COUNT WITTE DEAD

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2409, 15 March 1915, Page 6

COUNT WITTE DEAD

PASSING OF A FAMOUS MINISTER (By Telegraph—Press Assn.—Copyright.) (Itec. March 15, 0.15 a.m.) Petrograd, March 14. Obituary—Count Witte. Sergius Yulyevitcli Witte was born in the Caucasus, of poor but noble family. Educated at Odessa, lie made . early visits to Vienna, Paris, and Ber- , lin. Then lie commenced to earn his ] living as assistant statiomnaster in a j dull, out-of-the-way place in Southern j Russia. He made a special study of ] railway tariffs, and sained the reputation of a splendid organiser. In course j of time lie became director of the South- , Western Railway, fifteen hundred miles . in. length. Next he.was appointed, j tlirough influence, first Russian Minister of Railways, and. charged with the unification of railway ' His next portfolio was that of Minister of < Ways and Communications, and in 1892 ( he was made Minister of He j won the confidence and admiration of ( Alexander 111, who looked to him to j carry . out' his favourite scheme of a ■ trans-Siberian railway. The project had j been disoussed at intervals during seve- . •ial decades, but no one had much expectation of its practical accomplishment. The immense difficulties of the project only ma'de it more attractive to Witte, and at last tW railway was built. : Witte next organised a scheme, of .which it has been said: "Its rarnifi- i cations ran through every department ; ofApolitical, social, and commercial life i in Russia. Its effeots, like those of a revolution, "will not disengage themselves for generations to come. That scheme comprised the • reform of the , Imperial Bank, the introduction of a gold standard, and the fixation of the , value of the ruble; the_ extensive employment of foreign capital, the estab- , lishment of an alcohol monopoly, the development of savings banks, the spread of technical education, the emancipation of peasants, dissenters, and heretics, as well as Jews, from the galling network of special restrictive legislation. _In a word, it embodied all the practical corrollaries of the incipient reform inaugurated by Alexan- , der 11, when he struck the rusty chains off the limbs of millions of serfs." At the close of the RussoJapanese War, Witte secured in argument with the' Japanese the conditions of peace which were ratified in the Treaty of Portsmouth. The .comparative moderation of these was considered at first something of a triumph on - Witte's part, but it is doubtful if he , gained any advantage which the Japanese had not expected to concede'.