Of course, travelling in Russia is no longer what it was. During the
last quarter of a century a vast network of railways has been constructed
and one can now travel in a comfortable first-class carriage from Berlin
to St. Petersburg or Moscow, and thence to Odessa, Sebastopol, the Lower
Volga, or even the foot of the Caucasus; and, on the whole, it must be
admitted that the railways are tolerably comfortable. The carriages are
decidedly better than in England, and in winter they are kept warm by
small iron stoves, such as we sometimes see in steamers, assisted by
double windows and double doors—a very necessary precaution in a land
where the thermometer often descends to 30 degrees below zero. The
trains never attain, it is true, a high rate of speed—so at least English
and Americans think—but then we must remember that Russians are rarely in
a hurry, and like to have frequent opportunities of eating and drinking.
In Russia time is not money; if it were, nearly all the subjects of the
Tsar would always have a large stock of ready money on hand, and would
often have great difficulty in spending it. In reality, be it
parenthetically remarked, a Russian with a superabundance of ready money
is a phenomenon rarely met with in real life.
In conveying passengers at the rate of from fifteen to thirty miles an
hour, the railway companies do at least all that they promise, but in one
very important respect they do not always strictly fulfil their
engagements. The traveller takes a ticket for a certain town, and on
arriving at what he imagines to be his destination, he may merely find a
railway station surrounded by fields. On making inquiries he finds to
his disappointment, that the station is by no means identical with the
town bearing the same name, and that the railway has fallen several miles
short of fulfilling the bargain, as he understood the terms of the
contract. Indeed, it might almost be said as a general rule railways in
Russia, like camel drivers in certain Eastern countries, studiously avoid
the towns. This seems at first a strange fact. It is possible to
conceive that the Bedouin is so enamoured of tent life and nomadic
habits, that he shuns a town as he would a man-trap; but surely civil
engineers and railway contractors have no such dread of brick and mortar.
The true reason, I suspect, is that land within or immediately without
the municipal barrier is relatively dear, and that the railways, being
completely beyond the invigorating influence of healthy competition, can
afford to look upon the comfort and convenience of passengers as a
secondary consideration.
It is but fair to state that in one celebrated instance neither engineers
nor railway contractors were to blame. From St. Petersburg to Moscow the
locomotive runs for a distance of 400 miles, almost as “the crow” is
supposed to fly, turning neither to the right hand nor to the left. For
fifteen weary hours the passenger in the express train looks out on
forest and morass and rarely catches sight of human habitation. Only
once he perceives in the distance what may be called a town; it is Tver
which has been thus favoured, not because it is a place of importance,
but simply because it happened to be near the straight line. And why was
the railway constructed in this extraordinary fashion? For the best of
all reasons—because the Tsar so ordered it. When the preliminary survey
was being made, Nicholas learned that the officers intrusted with the
task—and the Minister of Ways and Roads in the number—were being
influenced more by personal than by technical considerations, and he
determined to cut the Gordian knot in true Imperial style. When the
Minister laid before him the map with the intention of explaining the
proposed route, he took a ruler, drew a straight line from the one
terminus to the other, and remarked in a tone that precluded all
discussion, “You will construct the line so!” And the line was so
constructed—remaining to all future ages, like St. Petersburg and the
Pyramids, a magnificent monument of autocratic power.
Formerly this well-known incident was often cited in whispered philippics
to illustrate the evils of the autocratic form of government. Imperial
whims, it was said, override grave economic considerations. In recent
years, however, a change seems to have taken place in public opinion, and
some people now venture to assert that this so-called Imperial whim was
an act of far-seeing policy. As by far the greater part of the goods and
passengers are carried the whole length of the line, it is well that the
line should be as short as possible, and that branch lines should be
constructed to the towns lying to the right and left. Apart from
political considerations, it must be admitted that a great deal may be
said in support of this view.
In the development of the railway system there has been another
disturbing cause, which is not likely to occur to the English mind. In
England, individuals and companies habitually act according to their
private interests, and the State interferes as little as possible;
private initiative acts as it pleases, unless the authorities can prove
that important bad consequences will necessarily result. In Russia, the
_onus probandi_ lies on the other side; private initiative is allowed to
do nothing until it gives guarantees against all possible bad
consequences. When any great enterprise is projected, the first question
is—“How will this new scheme affect the interests of the State?” Thus,
when the course of a new railway has to be determined, the military
authorities are always consulted, and their opinion has a great influence
on the ultimate decision. The consequence of this is that the railway
map of Russia presents to the eye of the tactician much that is quite
unintelligible to the ordinary observer—a fact that will become apparent
to the uninitiated as soon as a war breaks out in Eastern Europe. Russia
is no longer what she was in the days of the Crimean war, when troops and
stores had to be conveyed hundreds of miles by the most primitive means
of transport. At that time she had only about 750 miles of railway; now
she has more than 11,000 miles, and every year new lines are constructed.
_Russia_, by D. M. Wallace, M.A.