Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 19.djvu/323

Rh RUSSIAN.] POLAND 311 These figures, however, have already increased considerably, especially with regard to distilleries, which yielded, in 1882-83, 6,269,500 gallons of pure alcohol ; while the sugar-works, which occupied in 1882-83 9774 men, 2636 women, and 2403 children, produced 315,460 cwts. of rough sugar and 425,800 cwts. of refined sugar. In 1882 the production reached 66,291,700 roubles in Piotrkow, 3,948,200 in Siedlce, and 1,240,230 in Suwaiki. The railways of Poland have an aggregate length of 888 miles. A line of great importance, connecting Vienna with St Petersburg, crosses the country from south-west to north-east, passing through the mining district and Warsaw, and sending a short branch to Lodz. Another important line, connecting Dantzic with Odessa, crosses Poland from north-west to south-east. A branch line, parallel to this last, connects Skiernewice with Thorn and Bromberg ; while a military railway connects the fortresses of &quot;Warsaw and Ivangorod with Brest-Litowsky, via Siedlce and Lukow, and a side line will soon connect Siedlce with Maikin on the lower Bug. The great line from Berlin to St Petersburg crosses North Suwaiki for 54 miles, between Eydtkunen and Kovno. The aggregate length of the macadamized roads, increased by 2110 miles since 1864, is now about 6700 miles. The traffic on the Polish railways is very brisk. In 1 880 the aggre- gate amount of merchandise brought to and sent from Warsaw reached respectively 36,055,000 arid 18,248,000 cwts. ; and the whole amount of merchandise conveyed on Polish railways within Poland (exclusive of the Eydtkunen and Kovno line) amounted to 81,469,000 cwts. The chief custom-houses of the Russian empire Wierzboiowo, Sosnowice,&quot; Granica, Warsaw and many minor ones are situated on the frontiers of Poland. Their aggregate imports and exports reached respectively 127,414,054 and 146,320,921 roubles in 1882. The &quot;primary cell &quot; of the administrative organization of Poland is the gmina, formerly a village commune for the common posses sion and partly also for the common cultivation of laud, which lost its characters with the introduction of serfdom, but has been taken by the law of 1864 as the basis of the organization of the peasantry in Poland. Each district is subdivided into twelve to twenty gmina-s, including several villages and all farms on its terri tory, and having a population of from 2000 to 10,000 inhabitants. All landholders of the gmina, who are in possession of at least 4 acres constitute the communal assembly of the gmina. Only the clergy men and the police officials arc excluded from it. Each member has but one vote, however extensive his property. The gmina differs thus from the Russian volost in its including, not only pea sants, but also all landed proprietors of the territory. The assembly elects the woit, or elder (the executive of the gmina), a clerk, a sottys in each village, and a tribunal consisting of iawniki, who judge all matters of minor importance, according to local customs. It also allocates the taxation among the members of the gmina, administers the common property (pasturage, grazing lands, forests), has charge of the poor, and generally deals with all questions educa tional, hygienic, and economic which concern the gmina. The cost of administration of each gmina varies from 1000 to 3000 roubles. In reality, the powers of the gmina are, however, very much limited in all but purely economical questions by a numerous bureaucracy, and especially by the &quot; chief of the district &quot; nominated by the crown ; there is also a general tendency towards transforming it into a mere auxiliary to the Russian administration, the clerk or secretary becoming its chief organ. The provincial administration is regulated by the law of December 31, 1866. Each government being subdivided into ten to twelve districts, the district administration consists of an ouyczdnyi natchalnik, or &quot; chief of the district,&quot; with a number of secretaries an 1 &quot;chancelleries&quot; (military, for recruiting; philanthropic; for mutual assurance against fire ; for finance ; and for gendarmerie). The provincial administration, under a military governor, consists in each of the ten governments of the following institutions : (1) &quot;chancellery&quot; of the governor; (2) a provincial &quot; college,&quot; with councillors corresponding to the following departments admini stration, military and police, finance, state domains, law, medicine, and insurance ; (3) a philanthropic committee ; (4) a postal depart ment ; (5) a &quot;college&quot; for finance; (6-10) departments of excise, customs, forests, control, and education. There is also in each government a special institution for the affairs of peasants. The entire administration of Poland is under the governor-general, residing at Warsaw, whose power is limited only by &quot; collegiate &quot; institutions corresponding to the different branches of administra tion. He is at the same time the commander of the entire military force of the &quot; Warsaw military district.&quot; Justice is represented by the gmina tribunals ; the justices of the peace (nominated by government) ; the syczd, or &quot;court&quot; of the justices of the peace ; the district tribunals (assizes) in each government ; and the Warsaw court-j of appeal and cassation. The prisons of Poland, with excep tion of a reformatory for boys at Studzieniec, are in a very bad state. With an aggregate capacity for only 4050 prisoners, they had in 1883 7210 inmates. Poland constitutes also a separate educational district, a district of roads and communications, an administration of justice district, and two mining districts. Pcttind has had no separate budget since 1867; its income and Finances, expenditure are included in those of the empire, and since 1881 they have ceased to appear under separate heads. The peasants arrears, which reached 663,685 in 1878, have notably increased since then, ranging from 200,000 to 600,000 roubles in each government. Perhaps no other country in Europe had so many towns (453), Municipal for the most part enjoying municipal rights according to the institu- Magdeburg and Lithuanian law, as Poland. A large number oftions. them (228) remained, however, private property, or property of the crown. In some of them the proprietors only levied rents on the holders of land that had been built upon ; while in others the dominium suprcmwn was maintained, and the proprietor exacted, not only rents, but also taxes from the inhabitants and visitors, claiming also the monopoly of selling spirits, &c. After the last insurrection, all towns with less than 2000 inhab itants were deprived of their municipal rights, and were included, under the designation of posads, in the gminas. The seignorial rights were abolished or redeemed, and those inhabitants who lived on agriculture received allotments of land redeemed by the state. But the spirit-selling monopoly was maintained, as also the &quot; servitudes.&quot; Viewed with suspicion by the Russian Government, the Polish towns received no self-government like the villages. Instead of the former elective municipal councils (which enjoyed dejure very large rights, including that of keeping their own police, while in reality they were under the rule of the nobility), Russian officials were nominated and entrusted with all the rights of the former municipal councils. These last were, however, maintained to carry out the orders of the military chiefs. The new municipal law of 1870, first introduced at Warsaw and then applied to other towns, reduced the functions of the municipal council almost to nothing, depriving it even of the right of discussing the general budget, which is established by a special administrative committee aided by three to four citizens nominated by the governor. The burgomaster, chosen by Government out of three candidates, and the members of the municipality (iawniki} elected by one section of the citizens, mostly from the poorest classes, have no authority. The burgomaster, who often is a retired private soldier, very badly paid (18 to 45 per year), is entirely dependent upon the police and the chief of the district, and has to discharge all sorts of functions (bailiff, policeman, &c.) which have nothing to do with municipal affairs. Poland naturally contains the first line of the fortifications of For- the Russian empire on its western frontier. These fortifications, tresses, however, are intended only to protect the country to the east of the Vistula, the region to the west of it, which contains the chief mining and manufacturing districts of Poland, remaining quite open to invasion. The marshy lowlands, covered with forests on the western bank of the Vistula, are a natural defence against an army advancing from the west, and they are supported by the fortresses on the Vistula connected by the Vistula railway. Their centre is at Warsaw, with Novogeorgievsk, formerly Modlin, in the north, at the mouth of the Bug, and Ivangorod, formerly Demblin, in the south, at the mouth of the Wieprz. Novogeorgievsk is a strongly fortified camp, which requires a garrison of 12,000 men, and may shelter an army of 50,000 men. The town Sierock, at the junc tion of the Bug and Narew, is now fortified to protect the rear of Novogeorgievsk. The citadel of Warsaw protects the railway bridge over the Vistula, and six forts rather out of date, however protect the capital. The fortress of Ivangorod, on the right bank of the Vistula, is now supported by six forts, four of which are situated on the right bank and two on the left. The Vistula line of fortresses has, however, the great disadvantage of being easily taken from the rear by armies advancing from East Prussia or Galicia. Brest-Litowsky, at the western issue from the marshes of the Pripet, the towns of Dubno and Lutsk, now about to be fortified, and Bobruisk constitute the second line of defence. The educational institutions of Poland are represented by a Educa- university with 1000 students in 1881 ; 18 gymnasiums and 8 pro- tion. gymnasiums for boys, with 8269 scholars in 1878 ; 3 &quot; real-schulen,&quot; with 914 scholars ; and 3279 primary schools, with 113,084 boys and 57,260 girls. There are also excellent technical schools, an insti tute of agriculture and forestry at Nowa-Alexandrya, and several seminaries for teachers. In 1881 the number of scholars was 1 to 35 of the aggregate population, only 19 per cent, of the children of school age receiving instruction in school. The Jewish children mostly are taught in the hedcrs, where they receive almost no in struction at all. The school is the great means used by the Russian Government &quot; Russi- for the so-called &quot; Russification &quot; of Poland. The teaching in the iication.&quot; former Szkoia Gtowna, now the university of Warsaw (even that of Polish literature), has been carried on in Russian since 1873, both by a few Polish professors and by the new Russian ones. Polish is taught in primary and secondary schools only twice a week, in the lower classes ; and the scholars are prohibited from speaking Polish within the walls of the lyceums. In all official communications Russian is obligatory, and a gradual elimination of Poles from the