Eight months ago the Siberian rouble still flourished—true it was easily forgeable, but the yen at that time cost only 100 Siberian roubles, which translated into today's "buffer" rouble means 50 kopecks.
Now the buffer rouble is about 2,000 to the yen.
At that time, northern Saghaliet was still in the hands of the Russian nation, and, in spite difficulties, work on the coal mines and other industries was being pushed forward, and the people were under their own administration and ruled by their own officials.
In China, eight months ago, in spite of Bolshevism and all the disorders attendant upon the revolution, Russians still had extraterritorial rights like other European nations, had their own concessions over which waved the Becoars Acne Rei:
Let us contrast this state of affairs, bad though it was, with what exists now, and see for ourselves to what socialistic mie un-[der the aegis of the Bolsheviks has Jed the country, Nikolaievsk and Okhotsk are a mass of smoke-stained ruins, with those of their inhabitants who escaped an untimely and horrible death scattered far and wide and dependent for a crust of bread on the charity of their neighbours. Blagovestchensk—that rich town, centre of an immense trade grain, and gold, and one of the chief river ports of the country—under the hand of the Jewish Commissar, Trillisser, has become the centre of a band of hungry beggars, fieeing thither from the attentions of wandering bands of russian and Chinese—_ruffians. Habarovsk, after the evacuation of the Japanese will share the same fate, for even now the people are throwing everything away in order ito flee from the rule of the Com-june. Even the proletariat—that much abused and much misled part: of the nation in whose name and for whose sake Russia has been torn into bits and placed upon the Cross—is fleeing from its saviours! Those that are left will experience all the delights of a half-starved existence, as their compatriots in "Verkhne-Udinsk are experiencing.
Suips axp Titer Goxe.
The Russian river fleet is almost non-existent, part of the ships having been burnt and part disabled for use, while ships flying the Chinese flag boldly cruise up the rivers which were once forbidden them. The ocean ficer is scattered Li over the world, owing to mismanagement and too much politics} iboing introduced into a high! specialized branch of industry. The gold mines, the fisheries and timber! works on the Amur, the Zea and} other rivers have all been destroyed! or at most are in a moribund condition, while the machinery and other' appurtenances have either been blindly destroyed or stolen.
The Soviet Council of National Industry has only succeeded in washing out 14 boods of gold iustead of 400! The Ussuriski line is wrecked, with one of the largest! bridges in ihe world, the Amur bridge, a noble structure, in the list of casualties.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.