are destined to be might be called new and undeveloped, live 290,000,000 of people, who are increasing at the rate of something like 2,000,000 per year.  And these are but a few of the facts I might present to show that the early development of the Orient is the great fact America must take into account, and that it is almost a certainty that the world’s greatest possible production of gold in the future may be absorbed in the East, leaving the West to struggle with an increasing scarcity.  Indeed, Prof.  Eduard Suess, the great German authority, after giving reasons for his belief that the larger part of the gold product is used in the arts, and that all of it will soon be, points out that Asia will soon, in all probability, absorb almost the entire silver product, and that we shall then have a “crisis” indeed.

In my travels through India and the Orient generally I took notice of her enormous capacity to export wheat.  As a result, I predicted that the export, then but fairly begun, would soon menace our supremacy in the British market.  I began at the same time to study the social and industrial condition of Russia, and was soon satisfied that she was in the dawn of a great day.  I predicted the eastern extension of her enterprises, and increased political influence, especially with China, and the consequent absorption of western gold and capital generally.  It appears from the latest summary of the United States Bureau of Statistics that Russia had, on the first of January, 1892, $324,828,300 in gold in her banks, and on the last of last May $424,193,700.  If she carries out her present policy, this is less than half of the amount she will require.  On a strictly gold basis we must allow her at least $10 per capita, which would make for the empire $1,200,000,000.  But if we greatly reduce the per capita, in view of the undeveloped condition of her subjects, the amount still to be required will be enormous.  During the same four years and five months the Bank of France has increased its holdings of gold from $260,888,299 to $391,519,658; the Austrian-Hungarian Bank from $26,634,400 to $133,006,312, and the Bank of England from $109,342,800 to $232,791,709, while the Banks of Germany, Belgium, Spain, Italy, and the Netherlands have also increased their holdings some $30,000,000.  Thus we see that in these few years the leading nations have added nearly $500,000,000 to their previous hoards of gold, which shows too plainly that they are looking forward to a gold famine.  How much more will Asia demand?  In my opinion, India, notwithstanding British rule and influence there, has developed less rapidly than China will when she once comes into as intimate contact with western nations as has India, for the rigid system of caste which prevails in India and which does not exist in China has been and will be the cause of greater immobility.  It is not possible to say how long it will operate as an impediment to a high industrial development,