FAMINE IN RUSSIA.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVIII, Issue 81918, 14 February 1907, Page 4

FAMINE IN RUSSIA.

TBKRIBLE SUFFERINGS OF THE PEASANTS. The official Statistical Department has issued its of the Russian crops pi 1900. Xhe figures are extremely distressing. In forty prov inces with a population of nearly 1)3,000,000 souls, the harvist has be;n below the average of the live preceding years. In twelve provinces, w th a population of nearly 8.000,01)0. the crop was about the average, and iii nineteen provinces, with a population of 24,500,000, it was above the average. The provinces which have suffered most, the inhabitants having gathered less than one fifth of the average crop, are those of Kazan, Samara, S inbirsk and ITi. Then follow the provinces of S-iratof, Pen/a. Orenburg, XijniNovgorod, with a crop of about one-fourth of the average. The province of Astrakhan, Vladimir, Voronezh.. Kaluga. Kostraina, Tula, Turgai, Yaraslay. and the lands of tiie Cossacks of the Don have yield ed about one half the uaual crop. Altogether, in the forty provinces which have suffered from bad crop-, the total amount of corn gathered j, OT2 millions below the average. Famine of the worst description h ravaging the provinces lying along both sides of the Volga, Don. Kama, and 17a. In the province of l [ fa the peasmts since the beginning of the autumn* have been living upon acorns, but these, too, are beginning to be scarce. In the province of Kazan, the Tar tars, who constitute the greater part of the popuiation are selling their wives anU daughters. It is anticipated that the number of victims in the famished provinces will he enormous. much of it his suffering hefng directly due to the malpractices of Gurko, the Assistant Minister of the Interior, in whose hands were placed millions allotted for the purchase of corn for relief,