The St. Petersburg Vedomosti gives particulars of the reclamation of a vast track lying between the rivers Dnieper, Pripet, Beresina, and Ptitshja, known as the Polessje region, which has been hitherto useless and in great part impassable. The works began in the year 1874, and by the end of last year a canal system of about 1,695 versts (1,130 miles) had been completed, which had already drained 1,141,000 desatins (over 5000 square miles.) Nearly one-sixth of this vast track, which had previously been an impenetrable morass, has been changed into meadow land. An area of over 1,250 square miles of forest, which was totally useless, being traversed by a network of swamps, has been thoroughly drained, the lines of swamp being cleared, deepened, and converted into drainage canals, which, unfortunately, can have only a very slight fall. Another large piece of forest, over 750 square miles in extent, hitherto practically inaccessible, has been opened up by canals and made available for useful purposes; and the remainder, amounting to about 740,000 desatins (over 2,800 square miles) has been drained and brought into a condition fit for cultivation or pasturage. The work is said to have been executed at an annual expenditure of 2b'5,000 roubles, or a little less than £40,000.
Of the dexterity of the Lithuanians in what I may call woodcraft is thus incidentally alluded to by Mr Anderson in his account of Seven Months' Residence in Jtussian Poland in 1863, which has been already cited: —
' The birch tree is, to the Polish peasant, the most useful tree of the forest. His furniture, cart, plough — in fact, all his agricultural and garden tools— are made of this wood. It seems hard and strong enough for all purposes, and serves even for the teeth of his harrow, and for the lower part of his spade, as well as for its handle. He constructs, also, out of the same material, long forks, with which he contrives to throw up to a great height the sheaves of corn gathered into their barns. In this work two men stand with their backs to the place where the sheaves are to be stored; they then stick both their forks into the same sheaf, and, upon one of them giving a grunt, up it goes, flying over their heads, to its destination.' And again: —
' Considerable ingenuity is sometimes displayed by the peasants in the execution of their work. 1 once saw a man, who had invented a kind of turning-lathe, in order that he might rapidly finish the nave of a cart-wheel upon which he was engaged. He had fixed the piece of wood on which he was at work upon two iron pivots. He then twisted a rope twice round the piece of wood; attached one end of the rope to a strong birch sapling which he had fastened in the ceiling; and, in a loop at the other end, he put his foot. He then set in motion the wood, upon which he was at work; and the spring, given by the sapling, acted as a lathe. He had in his hand a stick, with a strong crescent-shaped piece of iron fixed to it; and with this he worked away, just as if he had the best turning-lathe and chisel in the world.'
CHAPTER V.
THE black sheep, the bete noir, of the Lithuanian patriot, and of the enthusiastic forest conservator in Lithuania, is the Jew. I hold in high estimation the nation ' to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and and the promises; whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh, Christ came.' I have met with noble men and women among them. Even amongst those of them who do not consider that Jesus of Nazareth was the anointed King, whose coming was, and is still, expected by the people, there are men, arid at least one large community, manifesting a spirit such as when seen amongst Christians is held in high esteem by the more devout: but all are not such; and of them, equally with the British and the Anglo-Americans, there are worshippers of the Mighty Dollar; of them, as of the other nations named, it may be said they are like the prophet's figs — the good are very good, but the bad are very bad.*