Book I. AGRICULTURE IN RUSSIA. 107 



Cossacks and Tatars in the Crimea. The horned cattle of the native breeds are small and 

 brisk ; the cows give but little milk, which is poor and thin. A Dutch breed was intro- 

 duced by Peter the Great, near Archangel, and do not degenerate. Oxen are much less 

 used than horses as beasts of labor. '^he original Russian sheep is distinguished by a 

 short tail about seven inches in length. The Merinos and other breeds from Germany 

 have been introduced in a few places and promise success. The great graziers and breeders 

 of horses, cattle, and sheep in Russia, are the Cossacks of the Don, the Kalmucks, and 

 other Nomadic tribes. These supply the greater part of the towns both of Russia and 

 Poland with butcher's meat ; and it is their hides and tallow that form so material an 

 article of export. In the northern districts of Russia and Siberia, the chace is pursued 

 as an occupation for a livelihood or gain. The chief object is to entrap by dogs and 

 snares those animals whose skins are used as furs, and especially the sable. Next to the 

 latter animal, the grey squirrel is the most valuable ; but the skins of foxes, martins, 

 fish, otters, bears, wolves, lynxes, gluttons, ferrets, polecats, and a variety of others, are 

 taken. Tlie hunters pay a rent or tribute to government in sable skins, or in other furs 

 regulated by the value of those. 



66 i. The forests of Russia are least abundant in the southern districts; but the cold 

 region may, like Poland, be described as one entire forest, with extensive glades. Forests 

 of pine leaved trees (or needle leaved trees, as the German expression is,) are chiefly 

 indigenous in the very cold, and cold regions. These include the spruce fir, the wild, 

 and black pine, and the Siberian cedar or stone pine (Pinus cembra). The larch grows 

 on most of the Siberian mountains. Among the leafy trees, the birch is the most com- 

 mon, next the trembling poplar, willow, lime, and ash. The oak is not indigenous in 

 Siberia ; the beech, elm, maple, and poplar, are found chiefly in the southern districts. 

 Timber of construction, fuel, charcoal, bark, potashes, barilla, rosin, tar, pitch, &c., 

 are obtained from these forests, which can hardly be said to have any sort of culture 

 applied to them. 



662. The implements and operations of Russian husbandry are the most simple and art- 

 less that can well be imagined. Pallas has given figures of ploughs and other articles ; 

 the former mere crooked sticks pointed, and drawn by horses, attached by ropes of bark 

 or straw. Speaking of tlie operations, he says, " the cultivator sows his oats, his rye, oi: 

 his millet, in wastes which have never been dunged ; he throws down the seed as if he 

 meant it for the birds to pick up ; he then takes a plough and scratches the earth, and 

 a second horse following with a harrow terminates the work ; the bounty of nature 

 supplies the want of skill, and an abundant crop is produced." This applies to the 

 greater part of ancient Russia and Siberia ; but in Livonia and other Baltic provinces, 

 and also in some parts of the Polish provinces of the Ukraine, the culture is performed 

 in a superior manner with implements equal to the best of those used in Germany. In 

 the Crimea, Mary Holderness informs us that the men dig in a sitting posture, and also 

 that smiths work in the same manner, both smoking all the time ; they never grease the 

 axles of tlieir carts, which, in consequence, make a disagreeable creaking noise, 

 heard at a great distance ; when asked the reason, they answer, " we are not thieves and 



are therefore not ashamed that the world should ^2 ^,^- -_^ 



hear of our movements." The most improved form 



of their carts (fg. 82.) in use round Petersburg, is 



evidently copied from those of the Dutch, and was 



probably introduced by Peter the Great. In the ;^ 



Ukraine they thresh out their corn by dragging 



boards studded with flints over it, and preserve it 



in pits in dry soil. In the northern provinces it is often dried on roofed frames of 



different sorts (fg. 83.) as in Sweden ; and about Riga and Mittau it is even kiln dried 



in the sheaf, before it can be stacked or threshed. The manner of 83 



performing the operation of kiln drying in the sheaf, as it may ---..--- . . .--.^p-s ^ 



sometimes be applicable in North Britain or Ireland in very ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 



late and wet seasons, we shall afterwards describe. (Part III. " ^*^ ' ~~" j -i-^^^s* 



BookV. Ch. ID ' 3^ |'T~^-^ 



663. In no part of Europe are the feld operations performed xvith .,^,.,^ ,I.,Ji i^^^^^--..;:^ 



such facility as in Russia, not only from the light nature of the .^rrrr-- i''=.=;r=^ 



soil, but from the severity and long continuance of the winters, cr^...^^ yi^=is=> 

 which both pulverizes the surface and destroys weeds. The same ^*- "^ ' ^'^^ |' p g ^ -^=^ ' 

 reasons prevent grass lands, or lands neglected or left to rest, from "^ ' y ^^'^-C""'"^^^^ 

 ever acquiring a close sward, or tough rooty surface, so that even ^ZT""^/ fe^-'-^T^ 

 these are broken up with a very rude plough and very little labor. """//V^^-^^^'^'' 

 In short, there is no country in Europe where corn crops may be ^^J'^.r<W^' 

 raised at so little expense of labor as in Russia, and as no more \^i^f^'*'^ 



than one corn crop can be got in the year in almost any country, so Russia may be 

 said to be, and actually is, even with her imperfect cultivation, better able to raise im- 



