The great plain of Eurasia, which borders about half the circuit of the Arctic Ocean, is undivided by topographic barriers or boundaries. It is physically a unit.

Russia.—Russia comprises more than one-half the area of Europe; the Russian Empire embraces about one-half of Europe and Asia combined, and constitutes more than one-seventh of the land surface of the earth. East and west, from St. Petersburg to Vladivostok, the distance is about six thousand miles. It has a similar position with respect to southern Europe and China as has Canada to the United States.

In latitude the country is unfortunately situated. North of the latitude of St. Petersburg the climate is too cold to grow bread-stuffs; a large part of the country is, therefore, unproductive. The central belt is forest-covered; the southern part, or "black earth" belt, comprises the greater part of the productive lands, and this region is the chief granary of Europe.

Russia is an agricultural country. Maize and rye grown for home consumption, and wheat for export, are the chief products. Flax is a leading export product, and the Russian crop constitutes about four-fifths of the world's supply. Lands too remote from markets for grain-growing produce cattle and sheep, which are grown mainly for their hides and tallow. The wool of the Don is a very coarse textile that is much used in the manufacture of American carpets; that of the arid plateaus of the southern country is a fine rug wool.

Agriculture in Russia is on a much lower plane than in western Europe. Most of the land is owned in large estates. Individual farming is rare, land tillage being usually a community affair. A village community rents or purchases a tract of land, and the latter is allotted to the families composing it, a part of the land being reserved for pasturage. The business is transacted by "elders," or trustees, who exercise a general management and supervision over the "mir," or community.

The methods of farming are not the best, and an acre of land produces scarcely one-third as much as the same area is made to yield in other states. The farming class, or peasantry, was in a condition of serfdom until within a few years. Poverty unfits them to compete with farmers of western Europe; moreover, the laws of land ownership and tenure also serve to discourage farming.

The metal and mineral resources are very great. Iron ore is abundant, and the yearly output of both is greatly increasing. There are extensive deposits in southern Russia, in the Ural Mountains, and in Poland. Coal of good quality is plentiful, and coal mining is encouraged by a heavy tariff on the foreign coal that enters regions where the home product is available. The most productive coal-fields are those of the lower Don River and of Poland.

Gold is obtained in various parts of Siberia and in the Ural Mountains, but scarcely enough is mined for the requirements of coinage. Copper is also mined in the Ural and Caucasus Mountains. More than nine-tenths of the world's supply of platinum is also obtained in the Ural Mountains. The petroleum fields of Transcaucasia have a yearly output a little greater than those of the United States.

The forest area is surpassed only by the timber belt of North America, both of which are in about the same latitudes. This area, within a very few years, is destined to be the chief lumber supply of all Europe. Moreover, the forests, the grain-growing lands, and the iron and coal constitute national resources which are surpassed in no other countries save the United States and China.

The Russian Government has done much to encourage manufactures. Steel-making in the Ural district, in Poland, and in the iron regions of the Don has progressed to the extent that home-made railway material and rolling stock are now generally used. Farming machinery is made in the cities of the grain-growing region. The manufacture of cotton, woollen, and linen fabrics has developed to the extent that the state is becoming an exporter rather than an importer of such goods.

Railway building has progressed under government aid, and about two-thirds of the 37,000 miles of track are owned by the state. The Transsiberian Railway connecting Vladivostok with the trunk lines of Europe was built by the state both for strategic and economic purposes. Large bodies of emigrants are carried into Siberia at nominal rates and are settled on lands that are practically free. The return cargoes consist of Chinese products—mainly silk textiles and tea—destined for western Europe.

A network of railways covers the grain-growing districts; trunk lines, mainly for strategic purposes, extend through Russian Turkestan to the Chinese border. For many years Russia has endeavored to acquire the territory that would afford commercial outlets to the Indian Ocean and into China. In this the state has been thwarted by two great powers—Great Britain and Japan. The construction of canals and the improvements of river-navigation are under government management, and the internal water-ways aggregate about fifty thousand miles of navigation.

The foreign commerce is changing in character as manufactures develop. Wheat, flour, timber products, flax, and petroleum are the chief exports. Cotton, tea, wool, and coal are the leading imports, the first-named coming mainly from the United States. Germany, Great Britain, France, Holland, and the United States are the chief European countries utilizing Russian trade. The commerce between Russia and China is growing rapidly. The Transsiberian railway is its chief northern outlet, and a branch of this road, now under construction, extends through to the leading commercial centres of Manchuria, to Port Arthur. A considerable amount of manufactured goods is sent to Asia Minor and the Iran countries.

The most available ports opening into the Atlantic are on the Baltic Sea, but these are blocked by ice in winter; the best ports are on the Black Sea, but the Russians do not control the navigable waters that connect them with the Atlantic.

Much of the internal trade is carried on by means of annual fairs. The most important of these are held at Nijni, (lower) Novgorod, Kharkof, Kief, and other points. At the first-named fair goods to the amount of $80,000,000 have changed hands during a single season, and the annual fair is the recognized common ground on which the oriental traders meet the buyers of European and American firms.

Unlike the schemes of colonization of other European states, the various possessions of the Czar are practically in a single area, the dependencies being contiguous. The lines between them, with few exceptions, are political rather than natural boundaries.

St. Petersburg, the capital, is the centre of finance and trade. Riga is the port from which most of the lumber is exported; it receives the coal purchased from Great Britain for the factories of the Baltic coast. The harbor of Riga is not greatly obstructed by ice. Archangel has an export trade of lumber and flax during the few months when the White Sea is free from ice. Odessa and Rostof are the grain-markets of the empire. Astrakhan is the centre of trade for the Iran countries, and Baku is the petroleum-market. Moscow is the chief focal point of the railways; and in consequence has become a great centre of manufacture and trade. Warsaw, next to Moscow, is the most important city.

Siberia.—This great territory resembles Russia in surface and climatic features. Like the former "west" of the United States, Siberia is the open "east" into which much of the surplus population of Russia, Germany, and the Scandinavian countries is moving, attracted by fine farming lands. The European emigrant becomes a producer when settled in Siberia, and, at the same time, a consumer of Russian manufactures. In five years more than one million people thus became occupants of the new country in Siberia. Russian trade is encouraged by a heavy tariff on foreign goods brought into Siberia.

Tobolsk, Tomsk, and Semipalatinsk are collecting stations for Siberian products, and each is built on navigable waters. Irkutsk receives the caravan trade that goes from Peking through Urga and Kiakhta, the frontier post of Chinese trade. Vladivostok is the great Pacific outlet and the terminus of the Transsiberian Railway. It is ice-bound in winter. Harbin, in Manchuria, China, is a Russian trading post of great commercial importance.

Bokhara and Khiva are Russian vassal states. The former was acquired chiefly as a trade-route. A railway from Krasnovodsk on the Caspian Sea extends through Merv, Bokhara, and Samarkand to Kashgar, where it meets the caravan trade from central China. The building of this railway has caused a great development of cotton-growing in these countries, which furnish Europe and America with the choice Afghan, Khiva, and Bokhara rugs.

Transcaucasia, now joined to Russia, is a part of the plateau of Iran. A railway extends across the country from Batum to Baku, connecting the Black and Caspian Seas. Transcaucasia is the petroleum region of the East. It is also noted for the Shirvan, Kabistan, Daghestan, and Kazak rugs which are sold all over Europe and America. The so-called "Cashmere" rugs are not a product of Kashmir, but are made in the town of Shemaka. Kabistan rugs are made in Kuba. Kazak fabrics are usually the sleeping-blankets of the Kazak (Cossack) rough-riders.

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