Roumania Past and Present by James Samuelson (lightweight ebook reader .TXT) 📖

|£1,000,475|£1,097,432|£1,199,262| +----------------------------+----------+----------+----------+


Total Imports into Great Britain from Roumania.

+--------------+---------+-----------+-----------+ | | 1878. | 1879. | 1880. | +--------------+---------+-----------+-----------+ |Maize |£587,635 | £805,788 | £558,745 | |Barley | 316,402 | 462,622 | 796,808 | |Other produce | 66,518 | 104,592 | 106,283 | +--------------+---------+-----------+-----------+ |Total |£970,555 |£1,373,002 |£1,461,836 | +--------------+---------+-----------+-----------+

The manufacturing industries of Roumania generally are hardly in their infancy, but at Galatz are to be found a wood factory and sawmills of a very superior order, owned by Messrs. P. Goetz & Co. They are lighted with the electric light, and are doing a large and increasing export trade; indeed last year (1881), as we are informed, a cargo of deals &c. was shipped from this factory to the Panama Canal Works. There is a very large flour mill, and also the 'Galatz Soap and Candle Company;' but this last has not proved a success, inasmuch as the raw products, including stearine (which is found in Roumania as ozokerit), are all imported at a cost which interferes with their profitable employment. Whilst we are dealing with the question of manufactures, we may mention that besides the petroleum refineries referred to in a former chapter, there are in Roumania sugar factories at Chitilla and Jassy, match factories in Bucarest and Jassy, and one cloth factory. Steam mills for grinding flour abound, and there are water mills for assisting in the preparation of flannel.

This seems a small beginning, but there is much hope in the future. The same causes that militated against the prosperity of Roumania in other respects have rendered the prosecution of national industries an absolute impossibility. Wilkinson referred at considerable length to this matter sixty years since. Who would have ventured to invest capital in mills and factories which were liable to be burned or plundered by Turks or Russians for strategical or other warlike purposes, or would be taxed beyond endurance by a suzerain master for the maintenance of his Constantinople harem and of his needy officials? The soil indeed could not be carried off, or there would not have been even an agricultural industry. But the time is not far distant when the advantages of Roumania as a manufacturing country will become apparent, and when her native products, coupled with her proximity to the Danube and Black Sea, will enable her to compete successfully with other nations, especially with those near neighbours from whom she is at present compelled to draw her supplies of manufactured commodities.

Her statesmen already recognise these facts, and they are taking steps accordingly. A new seaport is in course of formation at Constanta (Kustendjie), which will be connected with Bucarest and the whole of Roumania through the existing line to Cernavoda, and one in progress to Bucarest.[50] Besides being useful as a defensive maritime station, this new port will give an impetus to trade, which will be further stimulated by the establishment of entrepôts , hitherto confined to the seaports, at Bucarest and elsewhere.

But we have devoted sufficient space to Galatz and the nascent commercial and manufacturing industries of the country, and before treating of what is by far the most important source of her wealth, namely, her agricultural resources, we must say a word or two about the old Moldavian capital, Jassy. This is picturesquely situated at an altitude of more than 1,000 feet above the sea-level, on the railway from Pascani (Galatz-Cernowitz) to Kischeneff in Russia. The number of its inhabitants is uncertain, probably about 75,000, and includes a very large proportion of Jews, who monopolise the trade and banking business of the place.[51] It stands upon three eminences, and its principal streets have been paved by contract with a London firm at a cost of 200,000£.[52] It is lighted with petroleum lamps, and is badly drained and sewered, but possesses some important buildings, and contains many fine residences belonging to the landed gentry. Besides a university where there are some men of considerable attainments, it has a museum, school of art, various secondary educational establishments, and law courts, including a court of appeal. A noteworthy circumstance connected with the inhabitants of Jassy, and which applies equally to the whole of Roumania, is that the death-rate is persistently lower and the birth-rate higher amongst the Jews than the Christians, and in fact there have been periods when the Jewish population was increasing whilst the remainder was at a standstill.[53] When Jassy ceased to be the capital of Moldavia, it claimed and was awarded compensation by the legislature; but, according to the authority just quoted, 'no payment has ever been or appears likely to be made.'

Next in importance to Galatz as a port is Ibrail, or Braila, also near the mouth of the Danube; indeed, according to Consul Sanderson, the exports of the latter exceed those of the former, whilst Galatz imports much more largely owing to its nearer proximity to the embouchure and to the fact that the steamers first touch there. The same writer believes it probable that some day Ibrail will be a more considerable port than Galatz, but both are likely to be interfered with by the new port of Constanta. The other large towns, Craiova, the former capital of Little Wallachia; Ploiesti, a considerable town, with many picturesque churches, on the line from Bucarest to Kronstadt, and the junction from whence the railway branches off to Galatz, &c.; Tirgovistea, a former capital of Wallachia, not situated on the railway; Pitesti, &c., are all interesting in their way, but not sufficiently so to detain us, and we must now direct our attention to other phases of Roumanian progress.

[Illustration: AT THE CABARET ON A HOLIDAY.]

[Footnote 48: Consular Reports, Roumania, 1878, pp. 965-966. This statement applies, we believe, to what was formerly Moldavia rather than to Wallachia. When we were in Bucarest we saw stalls in the street at which English note-paper and writing materials (if they were genuine) were sold; and one day having occasion to buy a pair of scissors we entered a shop for the purpose, and some very dear ones were shown to us. On complaining of the price we were told they were English, but that we could obtain cheap ones of Austrian manufacture at another shop close by. This we did, and although the scissors were doubtless inferior, it shows that English goods are liked and command higher prices.]

[Footnote 49: See Consular Report, Roumania, 1878, pp. 966, 968, where these statements are practically confirmed.]

[Footnote 50: Purchased by the State whilst these remarks were being written.]

[Footnote 51: Several authors, copying one another as usual without enquiry, have estimated the population at 90,000, Aurelian having fixed it at 90,236 in 1866; but when in 1877 our Vice-Consul Bonham enquired of the Mayor of Jassy, he was told that, although no satisfactory data exist, 70,000 was nearer the mark. In like manner the population of Galatz has been set down until lately at 80,000, although an English gentleman residing there maintained that it should be about 50,000. That gentleman told us that according to a recent census there turned out to be only 40,000, but he questioned that result also, inasmuch as the people do not know the object of such a proceeding and fear to make returns, and moreover the census was taken at a time when many labourers and others had left the city for a season.]

[Footnote 52: Vice-Consul Bonham's report, 1877, p. 720.]

[Footnote 53: Ibid. p. 721.]


CHAPTER VI.

AGRICULTURAL AND PASTORAL--THE PEASANT PROPRIETARY OF ROUMANIA.

Cultivated acreage of Roumania--Comparative estimates of
agricultural products; waste lands, &c.--Nature of soil--Rotation
of crops--Agricultural implements--Old-fashioned ploughs--Improved
machinery--Yield of cereals--Maize, wheat, rye, barley, &c.--(Note:
Report of M. Jooris)--Uncertainty as to yield per
acre--Estimates--Quality and value of Roumanian cereals--Slovenly
cultivation--Cost of raising cereals--Uncertainty of
estimates--Present position of agriculture--Discouragement of
immigration--Competition of the United States--Cattle--Oxen and
buffaloes--Sheep--Wool--Cheese, butter, &c.--Capabilities of the
soil--Tobacco--Cotton--Agricultural education--The Agricultural and
Sylvicultural College of Ferestreu--M. Aurelian--The grounds and
buildings--External arrangements--Experimental growth of trees,
fruits, cereals, &c.--Number of professors and pupils--Internal
arrangements for board--Cost of education--Laboratory and excellent
collections--History of the plough illustrated by models--'École
des Arts et Métiers'--Manufacture of farm requisites--School of
design--The peasantry--Their history--Varieties of tenure prior to
1864--Creation of a peasant proprietary by forced sales of
land--Success of the reform--Subsequent allotment of state
lands--The 'obligations rurales'--The dark side--Fate of
improvident peasants--Forced to sell their
labour--Quasi-servitude--The boyards or landed gentry--Improvidence
and involved condition of many--Pledged
estates--'Fermage'--Purchase of their lands by industrious peasants
and others--Decline of the boyards--Excellent qualities of the
peasantry--Great endurance--Industry of women--Education in
progress--Bright future for the peasantry--Importance of their
prosperity to the State--(Note: Comparative numbers of agricultural
and other classes).


I.

The area of Roumania, as already stated elsewhere, is about 49,252 square miles, and estimates have been made of the cultivated and uncultivated acreage, which approximate sufficiently to give us a fair idea of the agricultural condition of the country. According to those estimates, which were probably made at the period (1864) when the peasant proprietary was created, about one-fifth is employed for the growth of cereals, garden products, and vines; rather under one-third is pasturage and hay; one-sixth forest; and the remaining nine-thirtieths, or nearly a third of the whole, still remains uncultivated.[54]

[Illustration: ROUMANIAN PLOUGHSHARE.]

The soil of the country is rarely less than three to four feet in depth, is easily turned, and, as already stated, it is usually a dark argillo-siliceous earth, which is so greatly charged with humus (decaying organic matter) that manure is rarely found necessary. The rotation of crops is largely practised, usually maize, wheat, then fallow; but very poor soil, capable of producing only rye, is often allowed to lie fallow for many years together. Much of the cultivation is performed with very primitive implements, the ordinary old-fashioned plough being furnished with a share resembling the broad flattened lance-head of a harpoon, which penetrates the earth horizontally. Of late years, however, a constantly increasing number of improved ploughs, reaping, mowing, and steam threshing machines have come into use. In 1873, according to Consul Vivian's report, there were about 185,000 native ploughs against about 38,000 imported ones; but even then already there were nearly three times as many steam as there were horse threshing machines in use, and since that time the employment of all kinds of improved machinery has been greatly on the increase, and several large English and American implement makers have agencies in Roumania.[55] There is little doubt that in the course of a few years the old-fashioned agricultural implements will disappear altogether; for the configuration of the surface, which