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PROGRESS OF AGRICULTURE. 5

shows—the first of which were held at Odessa and Jaroslaw, in 1844—serve also to exhibit the progress which agriculture actually makes in the different provinces.

Within the last seven years, there has been issued a physical and industrial chart of European Russia, as well as several of its govern- ments, indicating the climate, soil, products, mines, manufactories, internal improvements, imports, exports, valuations,&c., which con- tain a vast amount of information nowhere else to be found in so concise a form.

In attempting to provide express seminaries for agricultural edu- cation, more activity has been manifested in Russia, perhaps, than in any other country of Europe. Under the Emperor Paul, near the close of the last century, the idea of imparting special instruction in husbandry was formed, and the first practical school of agriculture founded about fifteen miles from St. Petersburg. Another school was established near the same city in 1804, under the patronage of the administration of the Appanages, and organized in a manner exceed- ingly appropriate to the wants and social condition of the agricultural population. In that school, theory is adapted to the capacities and education of the students, and closely followed by practical instruc- tion, which is made to extend not only to the tilling of the soil and che rotation of crops, but also to the trades most useful for the rural classes, as the weaving of linen, the preparation of leather, the making of wearing apparel, and various implements of the house- hold.

In 1832, there was founded a special Seminary of Agriculture for the peasants of the Appanages, in the neighborhood of St. Peters- burg, on the north bank of the Neva. Of the serfs owned by the Emperor, a certain proportion were annually sent to this school for the purpose of being educated in all the practical details of farming operations, according to the climate and necessities of the districts into which they are afterwards to be detailed. Modern implements of the most approved construction are provided, and the pupils in- structed in their use. The term of tuition, or rather of service, is limited to five years, and classes of sixty are annually sent out to farms in different parts of the empire, carrying with them into its remote provinces such knowledge and skill as a compulsory system of train- ing has bestowed upon them. The expense is privatel)y defrayed by the Emperor, and the project, it is stated, has resulted in success.

In 1834, an Agronomic Institute was established at Dorpat, for superior instruction in the various branches of rural economy; and in 1840, another, on a grand scale, in the government of Mohilew, on the domain of Gorigoretzk, belonging to the crown. A capital of about 38, 580 rubles(§28, 935) and a considerable tract of land, with

an agricultural population of 2, 735, were appropriated to this estab-

lishment, which is divided into two departments—one of inferior instruction, for simple cultivators, with the view of enabling them to carry out the praxis, and the other of a higher order, for the special purpose of training agriculturists for the management of large estates, and introducing upon them improved systems of husbandry.