Paddington they had adopted a system of case papers, and each case was numbered consecutively. The pauper carried his paper through the different institutions to which he might be transferred, and upon readmission he took up the same number again. That was an instance of how easily the thing might be carried out if the Government added a little pressure to the good will of the local bodies. The system of case papers there mentioned was certainly a very good one. As to part iv, Mr. Courtney hinted in a very gentle way that fools stepped in where angels feared to tread, and claimed himself to be on the side of the angels, but later on Mr. Courtney spoke of that wisdom which to the Greek was foolishness, and that showed that there were two possible ways of looking at a thing. Mr. Loch spoke of part iv as "sentimental statistics." Those statistics were by no means as hard and clear and firm as they should be, he wished he could have made them clearer and firmer. When he finished the first three parts he had doubted whether he ought to go any further, but he came to the conclusion that it was desirable the thing should be thrashed out. There seemed to him there was enough material for a very good discussion, and he thought that position had been proved. He did not at all object to being attacked. There were those who minimised the evil, represented at that meeting chiefly by Mr. Acworth. There seemed however no doubt that the numbers of old paupers were very great, counting as paupers everybody who received relief however small. He was inclined to think that if they knew the whole truth, it would be found that a very large number of those who received relief, received very little, but still they were in receipt of public relief. He did not doubt that good administration had a good effect, but in the first place all it did was to cause other forms of help to take the place of help from the rates. At Stepney they had practically given up out-door relief, but there were a great number who were so poor that when they were dead the parish had to bury them. Was it not possible that there might be a certain drift in town towards certain parishes? He believed it was so in districts where there was a great deal of endowment, and he felt sure that there would be a tendency to drift away from a well administered régime to another parish. Therefore they could not be certain that the evil was not so much cured as altered in its distribution. It had been suggested to him that Mr. Burt's return was taken on 1st August, and that there was no time in the year when the unions were so empty as at the beginning of August. That perhaps might be set against the possibilities of exaggeration with regard to age. Perhaps Mr. Allen would tell them whether the ages given in Mr. Burt's return could be relied upon.

Mr. ALLEN said he could not give an answer off-hand.

Mr. BOOTH said that Dr. Ogle spoke about the stigma of pauperism, and said that wealth might be disgraceful as well as poverty, but people without means who had to go before the guardians were in an entirely different position from those who

had pensions, however those pensions were obtained. Mr. Courtney said that no one could be trusted to save if the fear of want was not present. He thought that was a most astounding statement. People saved in order to get capital for business and for their children, and after that they saved for their own comfort. wished to lay stress upon the underlying character of the proposal advocated, and in that way he found little difficulty in agreeing with much that his opponents had said.

A vote of thanks to Mr. Booth terminated the proceedings.

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I.-The Russian Famine. By E. LEVASSEUR. (Translated from the Journal de la Société de Statistique de Paris, January, 1891.)

IN making this communication to the Society I am relying on the publications of the Central Statistical Commission of Russia, of which our colleague of the International Statistical Institute, M. Troinitsky, is the director. The most recent publication, which I received yesterday, bears the title, General Results of the Russian Harvest of 1891. It contains not only the results of this harvest, but a comparison with those of the three preceding years, according to governments and districts, and shows the production of cereals, potatoes, hay and straw in 1891.

As everyone knows, Russia occupies the whole of the eastern half of Europe; for its surface, as to which all writers are not in strict agreement, is, according to my estimate (based on the returns of General Strelbitsky), 5,477,000 square kilometres,' and that of Europe is 10 million square kilometres. But the sixty governments (of which ten make up the old kingdom of Poland) considered in the official returns, deal only with an area of 5,016,000 square kilometres, Finland and the European portion of the Caucasian provinces being excluded.

Comparing the general results of the year 1891 with those of the quinquennial period 1883-87, we have the following table:

Mhis is Levasseur's estimate of the area of that part of Russia which is d within the geographical boundaries of Europe; an area which does not d with that of political European Russia.

Mr. › results are published in La Récolte moyenne dans la Russie d'Europe. pauperishublished by the Central Statistical Commission, but they deal only poverty, y governments of Russia proper: in the table the ten Polish provinces guardians ted.

Compared with the average for 1883-87, the deficit of cereals (including peas) which serve for the use of man is therefore, according to this table, 257 million bushels, or 21 per cent. If we include oats, which are used as food in Russia both for men and animals, the deficit is 348 million bushels,3 i.e., 20 per cent. Comparing it, as the Russian Central Statistical Commission has done with the last three harvests, 1888-90, the deficit for the cereals (including peas) is about 21 per cent.; as compared with the first of these years, which is the best that up to the present has been recorded in Russia, it is 30 per cent.

3

Compared with 1888 there is a deficit of 30°2 per cent.

The Central Statistical Commission has calculated the mean weight of cereals of all kinds per head of inhabitants in the country districts (i.e., without taking into account the population of the towns), with the following result:—

In 1889................ 723 lbs. of cereals per head.

'90.. ..... 855

In Russia, wheat and maize having much less importance than rye and oats, we can estimate the mean weight of cereals at 48 lbs. per bushel, and the production per head is

In 1889, 151 bushels; 1890, 17.9 bushels; 1891, 12'4 bushels.

In France the production of all kinds of cereals is about 260 million hectolitres (see La France et ses Colonies, by E. Levasseur, vol. ii, p. 43), or 715 million bushels, which gives about 187 bushels per head, if we calculate on a population of 38 millions (i.e., the total population, towns included). It must be noticed, in comparing these figures with those of Russia, that the proportion for France would be much greater if we calculated only on the rural population. To convert these bushels into pounds, we should here take 52 as the factor instead of 48, because the principal crop in France is wheat, which is heavier than rye; we thus have 1,014 lbs. per head. Land is more highly cultivated in France than in Russia, and consequently the average production is greater.

VOL. LV. PART I.

It may be asked how far these figures are reliable. I answer, to the same extent as the returns of most other European States. They are collected on the spot by local administrators, and worked up by competent authorities. Like harvest returns generally, they are the outcome, not of enumerations, but of estimates; they are consequently only approximate. People can of course refuse to believe in them from a pre-conceived scepticism; but then we must give up speaking of good or bad harvests in any country, and refrain from passing any opinion on agricultural wealth, for opinions of this nature can in every country be founded with precision only on statistical data. We can check these figures and criticise them, but only by comparing them with other figures, furnished also by statistics on harvests of a similar nature, obtained during several years from the same localities, and by bringing to bear upon the official returns information obtained through private sources or by means of the press. This is what has been done, and I believe, on the whole, that the comparative measure here given of the harvest of 1891 is sufficiently well grounded to enable us to calculate fairly the consequences. Whether the deficit be 300 or 350 million bushels, it is in either

case enormous.

The causes of this failure are well known. The winter had been very hard, the late spring frosts were severe, and the cold, penetrating the ground unprotected by snow, killed the seeds; when the summer did come, the drought lasted long, and was aggravated by a persistent east wind.

The whole of Russia has not suffered to the same extent. Thus in the extreme south the harvest appears to have been good in the Caucasian provinces: but these do not form part of European Russia, and their crops are not included in the foregoing table. The grand duchy of Finland is also excluded. In short, the area of the sixty governments (including the Asiatic portions of Perm and Ufa, since their harvests are included in the total) on which the statistics bear is 5.016,030 square kilometres, and the population about 92 million souls in the middle of 1891.

This huge area covers many regions differing essentially in climate and soil. In Poland the harvest was up to the average, slightly inferior to that of 1890, but superior to that of 1889, and in this quarter there will be no scarcity.

* In this and the two following tables, the net weight of cereals and peas per head of rural popu

lation only is given, the quantity set apart for seed having been deducted.