Page:The Boy Travellers in the Russian Empire.djvu/99

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HEN the subject of the police was dropped by our friends, Frank asked a question about the Russian people and their origin. The Doctor answered that the topic was a broad one, as the Empire contained more than a hundred different nations and tribes of people, and that they spoke forty distinct languages. Many of the smaller tribes were assimilating with the Russians and losing their distinctiveness, even though they preserved their language; but this was by no means the case throughout the Empire.

"Not in Poland, I think," said Frank, "judging by what we saw and heard, and probably not in Finland."

"Quite right," added Doctor Bronson; "and the same is the case with the German population in the Baltic provinces. Though they have long been an integral part of the Empire, there are thousands of the inhabitants who cannot speak Russian, and refuse to teach it to their children. They are less revolutionary in their ways than the Poles, but none the less desirous of preserving their national characteristics.

"The population of Russia is about one hundred millions," he continued, "and it is spread over an area of nearly if not quite seven million square miles of land. Russia occupies about one-eighth of the land surface of the globe, but is very thinly inhabited. European Russia, including Poland, Finland, and other provinces, covers two millions of square miles, while Siberia, or European Asia, extends over at least five millions. This does not include the disputed territory of the last few years in Central Asia. It is pretty certain to come under the rule of the Emperor, and will add another half-million, if not more, to his dominions.

"The inhabitants are very unevenly distributed, as they average one