NIKOLAIEFF, the chief naval station of Russia on the Black Sea, is situated in the government of Kherson, 41 miles north-west of the government capital. It stands most advantageously a little above the junction of the Ingul with the Bug, at the head of the liman, or estuary, of the Bug, and is the natural outlet for the basin of that river. The estuary, which is 23 miles long, enters that of the Dnieper; and Nikolaieff, 42 miles distant from the Black Sea, thus combines the advantages of a good seaport with those of an inland town. The entrance to the double est nary of the Bug and Dnieper is protected by the fortress of Otchakoff and by the fort of Kinburn, erected on a narrow headland opposite, while several forts surround Nikolaieff on both sides of the Bug and protect it from an attack by land. The town, which occupies two flat peninsulas between the Bug and the Ingul, extends up the banks of the latter, while its suburbs spread still farther into the steppe, the whole covering an area of 6 square miles. Immense unoccupied spaces separate the houses, which are mostly one-storied, and border on spacious streets. The bank of the Ingul is taken up with shipbuilding yards, docks, slips, and various workshops of the admiralty for the construction of armour-plates, guns, boilers, <fcc. On the river there is a floating dock for armoured ships, but Nikolaieff has this drawback that fully armoured ships are unable to pass the bar, which is only 18 to 21 feet deep. Before the Crimean War the activity of the dockyards was very great, ships of 130 guns being built in them; the suburbs—which belong to the admiralty—were bound to supply the necessary hands to the number of 3000 every day, and all the inhabitants had to perform compulsory service. Special bodies of militarily ...organized workmen were trained in shipbuilding, and thus Nikolaieff became a great school for all branches of navigation and naval architecture. The population, numbering 35,000, was mainly dependent on these sources; but when the activity of the admiralty was brought to a stop for fourteen years by the treaty of Paris the inhabitants had to seek other means of support. By a branch of the Balta-Krementchug Railway, starting from Znamenka (147 miles), Nikolaieff has been brought into connexion with the Russian railway system, and its grain exports now equal those of Riga, while it is the chief market for a region comprising the governments of Kherson, Poltava, Kharkoff, Ekaterinoslaff, and parts of Kieff and Podolia. In 1878 it reached the maximum of 2,665,000 quarters (9,660,000 cwts. in 1881). Large storehouses, capable of holding 2,000,000 quarters, stand close to the commercial port, two miles distant from the town, at Popova Balka on the Bug. The export of timber, skins, tallow, and cattle is steadily increasing. The population, which is growing rapidly, now amounts, including the suburbs, to upwards of 70,000 (45 per cent, of them military, and 7000 Jews). The sanitary conditions are bad, and the mortality reaches 40 per thousand. The educational institutions of Nikolaieff are more numerous and better than in many capitals of Russian governments. They include a gymnasium, an artillery school, and a dozen schools for boys and girls, an astronomical and meteorological observatory (46° 58' N. lat. and 31° 38' E. long.), four museums and libraries, and a hydrographical institute. Among the public buildings, the cathedral, which contains some good Italian pictures, the theatre, the admiralty and several other state buildings are worthy of mention. The manufactures in the hands of private individuals include a shipbuilding yard and several tallow-melting houses and tobacco works. Since 1870 the Nikolaieff admiralty has resumed activity, especially in the construction of armoured ships and torpedo boats, though not to such an extent as before the Crimean War. Though a district town of the government of Kherson, Nikolaieff is under an independent military governor.
The remains of the well-known Greek colony Olbia have been discovered close to the confluence of the Ingul with the Bug at the Sto-Moghily (Hundred Graves). In mediaeval times the country was under the Lithuanians, and subsequently under the Zaporogian Cossacks. Russian colonists settled in the locality about the end of the last century, and after the fall of Otchakoff Prince Potemkin established a wharf on the Ingul which received the name of Nikolaieff. The further development of the town is due almost entirely to the efforts of the Russian Government to make it an important naval station.
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