RUSSIA. 



barilla; 249,000 rubles in mats, and 150,006 rubles in 

 pitch, tar, and refin. 



The Ruffian woods confift of limes, firs, pines, birch 

 and larch-trees (larix), to which may be added fome cedars. 

 The beech and the oak are rarely feen, excepting in Kazan, 

 where the oaks appear pretty plentifully. For (hip-building 

 the larch-tree is generally ufed, though fome veflelsare con- 

 ftrufted of oak, which is brought at an almoft incredible 

 expence from the territory of Kazan to the yard of St. 

 Peterfburg. The larch, which in other countries is clafTed 

 among the evergreens, is dcciduons in Siberia. Befides the 

 aftonifhing quantity of wood that is confumed as fuel, Ruffia 

 has ample fupplies of timber for conftruttion. For, through- 

 out the whole empire, excepting St. Peterfburg, and a very 

 few other places, the houfes and churches are almoin all of 

 timber. And even at St. Peterfburg great numbers of 

 them are ftill feen, though, in purfuance of an exprefs im- 

 perial edict., no new ones are to be built. Thefe timber 

 houfes are extremely well adapted to the Ruffian climate, as 

 being much warmer than thofe conflru&ed of brick and 

 flone. Both in towns and villages the fame mode of building 

 is uniformly pra&ifed. One balk is laid upon another to 

 the height intended. The roof is formed either of boards 

 or oak (hingles ; and the interilices between the balks are 

 crammed with mofs. The Ruffian carpenters, in the whole 

 conltru&ion of a houfe, employ no other tool than an axe, 

 and a fharp circular iron, with which they (have off the bark 

 from the timber. With the axe alone they carve the orna- 

 mental comb or crcll (gnl/en), which is frequently wrought 

 with exquifite ingenuity, and carried along the ridge of the 

 roof. It appears ftrange to the foreigner that they never 

 work without gloves, yet always, even in winter, go bare- 

 headed. The generality of houfes are only of one ftory ; 

 if they have another, as is occafionally feen in towns, the 

 ftaircaleis ufually run up on the outfide. In the houles of 

 the boors, as well as thofe of the citizens, unleis they are 

 in good circumitances, are fquare holes inftead of windows, 

 provided with a wooden fhutter. Sometimes thefe apertures 

 are furnifhed with a hog's bladder, through which the light 

 enters. Only boors of property have windows of ifinglafs. 

 The boors' houfes regularly confift. of one room ; which is 

 at the fame time kitchen, cellar, hog-ftye, and the habitation 

 of the whole family ; together with the tutelary faints, who 

 have their tabernacle in one corner of the upper part of the 

 apartment, commonly however fo encrufted with fmoke as 

 hardly to be cognizable. The boor, with all his inmates, 

 cuftomarily during the winter lodges oh the (helves fattened 

 to the walls about the ftove which heats his room, and which 

 fervc:, alfo as an oven for dreffing his vi&uals. Here they 

 conftantly deep, winter and fummer, without beds or other 

 accommodations. In all the boor-houfes the door of the 

 room is uncommonly low. On account of the abundance 

 of timber, and the cheapnrfs of provifions, and confe- 

 quently the mod -rate pricS of labour, building in Ruffia is 

 not expenlive. For five hundred rubles the burgher builds 

 himlel: a houfe of five rooms, with an ice-cellar, (table, a 

 bathing-room, and the neceflary offices. The burgher- 

 houfes have withinfide a femewhat better appearance than 

 the houfes of the boors ; the walls within, and frequently 

 without, being chipped fmooth and whitened over with a 

 fort of wafli ufed for fmearing their ftoves, and which dries 

 much f.uler than mortar. Houfes in Ruffia are reckoned 

 among the moveables, and in every town there is a houfe- 

 market, where a man bargains for a houfe, packs it upon 

 fledges, and fees it up wherever he chufes. Such a houfe 

 will lail thirty years, and often longer. Convenient, how- 

 ever, as thefe timber edifices are in feveral refpects, they are 



hazardous in another point of view ; fince they may be con- 

 fidered as the occafion of fuch frequent conflagrations as 

 happen in no other country ; for, notwithftanding that in 

 towns the houfes ftand pretty diftant from each other, yet 

 there never paffes a year in which a very confiderable num- 

 ber is not a prey to the flames. This is the lefs furpriiing 

 on being informed that the common people generally flick 

 a fir lath (luchine) into the wall, lighted at the projecting 

 extremity, as a fubftitute for a candle, and that the (pre- 

 cautions againft fires, in the Ruffian provinces, are none of 

 the belt. Mr. Tooke fays, that he has himfelf feen, more 

 than once, in a provincial town, on a calm day at high noon, 

 above 130, and at one time, upwards of 200 houfes on fire. 

 The number would certainly have been much fmaller, if the 

 houfes had not been of wood, and proper precautions had 

 been taken. 



Befides the important advantages that Ruffia obtains from 

 its wood, in regard of fuel and building, this produft is 

 profitable in feveral other ways, particularly in the prepa- 

 ration of potafh. The rind of the numerous lindens that 

 grow in the diflri&s of Kazan and Aflrachan is ufefully 

 employed in the manufacture of bafket-work of all kinds ; 

 of which, as well as of malts and deals, Ruffia annually ex- 

 ports to a great amount. 



As the mines conflitute an objeft of great importance in 

 the Ruffian empire, we (hall here fubjoin, from the work 

 cited at the clofe of this article, an abridged account of 

 them. The largeft works of this kind are at prefent car- 

 ried on in the Uralian, the Altayan, and Nertfchinfkian mi- 

 neral mountains ; the iron and copper mines of Olonetz, and 

 thofe in feveral other parts of the empire, being of compara- 

 tively lefs importance. In the Uralian mountains are gold, 

 iron, and copper mines, which latter are fome of the mod 

 important in the empire. The Altayan mountains contain 

 the richefl gold and Giver fhafts, alfo veins of lead, copper, 

 and iron, impregnated with gold and filver. But in the 

 Nertfchinfkian mountains are very rich mines of lead, 

 containing gold and filver. The difcovery uf thefe fhafts, 

 as well as the origin of the proper mine-werking in Ruffia, 

 is of no older date than the beginning of the laft cen- 

 tury. The art of mining, which had its rife in the reign of 

 Peter the Great, was protected and encouraged in the year 

 1716 by a manifefto ; and in 1719 he inftituted the college 

 of mines. In the reign of the emprefs Anna, and under 

 the emprefs Elizabeth, the Ruffian mines acquired increafing 

 importance and value ; but their moll brilliant era was the 

 reign of Catharine II. The gold mines belonging to the 

 Ruffian empire are properly two ; w's. that of Berefof near 

 Ekaterinenbmg, on the Ural, which is by far the molt mate- 

 rial, and the Voytzer gold mines in the mountains of Olonetz. 

 The moll important filver mines are thofe of Kolyvan, in the 

 mineral mountains of Altay. The filver, or rather the au- 

 riferous and argentiferous lead mines of Nertfchinfk, have 

 been wrought ever fince the difcovery of them in 1704. 



From ftatements, which we cannot here detail, it appears 

 that in the interval between 1704 and 1788, there were 

 gained at all the gold and filver mines about 1000 pood of 

 gold, and about 36,000 pood of filver, amounting together 

 in value to upwards of 45,000,000 of rubles, on which the 

 expences were not more than 15,000,000 of rubles. 



The molt important copper mines are principally in the 

 Uralian, Altayan, and Olonetzian mountains. The entire 

 annual amount of the copper obtained from them is about 

 200,000 pood ; the value of which in money, reckoning 

 the pood only at 10 rubles, makes a fum of 2,000,000 of 

 rubles. 



The iron mines form, next to the falt-works, the greateft 



portion 



