236 EUSSIA IN EUROPE. 



wealthy townsfolk speak German, while the peasantry, labourers, and even artisans 

 still cling to the old national speech.* 



To the period of '* Germanisation " has succeeded one of " Russification," a 

 term already employed by Catherine II. In 1835 the Russian civil code was 

 introduced, and the use of Russian in official correspondence was prescribed in 

 1850, and again in 1867. In 1877 the administration of the municipalities was 

 taken from the privileged German corporations, and the election of municipal 

 councillors intrusted to all the inhabitants complying with certain property and 

 educational qualifications. The correspondence of these municipalities is still 

 conducted " till further orders " in German, but it is to be replaced by Russian 

 in due course. In the primary schools, over 500 in Esthonia, instruction 

 is alwaj^s given in the native tongues, German retaining possession of the 

 secondary and higher schools. But the Government is taking steps for the 

 " Russification of the schools," and in the training institutions Russian already 

 prevails, and military service is shortened in favour only of those able to converse 

 in the language of their Slavonic officers. 



During the Germanic tenure the condition of the natives was truly wretched. 

 Amputation of the leg was the legal punishment of runaway serfs, and even now 

 the Esthonian mother still threatens her child with the words, Saks tuleh ! 

 " The Saxon comes ! " The Lett mother in the same way uses the term Vahzech, 

 which means German, and is at the same time the grossest insult you can offer 

 a Lett. Under Swedish rule the condition of the serfs was somewhat bettered, 

 especially in the matter of statute labour. But after the expulsion of the Swedes 

 by the Russians the privileges of the German lords were revived and confirmed 

 by imperial charter, and most of the lands of the peasantry again confiscated. 

 Serfdom lasted till 181(5 and 1819, when the p3ople were everywhere eman- 

 cipated, but received no right of any sort to the land, and the local magistracy 

 was left in the hands of the old proprietors. Since 1859, however, certain 

 lands have been secured to the peasants, and regulations were introduced 

 allowing them to purchase farms by agreement with the owners. But while the 

 boors, or farm peasantry, were thus partly emancipated, the Knechte, or farm 

 labourers, comprising nine-tenths of the rural population at the beginning of the 

 century, still remain in a deplorable state, so that many, driven by hunger, 

 emigrate to the interior of Russia, and even as far as the Crimea and the Caucasus. 

 But in other respects agriculture is much more developed than elsewhere in 

 Russia, and a due rotation of crops is generally practised. 



Topography. 

 There are few towns in the interior, and large centres of population are still 

 confined to the seaboard. Of these one of the most favourably sitviated is Bevel, 



* Germans in the Baltic Provinces : — 



Boekh's Estimate. Rittch's Estimate. 



Esthonia 14,700 12,150 



Livonia 63,300 64,120 



Kmiand 77,100 44,15 



155,100 120,420 



