One hundred years ago
The reports on the distress in Russia grow no better. The peasants in the huge Valley of the Volga are said to be literally starving, in all the Polish provinces the scarcity is intense, and from government after government accounts come in of savage riots to pre- vent the export of grain, a sufficient proof that the people are alarmed. The Minister of Finance, moreover, has issued 25,000,000 of paper roubles to meet the distress in the worst districts, and promises 25,000,000 more, making a grant of more than £5,000,000 in all — a most significant sign. He is said, too, to be raising a fresh loan in France. The difficulties of the Government will be great, both from peculation and vast distances; but the Western impression that the disaffection will be serious is probably erroneous. The peasantry blame the traders, not the Government, and console themselves for their hunger by massacring the Jews. It is, moreover, a nearly universal fact that a year of famine is a year of quiet. The sufferers do not stir till the pinch grows sharp, and then they have not the energy to stir to purpose. We recall four geat famines, in Ireland, Orissa, in the two Shans (China) — in which later eleven millions of people perished — and in Behar, and in none of them was there anything approaching to insurrection.
The Spectator, 5 September 1891
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