by Piotrkbw. The area is 4765 square miles. Its southern part stretches over the hilly plateau of Poland, which consists of short ridges of hills from 800 to 2000 feet in height, intersected by deep valleys, and is known as the Sandomir Heights. These heights are thickly wooded; the valleys, running west and east and watered by several tributaries of the Vistula, are excellently adapted for agriculture. Farther north in its central portion the contour of the government is level, the soil fertile, and the surface, which is diversified here and there with wood, is further broken up by occasional spurs, 800 feet in height, of the Lysa G6ra Mountains. The northern districts, where the Pilica joins the Vistula, consist of low flat tracts with undefined valleys, exposed to frequent floods and covered over large areas with marshes; the basin of the Pilica, notorious for its unliealthiness, is throughout a low marshy plain. Devonian, Carboniferous, Permian, and Triassic deposits appear in the southern plateau, Chalk and Jurassic in the middle, and Tertiary in the north. Wide tracts are covered with Glacial deposits,—the Scandinavian erratics reaching as far south as Ilza; these last in their turn are covered with widely spreading post-Glacial lacustrine deposits. The Vistula skirts the government on the south and east and is an important means of communication, several hundreds of light boats (gcilary) descending the river every year, while steamers ply as far up as S§domierz. The S§domierz district is occasionally exposed to disastrous inundations of the river. The tributaries of the Vistula (Radomka, Kamienna, and several others) are but short and small, while those of the Pilica are mere streams sluggishly flowing amidst marshes.

The population (644,830 in 1882) is Polish for the most part, one-seventh being Jews. According to creed the proportions are— Roman Catholic 840־ per cent., Jewish 146־, Protestant 13־, and Greek 0T per cent. The chief occupation of the inhabitants is agriculture, the principal crops being wheat, oats, rye, potatoes, and beetroot (for sugar). Corn is exported and potatoes largely used for distillation. In 1879 there were 148 manufacturing establishments (197 in 1883), employing 1708 hands, with an aggregate production of 2,121,000 roubles (£212,000), the more important being tanneries, flour-mills, sugar-works, and several machinery aud iron-works. These last are suffering, however, from want of wood-fuel, and many of them have recently been closed. Trade is not very extensive, the only channel of commerce being the Vistula. There is no lack of philanthropic institutions within the government (most of them founded early in this century), but nevertheless the sanitary condition of the people is deplorable. Plica polonica, which is endemic in the government of Radom as well as in that of Kielce, is widely diffused, no fewer than 15,000 persons suffering from it, and cognate maladies, such as goitre, scabies, and tinea capitis, are also widely prevalent.

The educational institutions include two lycees or gymnasia and two progymnasia (all at Radom), with 813 male and 287 female pupils, a normal school, a theological seminary at Sandomir, and 170 primary schools (112 in villages), with 8465 scholars.

The government is divided into eight districts, the chief towns of which are—Radom, Ilza (2750), Konsk (6275), Kozienice (5690), Opatow (5200), Opoczno (5585), and Sgdomierz or Sandomir (6265, or 14,710 including suburbs). Zavihvost (3700) is an important custom-house. Ostrowiec (5290), Staszow (6910), Przedborz (6345), and Szidlowiec (5290) have municipal institutions.

RADOM capital of the above government, situated on the Mleczna, a tributary of the Radomka, 65 miles south from Warsaw, is one of the best-built provincial towns of Poland. Lublin Street has a number of fine shops, and there are two well-kept public gardens. The permanent population in 1882 was 12,970, half of whom were Jews, and the town is rapidly growing towards the south-east. Though an old town, Radom has no interesting antiquities. The church of St Wlaclaw, contemporary with the foundation of the town, was transformed by the Austrians into a storehouse, and subsequently by the Russian Government into a military prison. The old castle is in ruins, and the old Bernardine monastery is now used as barracks. The manufactures are unimportant, but trade has been lately increasing.

Radom, which is mentioned in historical documents of the year 1216, at that time occupied the site of what is now Old Radom. New Radom was founded in 1340 by Casimir the Great. Here Jadwiga was elected queen of Poland in 1382, and here too in 1401 the first act relating to the union of Poland with Lithuania was signed; the “seim” of 1505, where the organic law of Poland was sworn by the king, was also held at Radom. Several great fires, and still more the Swedish War, were the ruin of the old city. After the third partition of Poland it fell under Austrian rule; later on, in 1809, it became capital of the Radom department of the grand-duchy of Warsaw. In 1815 it was annexed to Russia and became chief town of the province of Sandomir.