The Sun.
London, England, 1861-07-03 00:00:00

£21,164,000

£20,164,000

The above total of imports from Great Britain,
,E 6,450,000, greatly exceeds our own Board of Trade
statement of the declared value of exports to Russia
in that year, which was only £4,053,563 ; the dif-
ference, therefore, must be ascribed to the mode of
valuation, coupled with the fact that the Russian
figures include freifht and importers' profit. Of the
Russian produce taken by Great Britain in 1859
the fohowing were the proportions :
Grain
£3,200,.000
..... .
Tallow
Flax 1,550,000

......•• •••
Linseed and henapseed 1,350,000
Hemp and yarn BOO,OOO
Wool
Bristles

Of the different flags visiting.the Russian ports in
1858, 1,757 were British, 960 Russian, 9401 urkish,
685 Dutch, 628 Swedish, 529 Austrian, 494 Danish,
and 2,948 other nations. As regards the Russian
trade with China by the Kialakta frontier, the present
report removes misconceptions which are rather
widely entertained, Tea is almost the only article
imported from that country, and, with the view of
encouraging the exportation of Russian manufac-
tures in return by the Kiakhta route, the quantity
of tea conveyed by sea is limited to one or two car-
goes annually. The consequence is that the price is
so greatly enhanced as to keep down the consump-
tion of tea far below the natural demand, while the
revenue is defrauded by large quantities being
smuggled over the frontiers from the German ports.
The town of Kiakhta, where this trade is carried on,
is more than 3,500 miles from Moscow, and the tea
regions are about the same distance from Kiakhta.
Hence the internal couyeyance amounts to 7,000
miles, and raises the price of middling tea, duty-
paid, to about 6s, or 7s. the pound, or fully double
that at which it could be obtained from England
via Hamburg. The calculation is that the Russian
public, under this system, pay annually upwards of
£1,500,000 for the encouragement of an export
trade in Russian manufactures valued in the official
returns at less than £1,000,000. Mr. Erskine con-
cludes with some observations on the agriculture of
Russia. Everything in this respect is very back-
ward, but Russia in Europe alone possesses about
275,000,000 acres of arable land under cultivation,
which is half as much again as all the soil of P rance,
Austria, and Prussia added together, and about 18
per cent. of this consists of the black soil, the pro-
ductive power of which up to the present time has
been limited practically only by the difficulty of
finding a market for the produce either at home or
abroad. In abundant years a great mass of grain
is wasted, while distant regions, owing to the want
of means of communication, are afilicted with
scarcity. It is impossible to estimate with certainty
the proportion in which the produce of an average
harvest exceeds the home demand, but the excess is
far larger than the average amount of grai n exported.
The total production of Russia is believed to be
200,000,000 quarters, while during the three years
ending 1853 the mean annual export was only about
5,800,000 quarters. According to one authority the
export of grain from Russia could, if necessary, be
augmented tenfold if the foreign demand were suf-
fictently steady to induce the grower to improve his
culture and ecotiomise his crops, and if means of
internal communication were available.

THE GREAT .F 1 RE IN TOOL EY• STREET.

All hopes of finding Mr. Scott are now entirely
~one. Many opinions are entertained as to the
precise manner in which he came by his death, but
the one which seems to be most likely is that when
he saw the wall falling he rushed through a door-
way into a warehouse beyond, which door was
immediately blocked up by the fallen mass of bricks,
and the warehouse itself was a short time later
enveloped in flames. Some dozens of labourers
were yesterday busily engaged in clearing away
the fallen bricks, which they stack in square piles
of immense size. A vast quantity of wool, hemp,
jute, &c., has likewise been withdrawn from the
different basements ; this likewise is stacked in
solid piles many feet square. The steam floats still
continue to play upon the scorching masses of brick,
which in consequence throw off dense clouds of
white smoke, unlike the dark vapour emitted from
the vaults, in which tallow, bacon, &c,, is stored,
and which, driving to leeward without rising, almost
choke the passengers as they pass along.
It is now 12 days since this disastrous fire broke
out.

TIIREE SOLDIERS DROWNED.—A most sad scene
was witnessed at Scarborough on Sunday. Three men of
theath Eegiment, no wat the castle, went to the Homs,"
a tugged and dangerous part of the castle rock, on the north
side, to bathe. The place is full of quicksands, from which
accidents have several times resulted, and the three all fell
victims, their bodies being carried away by the tide. The
sad event cast a general gloom over the town, the visitors
and others assembling in great numbers as soon as the
accident became known.