same time, instinctively, and in view of the universal corruption of the administration, they realized that wealth was for them a tower of strength against their oppressors. At Moscow, many of the finest houses and the largest factories belong to Old Believers; at Perm, and in the mining districts of the Ural, they are the most substantial capitalists. Their success has been sufficiently marked to excite the envy of their competitors, and to arouse clamorous complaints of a threatened monopoly by them of industrial and financial undertakings. Their system of mutual assistance and support is another secret of their prosperity, and many, indifferent to their principles, have joined their ranks to profit by their tacitly recognized co-operative organization.
Among them, as in every community, there are intriguing and ambitious men, ready to make use of the enthusiasm of their more simple brethren, and to advance their own ends at the expense of their neighbors; but the Raskolniks cannot, as a body, be accused of being actuated entirely by selfish motives; they are liberal and charitable, and many of them dispense their wealth freely and generously in the endowment of schools and benevolent institutions; some, even, in the encouragement of art and literature, although, in this respect, their munificence is generally, and in conformity with their prejudices, confined to what is national and Russian.
With increasing riches, and the accompanying tendency to luxury of living, there has been considerable relaxation in the severity of their habits and practices, more inclination to mingle with the outer world and share in its duties and pleasures. Deficient education has limited the influence of this temptation, but, in the nature of things, it is destined to continue and to extend with the progress of enlightenment and of modern civil-
