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OVERSEAS TRADEContinued from page 132ly. The apparatus of business andfinance is destroyed.This description needs to be modifiedfor Siberia, where order is being achievedand signs of a renewal of economic lifeare at hand.This may appear a painful and discouragingrecital. Any student of Russianhistory knows, however, that this isnot the first time that the country has gonethrough a severe trial and come out of it.It is safe to say that, given order, food,and clothing, and a chance to go to work,Russians will surprise every one by theirrecuperative powers.Nothing will bring order and contentmentso quickly as the mere resumption ofbusiness life, which brings us to the considerationof Russia's needs. Russiadoes not ask for charity.The leaders of the Russian Co-operativeSocieties in America, when asked as to theneeds of their millions of peasant members,submitted the following list:Foodstuffs, such as sugar, condensed milk,tea, coffee, fats, margarine, cocoa, and chocolate.Agricultural implements, tools, and, in somecases, tractors.Bar and sheet iron.Hardware.Kitchen utensils and cutlery.Machines and tools for factories and repairshops.Clothing.Shoes and sole leather.Textiles—cotton and woollen—thread.To this list may be added raw materialsfor the idle factories, such as cotton, wool,jute, coal, and pig iron.Other items are cattle for breeding purposes,seeds, and fertilizers.These needs, of course, vary from onepart of the country to another. Thenorth Caucasus and western Siberia havesurplus stocks of grain; western Siberiaalso has butter, but needs sugar verybadly. The northern and central regionsare stripped of everything.Such are Russia's most immediateneeds. What has she to offer us?Northern Russia has at this time verylittle. Because of food conditions, gangshave not gone into the forest during thewinter and felled timber as normally.Fur-hunting has also greatly decreased.Central Russia, when the Bolshevikrule shall have ended, has considerablesupplies of flax and probably accumulatedstocks of hides and skins.South Russia is better provided withgoods for exchange. The Russian EconomicLeague, in New York, recently receiveda very interesting letter from largebanking interests declaring that theycould furnish, at Black Sea ports, largelots of potash, leaf tobacco, sunflowerseed oil cake, skins, cement, and benzine.Fair quantities of manganese ore havebeen offered by other interests.Siberia has wheat, hides, skins, butter,flax, and hemp.As to practical ways and means ofdoing business at this time, these arechiefly exemplified in dealings with Siberia.Some business is being done withArchangel under official supervision.The War Trade Board has been instrumentalin despatching food and seed cargoes.One vessel has gone to the BlackSea from the United States. The AlliedBlockade Committee is watching developmentsin the Baltic Provinces and permittingtrade just as soon as conditionsmake it possible. A recent order openedEsthonia to shipments, but this is practicallygovernment buying.As regards financing shipments, thereare three principal methods available:8 4(Continued on page 86)