Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1899 American Edition.djvu/1320

 964

RUSSIA

The building capital of the whole net belonging to the State was reckoned at 1,346,677,788 roubles in gold and 724,906,895 in paper ( = 2,744,923,577 paper roubles).

The gross receipts of the railways exploited by the State in 1896 were 273,969,819 roubles, and the expenditure 157,366,602 roubles, thus showing a net income of 116,603,217 roubles, or 119,666,619 roubles, including a newly-acquired railway ; out of them 110,635,698 roubles had, however, to be paid as interest upon the capital borrowed for the purchase of these lines, thus showing a real net revenue of 9,030,921 roubles.

On the same date (January 1, 1897) the railway-net belonging to private cowi^.7awies which had standing obligations towards the State attained 8,101 miles built, and 2,465 miles building ; total, under private management, 9,566 miles (inclusive of the 516 miles of State railways rented to private companies).

The building capital of this net was reckoned at 485,012,071 roubles in gold and 477,627,778 paper roubles ( = 1,005,145,885 paper roubles). The yearly interest upon this capital attained 41,668,695 roubles.

The gross receipts from the private net attained in 1896, 140,224,306 roubles, and the expenditure was 81,851,231 roubles.

In consequence of new purchases of private railways by the State, the total debt of the private railway companies to the State was, on January 1, 1898, 253,685,615 roubles, as against 819,170,204 roubles on January 1, 1897, i.e. about 92 per cent, of their total liabilities. ^

The activity of the Transcaspian railway appears as follows : —

1896. 1897.

Goods carried ... 292,500 tons. 390,100 tons.

Gross receipts ... 5,449,030 roubles. 7,061,000 roubles.

III. Posts and Telegraphs.

The following are the postal statistics for 1896 :— Number of offices, 7,887.

Sent out.

Interior.

International.

-

Letters and Postcards. Letters with Money. Value, Pounds (1895). Periodicals & Book Post Parcels

302,500,308

16,858,164

884,560,760?.

110,037,929

3,914,959

37,893,691 564,366

18,447,040Z.

21,077,868 177,237

The length of State telegraph lines in Russia on January 1, 1895, was 78,396 English miles, and the length of wire 157,397 English miles; there were 4,623 stations. Of the total system, about nineteen-twentieths were the property of the State. The total number of telegrams carried in 1894 was 14,546,753 (and about 55,000,000 railway telegrams). The length ot the telephone lines attained 19,313 miles in 45 towns (12,669 call .stations) anil the number of telephone messages was 21,199,500, as against 10,766,000 in 1894. The actual receipts and expenditure of the posts and telegraphs combined have been as follows : —