sent to Odessa from Khivia, Volhynia, Podolia, and Bessarabia, arrives in carts drawn by oxen. The journeys are tedious, the extreme rate of travelling being not more than fifteen miles a day; and they are costly, for the carriage of a tchetvert or seven bushels of corn varies from four to six rubles; moreover, the transport can only be effected between May and September in consequence of the deplorable state of the roads during the other seven months of the year. The result of all this is that wheat, though very cheap in the provinces we have mentioned, is quoted at very high prices comparatively at Odessa, so as not to leave foreign speculators a sufficient profit to compensate for the length of the voyage to the Black Sea, the outlay of capital, and the enormous expenses caused by the quarantines to which many goods are subject. Besides this, Odessa is the only port that offers any facilities for commerce; Kherson situated in the midst of a fertile and productive region, is only a harbour of export, and its commerce cannot possibly extend; for the ships destined to take in freight at that port must previously perform quarantine in Odessa. All the landowners are therefore forced to send their produce to Odessa, if they would have any chance of sale. But, as we have already observed, the means of communication are everywhere wanting. It must, indeed, be owned that the construction of stone-faced roads is attended with great difficulty, for throughout all the plains of Southern Russia the materials, are scarce and for the most part of bad quality, being limestone of a friable character. But might not the produce of a great part of Poland, and of all new Russia, be conveyed to Odessa by the Pruth, the Dniestr, and the Dniepr?
The only goods conveyed down the Dniestr consist at present of some rafts of timber and firewood from the mountains of Austrian Gallicia. The Russian government has repeatedly been desirous of improving the navigation of the river in compliance with the desire of the inhabitants of its banks. A survey was made in 1827, and again in 1840. Unfortunately all these investigations being made by men of no capacity led to nothing. An engineer was commissioned in 1829 to make a report on the works necessary for rendering the river practicable at Jampol, where it is obstructed by a small chain of granite. He estimated the expense at 185,000 francs, whereas it was secretly ascertained that 10,000 would be more than enough. The project was then abandoned. Thus with the best and most laudable intentions, the government is constantly crippled in its plans of amelioration whether by the incapacity or by the bad faith and cupidity of its functionaries. Last year the subject of the navigation of the Dniestr was again taken up, and it is even alleged that the Russian government has given orders for two steam-vessels destined to ply on that river.
The works on the Dniepr are scarcely in a more forward state than those of the Dniestr. It is known that below Iekaterinoslaf the course of the river is traversed by a granite chain, which extends between that town and Alexandrof, a distance of more than fifteen leagues. At the time of the conquest of the Crimea and the shores of the Black Sea, it was proposed to render navigable the thirteen rapids that form what has been improperly denominated the cataracts of the Dniepr. Works were begun at various times, but always abandoned. They were resumed under Nicholas with new ardour, but the government was soon discouraged by the enormous cost, and, above all, by the peculations of its servants. The whole amount of work done up to the present time is a wretched canal 300 yards long, more dangerous for barges to pass through than the rapids themselves. This canal was finished in 1838. The works had not yet been resumed when we left Russia in 1841. The rapids of the Dniepr are therefore still as impracticable as ever, and it is only during the spring floods, a period of a month or six weeks, that barges venture to pass them; and even then it rarely happens that they escape without accident. More than eighty men were lost in them in 1839, and a multitude of barges and rafts were knocked to pieces on the rocks. The goods that thus descend the Dniepr consist almost exclusively of timber and firewood, and Siberian iron. Corn never makes any part of the cargo, because in case of accident it would be lost beyond recovery. But what will really seem incredible is, that the German colonists settled below the rapids, are obliged to convey their produce to the Sea of Azov in order to find any market for it; hence the greater part of the government of Iekaterinoslaf, and those of Poltava and Tchernikof, watered by the Dniepr, are in a perpetual state of distress, though they have wheat in abundance; and the peasants sunk into the deepest wretchedness, are compelled every year to make journeys of 300 miles, and often more, to earn from six to seven francs a month in the service of the landowners on the borders of the Black Sea. The eastern part of the government of Iekaterinoslaf profits by the vicinity of the Sea of Azov, and tries to dispose of its corn in Taganrok, Marioupol, and Berdiansk, a port newly established by Count Voronzof.
This general survey of the means of transport possessed by Russia, is enough to show that the corn-trade of these regions owes its vast development in a great measure to fortuitous circumstances; and that the absence of easy communication, and the prohibitive system, both tend to bring it down lower and lower every year. Here follows a statement of the price of corn at Tulzin, one of the least remote points of Volhynia, and the cost of carriage to Odessa, during the years 1828–30, and 1839, 40, 41.
| 1828–30. | Rubles. | 1839–40-41. |
| Price of 100 kilogrammes of wheat on the spot | 15.30 | 63.70 |
| Cost of carriage to Odessa | 1.56 | 2.50 |
| Export Duties | 0.39 | 0.39 |
| Total | 17.25 | 66.59 |
| Or | 15.s.9d. | 61s.3d. |
From this table we see that prices rose remarkably during the latter years. We must remark, however, that the years 1828–29-30, were unusually productive, and the prices prevailing in them are by no means an average. But it is altogether obvious that with such prices, and an absolute blank in importation, the commerce of Southern Russia must necessarily perish. In 1841, the merchants could only offer the masters of merchant vessels two-and-a-half francs per sack for freight to Marseilles, while the latter can hardly realise any profit even at the rate of four francs. For Trieste they offered only twenty, and even eighteen kreutzers, whereas not less than sixty will yield any remuneration. Ship owners will not henceforth be tempted to visit Odessa in quest of gain. The English alone have obtained tolerable freights.
To all these causes of ruin are to be added the enormous charges to which merchants are subject; those of the first class pay 300 rubles for their licence, always in advance; the postage charges for letters are exorbitant; there are persons whose yearly correspondence costs 10,000, 15,000, 20,000 rubles. An ordinary letter to London pays seven and even eight rubles. Again, the great merchants not choosing to sit idle, keep up the high prices by their purchases: they may no doubt gain occasionally by these speculations, but they generally lose. Witness the disasters and failures of the year 1841. What chance of prosperity can there be for a trade that at the moment of the departure of the goods, hardly ever promises any profit at the current prices in the place of destination, and which consequently lives only on the hope of an eventual rise? How will it be with it in a few years, when the canals and railroads projected in Germany, shall have been finished? At this day the wheat of Nuremberg and Bamberg, reaches England by way of Amsterdam.
But without going so far, Southern Russia now sees growing up against it in the Black Sea a competition, which is daily becoming more formidable. The principalities of the Danube, have made immense progress in ten years, in consequence of the franchises and privileges bestowed on them by the treaty of Adrianople. Galatz and Ibraïla, now furnish a considerable quantity of corn to the foreigner; and in spite of the disadvantages of having to ascend the Danube, masters of vessels now prefer repairing to those ports on account of their administrative facilities, and above all by reason of the commercial resources which importation offers there. In 1839, Marseilles bought more than 4000 hectolitres of wheat in the markets of Galatz and
