Nature has provided a substitute in the splendid waterways. In about the center of European Russia, rises the Valdai plateau to a height of 1,100 feet above the sea level. This is Russia's great watershed. Near it, in Lake Volgo, rises the largest river of Europe, "Mother Volga," as the Russian ballad singers love to call it. Its entire length is 2,336 miles, or nearly the length of the Missouri; it has a basin of 590,000 square miles. Owing to the slight slope of the land, the great river flows placidly in its bed, which is fortunate since its Waters are swollen by several large rivers, so that there are points where it is seventeen miles wide. The Kama, one of the tributaries of the Volga, is 1,266 miles long; the Oka, another confluent, has a length of 633 miles. At Kazan, the Volga is 4,953 feet wide, at Jaroslaf 2,106 feet, and at Samara, 2,446 feet. It empties into the Caspian Sea, with a delta of more than seventy branches. The fish caught in this river often grow to gigantic proportions; its sturgeons, lampreys, and salmon, are highly prized. Since time immemorial, the Volga has been a great highway of trade. Kostroma, Nishni Novgorod, Kazan, Simbirsk, Saratof, and Astrakhan, are the most populous cities on its banks.
Other large rivers rise on the Valdai plateau. The Dnieper runs south, passing by Kief, and empties in the Black Sea, near Odessa. The Dwina runs northward, seeking the icy Arctic, which it enters by way of the White Sea near Archangel. The Düna takes a westerly course towards the Gulf of Riga where it empties near the city of that name. Of greater importance are the small streams which feed Lakes Ladoga and Onega, because they connect Central Russia with the Baltic Sea by means of the Neva.
European Russia is usually divided into four zones or belts, from the character of the soil and the nature of its productions; their general direction is from southwest to northeast. In the north, as a screen against the Arctic blast, is the poliessa or forest region, densely covered with lindens, birches, larches, and sycamores, with oaks on the southern fringe. These forests are invaluable to Russia where, in the absence of mountains, stone is scarce. The houses are built of wood, and fires are of common occurrence. Both lumber and fuel are supplied by these forests which originally extended to Novgorod, Moscow, and Jaroslaf. The increase in population together with the growing demand for lumber, have caused extensive clearings; but the area covered by the forests is so large, that the supply is well-nigh inexhaustible.
South of this zone are the black earth lands, extending down to the Caucasus and across the Urals, and covering in Europe an area of one hundred and fifty million acres,—equal to that of Texas. This zone derives its name from an apparently inexhaustible bed of black mold, so rich that no manure is required to produce abundant crops. Until late in the last century, and before the United States began to export its surplus harvests, this region was considered the granary of Europe. It was known in very old times since we read of it in the Heroic Age of Ancient Greece, when Jason sailed in the Argo to bring home the Golden Fleece.
Almost equal in extent is the zone of arable steppes, or prairies, once the home of the Cossack, the nomad who led here the life of a shepherd king, moving about as the condition of pasture and flock required. Most of this land is now under cultivation, and with careful farming produces good crops. These arable steppes cover an area equal to that of Iowa, Kansas, and Nebraska.
The fourth and last zone is that of the barren steppes. There is ample evidence that at some remote time these plains were covered with salt water. The Caspian Sea has a level eighty feet below that of the Black Sea, and it is therefore probable that here was a large inland sea of which the Caspian and Aral Seas are the remains. These steppes are unfit for farming. Here dwell the Kalmucks and Kirghizes, descendants of the Tartars whose yoke once pressed heavily upon Russia.
Russian Peasants