(usually Poles, and, in decreasing proportions, Ukrainians).
On the western borderlands of the Ukraine,, in this region, lies the city of Yaroslav on the San (25,000 pop.), a railway junction in an important strategic position. Founded by the ancient Ukrainian princes of Kiev, Yaroslav was once famous for its annual fairs. Near it, on the San, lies Radimno with its rope industry. But the most important city on the San is Peremishl (57,000 pop.), at once one of the oldest cities of Galicia and the one-time capital of the Ukrainian dynasty of the Rostislavids. Peremishl owes its importance to its position as a bridge city at a point where important roads from the west and northwest cross the San to the east and south. It lies at the important junction of the Galician main railroad line, with the important Lupkov line coming from Hungary, and is accordingly, as a result of its position, a first-class fortress, which closes the San valley and cuts off access to the adjacent Carpathian passes. The commercial standing of the city is considerable; here, too, a Greek-Catholic bishopric has its seat, and here there exist numerous Ukrainian cultural and economic societies.
In the sub-Carpathian Dniester region, which is traversed lengthwise by the Galician Transversal Railroad, lie a number of important cities. On the Dniester we find Sambir (21,000 pop.) at the crossing of the railroads, with a lumber industry of some size. On the Tismenitza Railroad lies Borislav (15,000 pop.), but recently a little Boike village, now, together with the adjacent towns of Tustanovichi (12,000 pop.) and Skhidnitza, the center of petroleum and ozokerite production. A forest of artesian wells, factory chimneys, petroleum reservoirs, have sprung up amid the famous "Borislav mud," among miserable dirty houses which shelter so many millionaires and hungry wretches, so much happiness and misery, crime and immorality. The refineries for the petroleum that is gained here are located mostly in the adjacent Drohobich (39,000 pop.), the seat of the petroleum speculators. Salt works also are found in this city, still greater ones in the adjacent Stebnik, where enormous deposits of salt have been discovered, but thus far not been exploited. Truskavez is a well-known watering-place.
On the Striy lies the important railroad junction of Striy (33,000 pop.), with a mill, lumber and match industry, the seat of the Ukrainian dairymen's association and other Ukrainian organizations; at the mouth of the Striy the ancient town of Zidachiv. On the sub-Carpathian Transversal Railroad toward the east, lie the following: the watering-place Morshin, Bolekhiv with salt-works and match factories Dolina with salt-works and saw-mills, Kalush with saltpeter-mining and salt-works. Stanislaviv (over 60,000 pop.), situated at the junction of the two Bistritza rivers, is an important railway center in which the Lemberg-Czernowitz Railroad meets the Transversal railroad, the South Polish Railroad and the Hungarian branch railroad to Marmarosh. The city has an important industrial and commercial activity, and is the seat of the Greek-Catholic bishopric. Stanislaviv has inherited the former importance of Halich, the one-time capital of the Ukrainian Kingdom of the same name, which, at its highest development, reached the Polissye swamps on the north, the Dnieper on the east, the Black Sea and the Danube delta on the south. At that time (11th and 12th Century), Halich equalled or surpassed in size, wealth and commercial importance, most of the capitals of Western Europe. After a thousand years of Polish dominion it is now a miserable town in a beautiful location, important geographically for its traffic advantages. A side-line here branches off from the main railroad into Podolia. Attempts are being made to enliven Dniester navigation, which begins here and in Zuravno at the mouth of the Svicha. Not far from Stanislaviv lie Tovmach, Tismenitza (10,000 pop.) with a leather industry, and Ottinia with a machine industry of some size.