1086 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



successfully promoted. Emigration agen- 

 cies have been established, traveling 

 agents employed, surveyors utilized, and 

 occasionally allotments have been made 

 for travel expenses. Along the Siberian 

 Railway there have been established suit- 

 able stations where immigrants are cared 

 for through barracks, kitchens, and hos- 

 pitals. 



Schools and churches have been pro- 

 vided for the newcomers, who are also 

 helped over the first year by grants of 

 seeds, loans of stock and machinery, 

 and other practical methods. Timber, 

 pasture, and arable lands are allotted to 

 newcomers, which may be either rented 

 or bought on very favorable terms. In- 

 struction is given along practical lines, 

 and valuable, up-to-date machinery has 

 been bought in large quantities for rent 

 or sale to actual settlers. 



In the Transbaikal region there were 

 incoming pioneers, as they termed the 

 immigrants, by the score, and in Irkutsk 

 province by the hundreds. It was only 

 in the region of Omsk that the travel 

 was in full tide, with from 2,000 to 4,000 

 arrivals each day. Travel was in fourth- 

 class cars at an expense of a quarter of 

 a cent a mile. The cars were fitted up 

 with berths, three-tiered, the lower 

 changeable at will into seats. 



Here could be seen an arriving train, 

 from which ran at top speed the men on 

 their way to obtain hot water for tea, 

 which is provided free at each station, 

 and later to buy bread at the emigrants' 

 market. The women and children await 

 in the train the arrival of bread and 

 water for their frugal meals. 



Again, at an important station would 

 be seen several hundred pioneers, hud- 

 dled in family groups on the main plat- 

 form or in sheltered places. Surrounded 

 by large bundles which contained their 

 worldly goods, they slept or ate, awaited 

 their turn in barracks, or looked forward 

 to the arrival of the train that carried 

 them to the Orient. 



Official statistics show that in 1908 

 there were 785,712 khodoki, or pioneers, 

 who entered Siberia, and that 121,204 

 returned to European Russia, making a 

 net gain for Siberia of 637,608 settlers — 

 a marked increase over 1907, when the 



net gain approximated 550,000. It is 

 said that a bad harvest in Europe would 

 swell the annual figures to a million or 

 more. 



From observation of pioneers en route 

 (of whom about 7,000 were personally 

 seen) and of actual settlers, it seemed- 

 certain that Siberia is receiving a hardy, 

 courageous, and resourceful immigra- 

 tion. In physique and deportment thty 

 appeared to be superior to the peasantry 

 between the Urals and Moscow. Natur- 

 ally the provinces nearer to Europe profit 

 most largely, and the destination of in- 

 coming pioneers is not far from 50 per 

 cent between the Urals and Omsk, 30 

 per cent to Tomsk province, 15 per cent 

 to Irkutsk province, and 5 per cent to 

 Transbaikalia. 



the: y£;nise;i valley 



Descending the Angara Valley, the 

 road passes through the pastoral country ' 

 of the Russian Bouriats, offshoots of the 

 tribes seen in China, and cross to the 

 watershed of the Yenisei. Incoming 

 pioneers are rapidly settling this region, 

 already beautiful with extensive fields of 

 grain, for which the soil is especially 

 suited. Crossing the Yenisei by a fine 

 steel bridge, half a mile long, brought 

 the train to Krasnoyarsk, the capital of 

 the province, the thriving business center 

 of the fertile upper valley (map, p. 1076). 



The Yenisei watershed, in area more 

 than one-quarter the size of all Europe, 

 is destined to be one of the great grain- 

 growing centers of the world. The grain 

 grown in these and other regions in easy 

 water communication already aggregates 

 three or more millions of tons annually, 

 which can be readily increased to five 

 million tons. There exists uncertain and 

 irregular water communication with Eu- 

 rope, which can be so improved as to 

 furnish cheap transportation and assure 

 wonderful prosperity to these inland 

 regions. 



the; taiga, or virgin-forest country 



The train soon enters the Taiga, an 

 immense region of dense forests, largely 

 of the well-known Russian birch and 

 Siberian cedar. Here appears one of the 

 strange vagaries connected with the en- 



