270 CENTRAL SIBERIA. 



obvious. Ploughs that are not of Russian manufacture 

 bear the names of American and German firms, while 

 M'Cormick reapers and Deering mowers bear witness 

 on all sides to the success which has attended the 

 energy and enterprise of our cousins across the Atlantic. 

 Siberia is a vast agricultural country, which must offer 

 a steadily increasing market for agricultural machinery 

 — a fact which does not seem to have been appreciated 

 by our own manufacturers. So, as I found before long, 

 with everything else. You may travel far in Siberia 

 with the fixed intention of finding something of Eng- 

 lish make, and fail. I think a Merry weather fire-engine, 

 the chemical balances used in the gold-smelting labora- 

 tory at Irkutsk, and the " Morgan " crucibles of world 

 renown used in the same place, about exhaust the list 

 of English articles which I saw. 



And when you begin to wonder why, and to search 

 for the reason, you are reluctantly compelled to admit 

 that the fault lies at our own door. No trouble is 

 taken to comply with the requirements of the people. 

 Catalogues, when they are sent at all, are almost in- 

 variably sent in English — I know of only one honour- 

 able exception — and might just as well be written in 

 Sanskrit. -"^ Specimens of the article required are re- 

 fused, a ridiculous economy, since nothing will induce 

 the Siberian to buy what he is unable first to see 

 working for himself; and further, long credits, which 

 are invariable in the country, are rigorously tabooed. 

 So the wily German and the astute American " travel- 

 ler " steps in, and before we realise what has occurred 

 the market is gone. 



^ The same lament comes from other quarters. Compare the report of 

 the British Vice-Consul at Resht for 1902-3, in which he states that cata- 

 logues sent to him from the United Kingdom are in the majority of cases 

 useless, owing to the fact that Persians cannot read them. 



