8th we arrived at Ekaterin-Nikolskoi, a
flourishing settlement, said to contain nearly three hundred houses.
It stood on a plateau forty feet above the river, and was the best
appearing village I had seen since leaving Habarofka. The people that
gathered on the bank were comfortably clad and evidently well fed, but
I could not help wondering how so many could leave their labor to look
at a steamboat. The country was considered excellent for agriculture,
yielding abundantly all the grains that had been tried.

On the Amoor the country below Gorin belongs to the Maritime province,
which has its capital at Nicolayevsk. Above Gorin is the Province of
The Amoor, controlled by the governor at Blagoveshchensk. In the
Maritime Province the settlers are generally of the civilian or
peasant class, while in the Amoor Province they are mostly Cossacks.
The latter depend more upon themselves than the former, and I was told
that this was one cause of their prosperity. Many peasants in the
Maritime Province do not raise enough flour for their own use, and
rely upon government when there is a deficiency.

It is my opinion that the Emperor does too much for some of his
subjects in the eastern part of his dominions. In Kamchatka and along
the coast of the Ohotsk sea the people are supplied with flour at a
low price or for nothing, a ship coming annually to bring it. It has
been demonstrated that agriculture is possible in Kamchatka. When I
asked why rye was not raised there, one reply was: "We get our flour
from government, and have no occasion to make it." Now if the
government would furnish the proper facilities for commencing
agriculture, and then throw the inhabitants on their own resources, I
think it would make a decided change for the better. A self-reliant
population is always the best.

Some of the colonists on the Amoor went there of their own accord,
induced by liberal donations of land and materials, while others were
moved by official orders. In Siberia the government can transfer a
population at its will. A whole village may be commanded to move ten,
a hundred, or a thousand miles, and it has only to obey. The people
gather their property, take their flocks and herds, and move where
commanded. They are reimbursed for losses in changing their residence,
and the expense of new houses is borne by government. A community may
be moved from one place to another, and the settlers find themselves
surrounded by their former neigh