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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



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© Underwood & Underwood 



A STREET SCENE IN VERKHNE-UDINSK, 3OO MILES EAST OF IRKUTSK 



This prettily situated town is the headquarters of the Western Trans-Baikal mining- 

 administration. Tt is the junction point of the two great highways of northern Asia. South- 

 ward stretches the road to Kyakhta, to Urga (the capital of Mongolia), and to Peking. 



range that divides Siberia from Mongolia 

 are believed to be of immense value. 

 That they had not been better ascertained 

 and exploited, and that all the resources 

 of the country had not been more swiftly 

 developed, was attributed to the incom- 

 petence and, above all, to the corruption 

 of the imperial administration — a deeply 

 rooted evil, which neither well-meaning 

 emperors nor an energetic minister, if one 

 now and then appeared, had been able to 

 cure. 



Had Siberia been in the hands of 

 Americans or Canadians from 1870 to 

 1910, its revenues and population would 

 have been double what they were in the 

 latter year, for the internal river commu- 

 nications would have been improved and 

 the railway tracks into European Russia 

 would have been duplicated or triplicated. 



In 1913 men were discussing one ex- 

 pedient for increasing the trade of the 

 country which a more enterprising gov- 

 ernment would have done its best to 



