SAINT-MARTIN

Saint-Martin, LOUIS CLAUDE, a French philosopher, born at Amboise, 18th January 1743, and died at Aurai near Chatillon, 14th October 1803. Influenced by Böhme and Mystrasin, he was a vigorous opponent of sensationalism and materialism. Of his numerous works amongst the best known are Des Erreurs et de la Vérité (1775); De l'Esprit des Choses (1800); and L'Homme de Désir (1790). See the Essai on him by Caro (1852).

St Mary Church, a town of South Devon, overlooking Babbicombe Bay, 13 mile N. by E. of Torquay, of which it is practically a suburb. Pop. (1851) 2293; (1891) 6653.

St Mary's Loch. See YARROW.

St Mary's River, the strait connecting Lakes Huron and Superior, with a 'sault' or rapids falling 20 feet.

St Maur. See MAURISTS.

St Mawes, a village of Cornwall, on an offshoot of Falmouth Harbour, 3 miles E. of Falmouth. It has a castle (1542), and from 1562 to 1832 returned two members.

founded the order of St Michael; and 'La Merveille,' the monastery proper, so called from its huge north wall of the 13th century, 246 feet long and 108 high. Beneath is a little fortified town with 200 inhabitants. See Luce, Chronique de Mont St Michel (2 vols. 1879-86).

St Moritz, a favourite watering-place in the upper Engadine (q.v.), with chalybeate, sulphurous, and other mineral waters, and a pop. of 500.

St Nazaire, a seaport of France, dept. LoireInférieure, is situated on the north side of the estuary of the Loire, 40 miles by rail W. by N. of Nantes. Between 1831 and 1887 £1,450,000 was spent on harbour improvements, extensive docks (82 acres) having been built in 1845-57 and 1864-81 to accommodate the larger vessels that were unable to get up the Loire to Nantes (q.v.). Since these began to be used the shipping of the place has increased at a very rapid rate. In 1887 there entered 755 vessels, with a total tonnage of 504,286 tons; in 1890, 1621 vessels of 860,625 tons (637 of 443,714 tons being British and 911 of 381,746 French). The most important of the imports are wine (to

St Michael's Mount, a conical and isolated granite rock in Mount's Bay, Cornwall, 3 miles E. of Penzance. It communicates with the shore by a causeway 560 yards long, which, however, is covered with water eight hours out of the twelve, and sometimes is impassable for two or three days together. The Mount is 195 feet high, is 5 furlongs in circumference, and is crowned by an old and picturesque castle-now used as a manorial resi dence-surmounted by a tower, on one angle of which there is a projecting stone lantern, popularly called St Michael's Chair.' At the base of the north or landward side of the Mount is a fishingvillage. The guarded mount' is said to have received its name from an apparition of St Michael to some hermits; and Edward the Confessor founded upon it a Benedictine priory, which in 1088 was annexed to the abbey of Mont St Michel in Normandy. After the Dissolution it became the residence of five families in turn, until it was sold in 1660 to its present proprietors, the St Aubyns. For a demolition of the notion that the mount within Cornish-speaking times has been converted from a wooded promontory to an island, see vol. iii. of Max-Müller's Chips (1870).

St Michel, MONT, an extraordinary rocky islet of the Norman department of Manche, in the bay of St Michel, 18 miles WSW. of Avranches. It is a solitary cone of granite, a thousand yards in circumference and 242 feet high. It rises sheer out of a level expanse of sand, and, though its elevation is not great, the perfectly flat environment and its pointed crest render it a most striking feature in the landscape. Till 1880-81 it was only accessible by crossing the sands at low-water, there being a firm track across them, with quicksands to right and left; but a good road was then formed along a causeway a mile in length. A Druid stronghold once, the islet, as the scene of an apparition of St Michael in 708, became the seat of a great Benedictine monastery, which, half church of God, half fortress,' has memories of Henry I., II., and V. of England, resisting the last successfully in two sieges. The Revolution transformed this celebrated place of pilgrimage into a prison, and such it remained until 1863; in 1874 it was declared a 6 monument historique,' and large sums have been spent on its restoration by Violletle-Duc and his successor. The buildings include the church (c. 1140-1521), with Norman nave and Flamboyant choir; the exquisite cloisters (1228); the Halle des Chevaliers, where Louis XI. in 1469

tar, iron and lead, wheat and flour, timber, and manure; the exports embrace chiefly brandy (11,600 to 109,600 gals.), wine, coal, wheat and flour-these four in transit-eggs and poultry, sardines, butter, bone-dust, vegetables, dyes, glass, and toys. The respective values are not returned; but in 1886 the total trade was valued at £5,124,000. Pop. (1851) 2400; (1881) 16,314; (1891) 26,461.

St Neots, a market-town of Huntingdonshire, on the Ouse, 8 miles SSW. of Huntingdon. It takes name from Alfred the Great's eldest brother, whose relics were translated from St Neot in Cornwall to a Benedictine monastery founded at Eynesbury, close by, in 974; and it has a fine parish church, with a tower 156 feet high, a corn exchange (1863), and manufactures of iron, paper, &c. Pop. (1851) 2949; (1891) 4077. See Gorham's History of Eynesbury and St Neots (2 vols. 1824).

St Nicolas, a town of Belgium, in East Flanders, 12 miles by rail W. by S. of Antwerp, stands in the midst of the district of Waes, a densely-peopled and productive agricultural region. It has a large flax-market, and manufactures cotton and woollen stuffs, lace, needles, bricks, and pottery. A flourishing trade is carried on in linens, flax, corn, &c. Pop. (1893) 28,487.

St Omer, a town of France, and second-class fortress, dept. Pas-de-Calais, stands in a marshy site, on the Aa, 26 miles SE. of Calais by rail. The chief objects of interest are the Gothic cathedral (13th-15th century), with remarkable sculptures, the ruined tower and arches of the Benedictine abbey church of St Bertin, an arsenal, a museum, and a library. A college for the educa tion of English and Irish Catholics was opened at St Omer in 1592. It was closed, however, during the Revolution, but still exists as a seminary. Alban Butler was a president, and O'Connell a student. The people carry on active manufactures of tobaccopipes, tulle, cambric, cloth, and muslin, and a brisk trade in provisions (eggs, vegetables, &c.), sugar, and spirits. Pop. (1872) 21,007; (1891) 20,829.

Saintonge, a former French maritime province, now forming mainly the department of CharenteInférieure. The capital was Saintes (q.v.).

St Paul, the capital of the state of Minnesota, occupies a commanding and elevated situation on both banks of the Mississippi, near Copyright 1892 in U.S. the mouth of the Minnesota River, by J. B. Lippincott one of its principal tributaries. It is the outgrowth of a small hamlet of voyageurs, chiefly Canadian, employed in the fur trade, and

Company.

and the two side spans 502 feet each. It is a railroad, foot, and wagon bridge, and connects with the Union Depôt by a tunnel one mile long under the city. The Merchants' Bridge, a railroad bridge, was commenced January 24, 1889, and was completed May 3, 1890. It is constructed of steel, and is 2420 feet long, including approaches.

During 1890, 10,633,021 tons of freight were received in St Louis by rail and river, and 5,872,712 tons shipped. The total bank clearings of the same year were $1,118,573,210. The receipts of grain aggregated 77,795,232 bushels, and of cotton 587,187 bales. St Louis is an important manufacturing city. In tobacco it leads the world, the product

ST MARTIN

in 1890 amounting to 52,000,000 pounds. The beer production was 58,491,814 gallons, and the value of boots and shoes manufactured was $7,000,000. Its dry-goods trade in 1890 amounted to $35,000,000, hardware $14,000,000, groceries $75,000,000, and boots and shoes $21,000,000.

In 1875 St Louis was separated from the county of St Louis and given an independent government of its own. The mayor and municipal assembly constitute the governing power. The bonded debt of the city at the close of the fiscal year ending April 13, 1891, was $21,673,100. The payment of this debt is provided for by a sinking fund. The receipts for the same fiscal year were $10,834,962;

expenditures $8,555,240. The total assessed value of real estate in 1891 was $252,031,820. See Billon, Annals of St Louis in its Early Days (1887).

St Louis, the capital of the French colony of Senegal in West Africa, is situated on a small low island near the mouth of the Senegal River. Bridges connect it with N'dar Toute, a summer watering-place, on the right bank, and with the suburb of Bouetville, the terminus of the railway, on the left bank. The mouth of the river is rendered dangerous by a shifting bar of sand. The great ocean steamers land goods and passengers at Dakar, on Cape Verde, 100 miles to the south-west, and thence they are conveyed by rail. Nevertheless, the place has a trade worth £1,000,000 a year, gums and earthnuts being exported. The climate is not healthy; water is supplied by an aqueduct 7 miles long. There are a cathedral, governor's palace, &c., and a public garden. Pop. 16,682.

St Louis. See MAURITIUS.

St Lucia, the largest of the Windward Islands, in the West Indies, 42 miles long and 15 to 20 wide, with an area of 245 sq. m. Pop. (1891) 42,220 1200 whites and 2600 East Indian coolies. The exports (sugar, cocoa, logwood, &c.) vary in value from £115,000 to £160,000; the imports vary between about the same limits. Much of the island is high and rocky land, covered with well-nigh impenetrable forest, and it contains extensive deposits of sulphur, the successful working of which was checked by the export duty. The climate is in the main healthy, a fresh trade-wind blowing almost continually. The island, discovered in 1502, was colonised by the French in 1563; but between that date and 1803, when it definitively became an English possession, it five or six times changed hands between France and England, by capture or treaty. The capital is Castries (pop. 8000). Caribbee Bark (q.v.) is sometimes called St Lucia Bark.

St Lucia Bay, a lagoon at the mouth of the Umfulosi River in Zululand, surrounded by unin habitable swamps. Cape St Lucia is a promontory to the south of the channel which connects the lagoon with the sea.

St Malo, a fortified seaport of Brittany, dept. Ille-et-Vilaine, stands 51 miles NNW. of Rennes by rail, on the estuary of. the Rance. The old town clusters all over a rocky islet that is surrounded with walls and connected with the main

land by a single narrow causeway (Sillon). Forts and batteries crown several rocks lying off the town, and the defences are completed by an old castle next the causeway. The harbour is safe, but difficult of approach; the tides sometimes rise 50 feet, and storms dash over the top of the battlements. About the end of the 17th century the people of this town reaped large fortunes by piracy in the English Channel, and the port was the headquarters of the French East India Company. Although its trade has fallen off somewhat of late, its harbour, which lies between St Malo and St entered by 1286 vessels of 222,700 tons (average for Servan, and is common to both places, is still four years ending 1890), of which 650 of 180,800 Malo exports potatoes, buckwheat, barley, butter, tons are British and 600 of 36,300 tons French. St eggs, and fruit, and imports coal (173,200 tons annually), timber, pitch, and iron. The people, 10,225 in 1886, are principally engaged in shipping pursuits. The most noteworthy features of the since 1790) and the museum. town are the cathedral (which has had no bishop This town has been the birthplace of several distinguished sons, including Chateaubriand, Maupertuis, Lamennais, Lamettrie, and the sailors Duguay-Trouin, Cartier, and Labourdonnais. The English bombarded the town in 1693 and 1695, and in 1758 an expedition led by the second Duke of Marlborough burned several vessels lying in the harbour.

Saint-Marc Girardin. See GIRARDIN.

India Islands, has since 1648 been divided between St Martin, one of the Lesser Antilles, West France and the Netherlands. It exports sugar, cotton, tobacco, maize, &c., and large quantities of salt. The French portion, a dependency of Guadeloupe, has an area of 20 sq. m, and a pop. of 3500. The Dutch portion, a dependency of Curaçao has an area of 18 sq. m. and a pop. of 4500.

SAINT-MARTIN

Saint-Martin, LOUIS CLAUDE, & Fren philosopher, born at Amboise, 18th January and died at Aurai near Chatillon, 14th October 183. Influenced by Böhme and Mystrasin, he was vigorous opponent of sensationalism and mater ism. Of his numerous works amongst the best known are Des Erreurs et de la Vérité (1775); De l'Esprit des Choses (1800); and L'Homme de Dear (1790). See the Essai on him by Caro (1852).

St Mary Church, a town of South Devon, overlooking Babbicombe Bay, 13 mile N. by E. of Torquay, of which it is practically a suburb. Pop. (1851) 2293; (1891) 6653.

St Mary's Loch. See YARROW.

St Mary's River, the strait connecting Lakes, Huron and Superior, with a 'sault' or rapids fall-e ing 20 feet.

St Maur. See MAURISTS.

St Mawes, a village of Cornwall, on an offshoot of Falmouth Harbour, 3 miles E. of Falmouth. It has a castle (1542), and from 1562 to 1832 returned two members.

St Michael's, or SAO MIGUEL, the largest ani most important of the Azores (q.v.).

St Michael's Mount, a conical and isolatei granite rock in Mount's Bay, Cornwall, 3 miles E. of Penzance. It communicates with the shore r a causeway 560 yards long, which, however. > covered with water eight hours out of the twee and sometimes is impassable for two or three together. The Mount is 195 feet high, is 5 furines in circumference, and is crowned by an out ar picturesque castle-now used as a manoria dence-surmounted by a tower, on one ac which there is a projecting stone lantern, pec called St Michael's Chair.' At the base ir ie north or landward side of the Mount is a f village. The 'guarded mount' is said received its name from an apparition Michael to some hermits; and Edward e fessor founded upon it a Benedictine pri in 1088 was annexed to the abbey of ke Michel in Normandy. After the Dis became the residence of five families in t it was sold in 1660 to its present proprier. St Aubyns. For a demolition of the the mount within Cornish-speaking times ma converted from a wooded promontory tea see vol. iii. of Max-Müller's Chips (18.

St Michel, MONT, an extraordinary rear of the Norman department of Mancue of St Michel, 18 miles WSW. of Avrace a solitary cone of granite, a thousand cumference and 242 feet high. It nee of a level expanse of sand, and, thou

is not great, the perfectly flat environmer a pointed crest render it a most string the landscape. Till 1880-81 it was by crossing the sands at low-water. La firm track across them, with quicksand and left; but a good road was along a causeway a mile in length stronghold once, the islet, as the apparition of St Michael in 708, les of a great Benedictine monastery church of God, half fortress," Henry I., II., and V. of England, successfully in two sieges. The R formed this celebrated place of prison, and such it remained u was declared a monument i sums have been spent on its r le-Duc and his sor. T

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might be expected, hangeable on the es are 154° F. in for the year. Still, average of 147 days Summer is followed changeable winter, y rainy days in the in April and May e spring.

increased during the 1, with the suburbs, , as against 918,016 in ery much during the 1889), chiefly because Come to work in the urn to their villages in 89 the population of the December, 924,466; in December 1890, 956,226. s being very imperfect, an cholera are endemic, ecially severe upon newis high from 31 to 39 but since only 28. The years been 312 to 31.6 585 the deaths exceeded e were in St Petersburg nish citizens, and 26,567 ans (16,112). The total from the Baltic provinces out 50,000.

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in selling whisky to the soldiers at Fort Snelling in the vicinity. The first log-huts were erected on the site of the city in 1840, and in 1841, at the suggestion of a Roman Catholic priest who made occasional visits, a small log-chapel was erected and dedicated to St Paul, which has given the name to the city. In 1842 the first family of American ancestry arrived, and in 1846 the hamlet had become of sufficient importance to have a postoffice. In the act of the United States congress passed in 1849 authorising the organisation of Minnesota Territory, St Paul was designated as the capital, and from that time has occupied an important position. At that period the town did not contain a brick or stone building, and the number of inhabitants was about 500, which in 1891 had become nearly 150,000. Upon the lower plateau of limestone rock are the capitol, postoffice, court-house, and large stores; the best private residences are on the upper plateau, overlooking the Mississippi. The Summit Avenue is noted for its width and the beauty and costliness of the houses. The sanitation of the city is excellent. Ample provision is made for education. In 1851 there were two small wooden schoolhouses; in 1891 there were 45 school buildings, 468 teachers, 18,000 pupils, all under the supervision of a board of education and superintendent. Besides these schools supported by the public are numerous private schools. There are several colleges, not under the control of the city or state: Macalester College, the oldest of these, was chartered in 1853, and that year opened its preparatory department, known as the Baldwin School; Hamline University, chartered in 1854, is under the control of the Methodist Church; and St Thomas College is a Roman Catholic institution. The water-works furnish a daily supply of eight million gallons. All parts of the city are reached by electric street-railways. The free City Library contains 30,000 volumes. There are 138 churches, of which 19 are Baptist, 10 Congregational, 22 Lutheran, 23 Methodist, 14 Presbyterian, 12 Protestant Episcopal, and 19 Roman Catholic. In a central depôt ten railways receive and deliver passengers. St Paul is the centre of the wholesale grocery and dry-goods business in Minnesota. Pop. (1860) 10,701; (1870) 20,030; (1880) 41,473; (1890) 133, 156.

St Paul, a bare volcanic islet, 860 feet high, in the Indian Ocean, midway between Africa and Australia, in 38° 42′ S. lat. and 77° 32′ E. long.; area, 3 sq. m. Both it and the densely vegetated New Amsterdam (26 sq. m.), 50 miles to the north, were taken possession of by France in 1843. the beaching here of H.M.S. Megara (June 1871), and the eleven weeks' detention of her crew, see Blackwood's Magazine for January 1872.-St Paul's Rocks, a group of small islets 1° N. of the equator and 540 miles from the South American coast.

St Paul de Loanda. See LOANDA.

For

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St Paul's School was founded in 1509-12 by John Colet (q.v.), dean of St Paul's, for 153 children of every nation, country, and class.' He endowed it with lands, whose yearly value has risen from £122, 4s. 74d. to £10,000; and he dedicated it to the Child Jesus, but the saint,' in Strype's words, has robbed his Master of the title.' original schoolhouse in St Paul's Churchyard was burned in the Great Fire of 1666; the second by Wren (1674) gave place in 1824 to a third; and a fourth, on a site of sixteen acres at West Kensington, near Addison Road station, was opened by Lord Selborne on 23d April 1884. This removal was effected under a scheme of the Charity Commissioners (1879), which provided for a classical school for 500 boys, a modern school for a like

ST PETERSBURG

number, and a high school for 400 girls. The boys either are day-scholars or live in one of eight boarding-houses. The governing board consists of thirteen members chosen by the Mercers' Company (to whose oversight Colet committed his foundation) and nine nominated by the universities. There are seven Oxford and Cambridge exhibitions of from £80 to £40 tenable for four years, and a Woolwich one of £50 for two years, besides six other exhibitions and thirteen prizes. The first highmaster, from 1512 to 1523, was William Lilye; and among his successors have been Richard Mulcaster (1596-1608), Alexander Gill (1608-35), his son and namesake (1635-40), Thomas Gale (1672-97), and Herbert Kynaston (1838-76). Famous Paulines have been Major André, the Hon. C. Boyle, Camden, Roger Cotes, Sir P. Francis, Halley, Leland, the Duke of Marlborough, Milton, Robert Nelson, Pepys, and Strype; and one has been infamous Judge Jeffreys. See R. B. Gardiner's Admission Registers of St Paul's School (1884).

St Peter Port, the town of Guernsey (q.v.). St Petersburg, the capital of the Russian empire, stands at the head of the Gulf of Finland, in 59° 56′ N. lat. and 39° 19′ E. long., at the mouth of the Neva. The flat and low marshy ground upon which the city is built only recently emerged from the sea, and even in historical times the hills of Pulkova and Duderhof, which are now at a distance of 9 miles from the shore, stood close by the sea. Before entering the sea the mighty Neva, which flows 36 miles from Lake Ladoga, subdivides into many branches, thus giving origin to no less than 100 islands of various sizes, the surfaces of which rapidly increase. Nearly 600 acres of land have thus been added to the area of St Petersburg during the last 150 years. When a strong wind is blowing from the sea its level rises by several feet, and the poorer parts of St Petersburg are inundated every year; but when the overflow exceeds 10 feet nearly the whole of the city is inundated too. Such was the case in 1777 and 1824, when the Neva rose 13.8 feet above its average level. In August 1891 it rose again for a few hours full 10 feet above the average. The country round St Petersburg being covered with morainic deposits, peat bog, and marshes, is of a poor aspect and so thinly peopled that the government of St Petersburg has only thirty-three inhabitants per square mile. The almost uninhabited wildernesses of Karelia, Olonetz, and Vologda, beginning at the very gates of the capital, stretch towards the north and east, while the lake-depression (see RUSSIA) and the very thinly peopled tracts of the Valdai plateau separate St Petersburg from the Russian cities of Tver, Yaroslav, and Moscow (400 miles). Within a radius of 120 miles there is not one single town worth naming, the towns nearest to the Russian capital being the now decaying Novgorod, the Finnish cities of Viborg and Helsingfors (263 miles), and the Baltic cities of Reval and Riga (449 miles). Nevertheless the mouth of the Neva was from an early period coveted by the Novgorod merchants. In the 15th century they already had their factories at the head of the delta of the Neva; so that Peter I. only followed the tradition of the Novgorodians when he took possession of the Swedish forts at the head and at the mouth of the Neva, laid the first foundations of his capital (in 1702) on one of the islands of the delta, and dreamed to make of it a new Amsterdam. dream was realised to some extent, but St Petersburg still remains isolated from the rest of the empire. One single line of railway connects it with the head of the Volga and Moscow; another with Poland and western Europe; a third with the Baltic provinces; and a fourth with Finland. The

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real connection between Russia and its capital was established through the Neva, which since it was connected by canals with the upper Volga, became the real mouth of the immense basin of the chief river of Russia and its numberless tributaries. Owing to this connection St Petersburg became, and has remained for more than 150 years, the chief port of Russia for the export of raw produce and the import of manufactured goods. Foreign trade and the centralisation of all administration in the residence of the emperor have made of St Petersburg a populous city with more than a million inhabitants and covering 42 sq. m., on the banks of the Neva and the islands formed by its branches-the Great Neva, the Little Neva, the Great Nevka, the Little Nevka, and scores of others.

The Great Neva, the chief branch, which has within the city itself a width of from 400 to 700 yards, and carries every second 1,750,000 cubic feet of very pure water, is a most beautiful river. It is so deep that large ships can lie alongside its granite embankments. But it is rather shallow at the mouth, with a narrow and sinuous channel across the bar, so that Cronstadt, built on an island 16 miles to the west of St Petersburg, remains both the fortress and the port of the capital. Since 1885 a ship-canal, 22 feet deep, admits ships to the Galernaya Harbour in the south-west corner of St Petersburg, and two-thirds of the foreign vessels unload within the city itself. The main body of the city, containing more than one-half of its inhabitants as well as all the chief streets, stands on the mainland, on the left bank of the Neva; and a beautiful granite quay, with a long series of palaces and mansions, stretches for 2 miles from the timber yards in the east to the New Admiralty in the west. Only two permanent bridges cross the Neva; the other two, built on boats, are removed in autumn and spring, as well as when the ice of Lake Ladoga comes down the Neva in the beginning of May. The island Vasilievsky, between the Great and Little Nevas, has at its head the Stock Exchange, surrounded by spacious storehouses, and a row of scientific institutions, all facing the Neva-the Academy of Sciences, the University, the Philological Institute, the Academy of Arts, and various schools and colleges. On the Peterburgskiy Island, between the Little Neva and the Great Nevka, stands the old fortress of St Peter and St Paul, facing the Winter Palace, and containing the Mint and the cathedral wherein the members of the imperial family are buried; its old-fashioned casemates are used as political prisons. It has behind it the arsenal, and a series of wide streets bordered by small, mostly wooden houses, chiefly occupied by the poorer civil service functionaries. Farther up the mainland on the right bank of the Neva is covered by the poorer parts of the city, but contains some public buildings and a great number of factories. Numerous islands, separated from each other by the small branches into which both Nevkas subdivide, and connected together by a great number of wooden bridges, are covered with beautiful parks and summer-houses, to which most of the wealthier and middle-class population repair in the summer. The main part of St Petersburg has for its centre the Old Admiralty; its lofty gilded spire and the gilded dome of St Isaac's Cathedral are among the first sights caught on approaching St Petersburg by sea. Three streets radiate from it, east-south-east, south-east, and south; the first of them the famous Nevskiy Prospect; while four canals describe irregular half-circles which intersect these three streets at right angles. The street architecture, with its huge brick houses covered with stucco and mostly painted gray, is rigid and

95

military in aspect. But the canals and the bridges which span them, the width of the chief streets, and an occasional glimpse of the Neva or of some broad square break the monotony.

A spacious square, planted with trees, encloses the Old Admiralty on three sides. To the east of it rise the huge and magnificent mass of the Winter Palace, the Hermitage Gallery of Art, and the semicircular buildings of the general staff, which surround a square facing the palace, and adorned by the Alexandra column, a shaft of red granite 84 feet high. To the west of the Admiralty is the Petrovskiy Square, where prances the wellknown statue of Peter I.-the work of Falconet -on an immense block of granite brought from Finland. The cathedral of St Isaac of Dalmatia, in the south of it, is an almost cubic building (330 feet long, 290 broad, and 310 high), surmounted by one large and lofty and four small gilded domes. This church, erected by Nicholas I., is devoid of architectural beauty, but its peristyles of immense red granite monoliths give it a character of rude majesty. Its interior decorations are very rich, and it contains pictures painted by the best representatives of Russian art during the last half century. A somewhat stiff monument to Nicholas I. by Baron Clodt stands on a large square to the south of the cathedral.

The Nevskiy Prospect is one of the finest streets of the world, not so much for its houses they are of a very mixed and mostly vulgar architecture-as for its immense width and length, the crowds which overflow its broad trottoirs, and the vehicles which glide over its wooden pavement. It runs for 3200 yards, with a width of 130 feet, from the Admiralty to the Moscow railway station, and thence with a slow bend towards the south for another 1650 yards, to reach again the Neva near the Smolnyi convent. About midway in its first part it passes by the Kazan cathedral, the Gostinoi Dvor-a twostoried building containing numerous shops-the public library, the square of Catharine II. adorned with a gorgeous but tasteless statue of the empress, and the Anitchkoff Palace. It crosses the Fontanka on a broad bridge adorned by four groups in bronze of wild horses with their tamers.

The climate is less severe than might be expected, but it is unhealthy and very changeable on the whole. The average temperatures are 154° F. in January, 64° in July, and 386° for the year. Still, the Neva remains frozen for an average of 147 days every year. A short but hot summer is followed by a damp autumn and very changeable winter, severe frosts being followed by rainy days in the midst of winter, and returning in April and May after the first warm days of the spring.

The population has rapidly increased during the 19th century, and attained, with the suburbs, 1,036,324 in December 1890, as against 918,016 in 1881. But it decreases very much during the summer (849,315 in July 1889), chiefly because masses of peasants who come to work in the factories in winter time return to their villages in summer. Thus in July 1889 the population of the city proper was 724, 102; in December, 924,466; in July 1890, 731,336; in December 1890, 956,226. The sanitary arrangements being very imperfect, typhoid fever and European cholera are endemic, and their attacks are especially severe upon newcomers. The mortality is high: from 31 to 39 per thousand before 1885, but since only 28. The birth-rate has for many years been 312 to 316 per thousand. Before 1885 the deaths exceeded the births. In 1881 there were in St Petersburg no less than 22,189 Finnish citizens, and 26,567 foreigners, chiefly Germans (16,112). The total German population both from the Baltic provinces and Germany attains about 50,000.