and cotton is cultivated towards Azerbaijan. Maize, wheat or barley are sown almost everywhere. Georgia is particularly rich in excellent wine, and seems to be the home of the grape, which grows wild in the woods. Tobacco also thrives very well, and, in quality, seems to be better than that of Trebizond. Nowhere have I seen such abundance of fruit as in Georgia, and in this respect it can only be compared with California. The Georgian mountains, especially the Caucasus, are infinitely rich in valuable woods. In minerals, too, Georgia conceals great treasures, of which the most important is the manganese of Tchiaturi, which ranks as the richest in the world. The three most considerable deposits of manganese are to be found in Brazil, India and Georgia. In 1913 these countries exported:—
| Brazil | 122,000 | tons of manganese. |
| India | 772,366 | tons„ of„ manganese„ |
| Georgia | 1,061,731 | tons„ of„ manganese„ |
Rich seams of coal are found in Georgia in at least two places, and, in addition, iron, copper, lead, zinc, etc.
In antiquity the country was famed for its gold (whence the legend of the Golden Fleece), but no gold mines are worked to-day. In many copper and zinc mines small admixtures of gold are found in the ore.
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