In the narrow strip of low country on the north shore of the Black Sea, all the larger cities keep close to the coast. Melitopol on the Molochna (17,000 pop.), carries on considerable trade in cattle, lumber, skins, eggs and wool, and has large mills, alcohol-stills and factories, which make agricultural machinery. Berdiansk (36,000 pop.), despite its poor harbor, exports much grain, and has machine factories, mills, breweries, and fine fruit gardens and vineyards. The former great importance of Berdiansk has been inherited by Mariupol (53,000 pop.), with a good harbor at the mouth of the Kalmius, a city which possesses some factory industry, and carries on an active export trade in coal, coke, metal and grain. Still more important are the harbors at the mouths of the Don. Opposite the Don delta lies Tahanroh (75,000 pop.) with a leather and metal industry, as well as an extensive trade in grain, fish, beef, oil, bacon, leather and fruit, the most important grain exporting harbor of the Ukraine, after Odessa and Mikolaiv. In the Don delta lies Rostiv (172,000 pop.), the most important commercial city of Southeastern Ukraine, with an extensive trade in grain, cattle, wool and flax, large mills, shipyards, tobacco and machine factories. The Armenian city of Nakhichevan (71,000 pop.) forms the suburbs, as it were, of Rostiv, taking considerable part in its industrial and commercial activity. The historically memorable city of Osiv (Azof, 31,000 pop.) is an important center of the Don and Azof fishing industry, and has some grain trade. Yesk (51,000 pop.), on the eastern shore of the [338]Sea of Azof, has some grain export, and is a not insignificant importing city. The mountains and hill country of the Crimea are not properly a part of the Ukrainian territory, altho the Ukrainian element flows into the villages and cities of the land in an uninterrupted stream, while the Mohammedan Tartar population emigrates to Turkey. In the northern part of the Crimean peninsula, the economic and settlement conditions are the same as in the Pontian lowland. There is an especially important cattle-raising industry. In the southern, mountainous part of the peninsula, agriculture and cattle-raising lose their predominating importance, and fruit, wine and vegetable-cultivation, navigation and salt-making, which flourishes along almost the entire coast of the Crimea, comprise the chief occupations of the population. The chief center of salt-manufacture lies on the salt lakes and limans of Eupatoria (30,000 pop.), where also famous sanatoriums are located. In the northern foothills of the Yaila lies the ancient capital of the Khans, Bakchisarai (13,000 pop.), which has entirely preserved its oriental character, as well as the new capital of Tauria, Simferopol (71,000 pop.), the center of the fruit and wine-culture and of important fruit-canning factories. An extensive fruit trade is carried on also by Karasubazar (15,000 pop.).