PERHAPS there is no nation more feared and less understood by her neighbors to-day than Russia, the great White Bear of the North; and yet the world understands that Russia has one unswerving purpose before her, from which she never deviates from one generation to another. That purpose is the ultimate domination of the continent of Asia. All her diplomacy is shaped to that end; and where she seems to yield from time to time, it is with the object of ultimate gain in the line of her ambition. Her recent declarations in reference to maintaining the integrity of China have been a surprise to European diplomats. They had thought Russia was desirous of obtaining Chinese territory; but it is because Russia is not working for a portion of China that she opposes China's dismemberment. Her purpose is the gradual absorption of the whole Asiatic continent. The dismemberment of China would mean that the other great nations would become more firmly established than they are now within the borders of what Russia considers her ultimate boundaries. Some of them are quite firmly established there now, and to dislodge such would mean a long and expensive war. Russia is now preparing for that war, and has been for many years. To that end she is husbanding her strength and hoarding her wealth. Because her diplomacy has this one essential objective, its different phases are misunderstood; and because of the already ponderous weight of her accumulating dominion, her slow, powerful progress is heartily feared. Like a great, irresistible glacier, she is forcing a channel for herself from her frozen home to the waters of the eastern and the southern seas, and, as she moves, she is storing up the power necessary to carry her project through. Little is known of the great hoards of gold which that nation has locked up in her vaults. Some have considered Russia a very poor nation, one whose credit was questionable; and when she has negotiated loans, they have been looked upon by financiers as doubtful security; but Russia can afford to be considered a poor creditor if thereby she can keep the world in the dark as to her plans and preparations. The immediate is made secondary to the ultimate with her. Last year she contracted a loan of $20,000,000 in the United States to pay for American war ships and American locomotives. She will pay it back gradually from imposts and excises, without having to touch that which she has laid away for the time of her great stress. She is now said to be negotiating another great loan, this time of $100,000,000. The czar, who is head of both Church and State, employs the Church as a collector for the State, and as a depository for the great sacred fund. Colonel McCarty, formerly United States military attaché at St. Petersburg, and afterward an attaché in the service of the czar, where he had special opportunity for learning the facts in the matter, gives in the October 11 issue of the Independent the following striking information:— "Since the Napoleonic wars the Russian Church has had, in addition to its ordinary work, one great and specific charge intrusted to it, the hoarding of money in order to restrict the power of rival nations. Every year since 1815 Russia has added a vast sum to her secret hoard. In no war since then has she ever used a rouble of the money thus laid by. There are two great sources of revenue, both of them fully under control, and where the world could know nothing of them—Russian mines, and contributions to the church. Russia, in earlier days, was the one great gold-producing country. Since Peter's day she has been a large producer of gold, tho much larger than generally known, because only a part of the gold mined in Russia—it is mined by the government—has been reported. It has been secretly put into the church fund. The Russian mines were established by Peter the Great. But they have been very largely developed since, and in recent years gold-bearing rock has been worked to some extent, tho the great bulk of Russia's gold output has come from placer mining by convicts. "A great fund has been created by collections from the people through the church. In Russia all citizens belong to the Russian Church. Every officer and soldier and every government official and employer, from the czar to the poorest moujik, contributes weekly to the church. It has been said by those who had means to know, that church expenditures have not for eighty years past exceeded one-half of the church collections. Twenty years or more ago the author had some means of knowing the extent of the accumulations from the Russian mines. And four or five years afterward it became his fortune to be able to learn something of the total from the mines and the church collections. At this time Russia's gold hoard approximated three billions of dollars,9and to-day it is nearly four billions at the rate of accumulation. Fully half of Russia's hoard has come from gold not counted in the world's production, because secretly treasured. This information comes partly from the statements of one of the highest officials of the church at St. Petersburg, who is familiar with the extent of the accumulation. In a single church in St. Petersburg the writer has seen, on an Easter morning, a cloth of the size of a blanket, so heaped with gold, paper money, diamonds, rubies, turquoises, and jewels of all kinds, that its corners could not be brought together. Rich and poor strip themselves of wealth on these great church days. The giving up of money becomes a religious frenzy and a paroxysm of patriotism. And on every Sunday, in every church in Russia, liberal contributions are made. The church is a most thorough and effective collector. "There has been a belief generally entertained that Russia had no money and no credit. She has more money, considering the work she has to do, than any of her neighbors. She needs no credit. Russia is a slow country, but progresses very surely, and her government is never at the mercy of her money lenders. "It is an interesting fact that the stack of gold in the Russian banks has, in late years, increased about enough to absorb the recent increase in the world's gold output. The Bank of England and the continental banks have remained nearly stationary, stood still, or lost gold; but the gain in Russian banks has been very large. The modern ammunition is gold. Russia has the largest stock of it in the world, and adds to it year by year, biding her time." It had been considered that the Bank of France held the largest hoard of gold in the world, $450,000,000, and that America stood second, with something like $427,000,000 in gold; but how small are these when compared with what Russia has heaped together! Thus we can see with what a terrible perseverance this one great nation is preparing for the last great conflict. Truly, she is "biding her time;" but that time is not far distant. C. M. S.