimate of the situation of some branches of Russian industry presented in 

 this book, that the manufacturing activity of Russia cannot be regarded otherwise 

 than as an earnest of the future. The history of the origin of the majority of the 

 industries is still very recent, and the requirements of the people who still preserve 

 the patriarchal character of their lives, are till now very simple. The preceding 

 considerations also explain the commercial peculiarities of Russia in the foreign trade, 

 the sale of raw materials and the demand for the machinery of new industries and 

 for half-manufactured goods, which have not yet become firmly established in the 

 country, in the home trade, the transport of grain and raw materials to the centres 

 of industrial activity on the one hand, and the export from those centres of a few 

 products of manufacturing activity not presenting any great variety, on the other. In 

 this sense Moscow, St. Petersburg, Warsaw and Odessa are related to the majority 

 of the other districts of Russia, as centres yielding the trade results of manufactur- 

 ing industry, while receiving from them grain, fuel and every kind of raw material. 



For the more accurate characterization of the foreign trade relations of Russia 

 a quotation is made in the form of a short summary (Table 10), of the aver- 

 age annual result, in reference to tlie quantity by weight and the value of 

 the principal groups of goods, distributing the raw and half-manufactured wares, 

 alike imported and exported by Russia, according to their origin from the three nat- 

 ural kingdoms, and taking for this purpose the data for the five years from 1884 

 to 1888. 



