Before I had been many days in the place I witnessed a dust-hurricane, during which it was impossible at certain moments to see from my window the houses on the other side of the street.

Amidst such primitive surroundings the colossal new church seemed a little out of keeping, and it occurred to my practical British mind that some of the money expended on its construction might have been more profitably employed.

But the Russians have their own ideas of the fitness of things.

Religious after their own fashion, they subscribe money liberally for ecclesiastical purposes--especially for the building and decoration of their churches.
Besides this, the Government considers that every chief town of a province should possess a cathedral.
In its early days Samara was one of the outposts of Russian colonisation, and had often to take precautions against the raids of the nomadic tribes living in the vicinity; but the agricultural frontier has since been pushed far forward to the east and south, and the province was until lately, despite occasional droughts, one of the most productive in the Empire.

The town is the chief market of this region, and therein lies its importance.