Fifty millions of Russian subjects yield to their Czar not more than a revenue of twenty millions sterling. More cannot be extracted from the people; and, out of this, a large army of soldiers is not, it stands to reason, too liberally paid. Every member of the Russian population, taking one with another, pays eight shillings a year for being ruled imperially, with little or nothing more to pay for local government of any kind. In the same way, every Austrian pays twelve shillings; every Prussian eighteen shillings; every Frenchman forty-four shillings; and every Englishman forty-eight shillings to the resources of the nation, besides considerable sums towards local expenditure. Public expenses suggest, roughly, a nation’s wealth, and Russia, judged by this test, is inhabited by a people manifestly poor. Whenever war arises, therefore, the Czar goes abroad to borrow, and there is, every year, a deficiency in the imperial budget. If all the European money-lenders buttoned up their pockets closely, Russian war must cease. How these loan contractors will ever get back more than interest on capital, it is not easy to see; for, if borrowing continues, even the receipt of interest by them may become precarious. The only direct tax in Russia is the poll tax, yielding less than three-and-a-half millions sterling; add to it the license-duty paid by merchants and tradesmen, and the sum becomes five millions. We speak only of pounds sterling, because the value of sums stated in silver roubles (the national denomination in which Russian accounts are computed) is less clearly perceived. The customs’ duties yield five millions more to the revenue; and these duties fall entirely on the upper classes; as the Russian peasant does not make any appreciable use of foreign goods. Crown estates yield less than three millions and a half; and under the head crown estates are included mines, forests, and gold-washings, with nearly half the estates in the empire, the real annual profit obtained from each crown peasant being not more than three shillings and fourpence. The rest of the imperial revenue is extracted from the sale of brandy.