The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER TUESDAY, MAY 13, 1913. RUSSIA AND ROMANCE.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVI, Issue 7, 13 May 1913, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER TUESDAY, MAY 13, 1913. RUSSIA AND ROMANCE.

Russia is without doubt obtaining full sluu g of attention from the press all over the world at present and the Slav is being much discussed as a national factor of the future. Glimjises at tile London “Times’s” Russian supplement show the romantic side of Russian industrial life. A characteristic feature of Russian trade is the fail’s, a relic of the low state of civilisation and economical development of the people when the predominance of hand-made goods and the absence of any but general traders united to make it the only convenient place of barter. Only two of the big fairs have retained their former national importance: Nizhni Novorod and Irbit. The Nizhni Novgorod fair owes much to the fact that the Volga system connects it with the remotest centres of production. It also forms a central point in the trade routes between Europe and Asia. __ The other ‘all Russian mart’ is at Irbit, which still serves as a medium of exchange for Russian and Asiatic goods. Its importance is due to its being situated in the centre Of fur and game districts, and near to the rich northern and central I'ral. The inhabitants of some parts of Russia still live by the chase, and the pursuit of game in modern Russia has retained to a very large extent the old character of a trade, it was to a less extent a sport, but even in this respect it served utilitarian purposes, the pursuit of the more dangerous animals affording an admirable field for the development of military virtues. It is not so long ago since some of the remoter districts paid their taxes in sable skins, and it is an historical fact that the Russian Army once fed on the game and fish which it killed on the march. With the increase of population and development of farming and industries, game began to disappear. and within the last three centuries the more populous regions have gradually ceased to depend upon the chase as a means of livelihood. At the same time, falconry, and subsequently hunting with hounds and shooting came successively into favour , as the sport of the wealthier classes.

A fi-cquont cause of wonder is the: great amount of time which the Rus-, sian women of all classes devote to entirely unproductive work, which is nevertheless held to he of the highest importance to their spiritual existence —towels, hod-linen, shirts, a proms, female headdress and so forth, all eloquent of artistic tastes and religions leanings. Indeed, M. V. Stasov has said that it is in these embroideries and weavings of linen that we find the survivals of the most numerous, original, and characteristic expressions of Russian national art.