54 small cattle.* With the breeding o f cattle should be
noticed the keeping of bees, that has long existed in
the Cossack villages of the Ust-Kamenogorsk district,
where, however, notwithstanding numerous facilities,
agriculture has not progressed so much as might have
been expected. The year 1881 was favourable to the
interests of 180 beekeepers, who had 5,217 hives (1,830
remaining over from the preceding year), from which
were taken 2 7! tons of honey and 2\ tons of wax.
The abundance of live stock, copper mines, glauberite
and common salts in the province would suggest a
* The untrastworthiness of the figures is further apparent if the districts
be taken separately ; for then in the Ivarkaralinsk district, the richest
of the province in cattle, each kibitka is returned as possessing only at
the rate of 44 sheep. Information respecting the number of the Kir-
ghese herds is collected triennially, on the enumeration of the tents,
and is based upon the reports of the Kirghese themselves, without any
check. Now up to 1869 a tax, called the yasak, was imposed upon the
herds in Akmolinsk and Semipolatinsk ; the nomads therefore found it
advantageous to return as few heads of cattle as possible, and though
the impost no longer exists, the nomads do not yet believe fully in the
irrevocable abrogation of the yasak, and so retain the practice of understatement.
But whilst a Kirghese gives the smallest .figure for his own
herds, he has no objection to tell the truth about those of his neighbours,
so that it is not difficult to find out on separate occasions to what
extent the official figures differ from the actual. After comparing all
available data regarding this difference in 1881, it was judged by thè
Russians that, in order to have figures nearer the truth concerning the
Kirghese herds, it was necessary to multiply the nomad returns by three
for the Karkaralinsk and Zaisan districts, and by two for the rest of the
province. For camels, however (which had never been taxed), it sufficed
to increase the number by one-half. The following amended table for
the province in 1881 is compiled with reference to the above considera-
5 .---
Cossacks and Peasants. Kirghese.
C a m e l s ....................................... 80 104,680
H o r s e s ...................................... 36,08a 1,101,600
Horned C a t tle . 24,856 483,600
S h e e p ....................................... 32.59I 15,529,000
G o a t s ....................................... 3.747
Swine . 350
Number of families (or ten ts ) . 5.095 110,616
Large beasts to a family. 12 144
Small ,, „ 7 50
possibility of the local development of tanning, fur
dressing, stearine, soap-boiling, soda, and copper
smelting trades ; but up to the present, from want
of enterprise, not one of these branches of industry
has been vigorously commenced. Skin-dressing is
carried on in a few works resembling trade establishments,
but both the quality and quantity of work are
of small account. During 1880 and 1881 the production
of hides decreased 45 per cent. Copper-smelting,
which began to acquire a certain development 20
years ago, has fallen away of late years, and in 1881
ceased entirely on the winding up of the affairs of
Messrs. Popoff, who for a long time kept in their
hands the greater part of the mines in the Pavlodar
and Karkaralinsk districts.*
The gold industry that has long been carried on in
the Kalbinsk mountains was as productive as usual
in 1881, notwithstanding the constantly decreasing
find of gold, that at present consists there of io£ dols
to the 100 poods of sand, at which rate eight tons of
sand would need to be washed for enough gold to
make a sovereign. So poor a sand is worked with
profit only by reason of the cheapness of Kirghese
labour, and of provisions brought to the mines from the
neighbouring villages of Biisk.f
* In 1881 there were in activity 67 works (consisting of I9 tanneries,
5 soap and candle works', 7 tallow boileries, 1 oil mill, 1 brewery,
1 wire and 1 pottery manufactory, and 32 brickfields), the whole giving
employment to 400 workmen, and producing merchandise to the value
° f ¿43>257. or ^ Ii011 more than in 1880.
t In 1881 were worked 31 mines, and 526,716 tons of sand washed
(28,174 tons more than in 1880)— as much, that is, as would cover
T r a f a l g a r Square to a depth of 35 feet— and therefrom extracted 412 lbs.
of slich gold (25 lbs. mqrethan in 1880). The number of workers was:—
2,091 men, ofwhom 1,092 were Kirghese ;, 178 women, o f whom 22 only
were not Kirghese, and 127 children. Of the workmen engaged (from
a distance) 36 did not think fit to put in an appearance at the mines,