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A TRIP 
 
 TO 
 
 ST. PETERSBURG. 
 
 In the hope of affording some little amusement to my 
 friends, the following Letters have been reprinted from the 
 " Windsor and Eton Herald,'" for private circulation. 
 
 E. RICHARDSON-GARDNER. 
 
 46, Sussex Gardens, Hyde Park, 
 Christmas 1872. 
 

 "WESIJfTS'STEB : 
 PEISTED BY X. BEETTELL A^D CO. 51, RUPEE! ST B E E T, — W. 
 
 205449 
 '13 
 
Hotel de Russie, 
 
 St. Petersburg, 
 
 16-28th December, 1871. 
 
 My dear John, 
 
 You kindly expressed a wish, to hear how our 
 party fared in undertaking such a long journey in the 
 dead of winter ; and so, in compliance with your request, 
 I send you a few "jottings by the way," which I trust 
 may interest you and our friends at home, although you 
 must expect them to be very incoherent, and not be 
 surprised to find that I run in my thoughts up and 
 down the line, backwards or forwards, some odd 
 thousand miles or so, to describe something, which 
 occurred at some time, somewhere. 
 
 St. Petersburg sounds a long way off ; and so it is ; 
 overland above two thousand miles, by Calais, Brussels, 
 Cologne, Berlin, Kowno, Wilna, and Pskof; but our 
 time has passed so pleasantly, in such agreeable society, 
 with so much comfort and convenience, that on our 
 arrival here, after five days' and five nights' journey, 
 two nights of which were passed in beds and three in 
 railway carriages, we found ourselves, after warm baths 
 and a nice little supper, quite prepared to start again if 
 necessary. 
 
 "Well, our party consisted of Louise, myself, Colonel 
 Money, (the accomplished writer of those interesting 
 
articles in The Times of September last, descriptive of 
 the Russian autumn manoeuvres), Lieut. -Colonel Isen- 
 beck, (a distinguished officer in the Russian army, 
 speaking English like an Englishman), Captain 
 Chambers, (a Canadian officer on his way to the 
 Caucasus), and a jolly party we were, the endeavour of 
 each being to amuse and entertain the others, so as to 
 wile away the hours which might otherwise have been 
 felt to have been long and wearisome. 
 
 To begin at the beginning, as the story books say, we 
 first of all paid a visit to Nicholay's, the extensive 
 furrier, in Oxford Street, for our Russian outfit, which 
 comprised a regular suit of furs, clothing ourselves cap- 
 a-pie, from head to foot, in the skins of wild beasts ; 
 with this advantage over the inferior animals, that we 
 wear their fur next our bodies, by turning them inside 
 out, or outside in, which is it ? as Dundreary would say. 
 My " shuba," (a long fur cloak), cap, boots, and gloves 
 are of beaver ; Louise patronised the lynx, Colonel 
 Money was enveloped in racoon, Colonel Isenbeck in 
 bear, and Louise turned out her maid (Bateson) as a 
 kangaroo. I must consult Darwin, and ascertain 
 whether there is any natural affinity in his theory, 
 between either of us and the animals whose skins we 
 inhabit, or whether, in the event of our wearing them 
 long enough, we are likely to return to our aboriginal 
 or abnormal state. We should make the fortune of 
 Wombwell's menagerie, if we offered ourselves for 
 exhibition on our return. 
 
 Among other desirable things we provided ourselves 
 with, were a pic-nic basket, fitted up with four knives and 
 forks, plates, tumblers, d'oyleys, two wine bottles with 
 screw corks, a butter bowl, tin for preserved meats, salt, 
 pepper, mustard boxes, &c, which we had carefully 
 
filled at Fortnum and Mason's with collard tongue, 
 Yorkshire pies, pate de foie gras, Bolognas, and solid 
 beef tea, so as to be prepared for a campaign on the 
 road, in the event of our being snowed up, which does 
 occasionally happen, besides being useful whenever the 
 qualms of hunger overtook us, and no refreshment- 
 room within reach. Then we laid in an "Etna," and 
 spirits of wine, railway reading lamps on an improved 
 principle, purchased at Argand's, in Bruton Street, a 
 chess board, with men moving on pegs fitted into holes 
 in the board, india-rubber things to be inflated so as to 
 support the back, very much in the form of (pray don't 
 mention it) a lady's bustle, a thermometer and 
 barometer in'Morocco cases, and Murray's hand books for 
 North Germany, Russia, Poland, and Finland, &c. &c. 
 
 Wishing our friends good-bye, and being all prepared 
 with first-class through tickets to St. Petersburg, with 
 28 coupons for places en route, off we started by 8.45 
 p.m. train from Charing Cross for Dover and Calais, 
 leaving the latter place for our 2,000 miles journey in 
 the early hours of the morning, with a carriage to 
 ourselves, and Colonel Money, and the other gentlemen 
 with one to themselves, all tucked up and made ready 
 for a comfortable nap, in which we all thoroughly 
 indulged ; and, as at this moment writing to you from 
 my hotel at St. Petersburg, I find it is time to retire, 
 I will say good night, and resume my "'jottings by 
 the way " to-morrow morning. 
 
 A fine fresh morning, clear and frosty, with the 
 sleighs dashing about, and everyone looking happy and 
 cheerful. Thermometer a few degrees below freezing 
 point outside, with a delightful atmosphere in our rooms 
 of about 65 degrees Fahrenheit, kept at that tempera- 
 ture all day and all night through. But I forget that 
 
6 
 
 my jottings have not yet brought me here, so I must 
 not anticipate. Let me see ; where was I last night ? 
 Leaving Calais, fast asleep, to wake up at Lille, where 
 cafe au lait was the order of the day. By-the-bye, who 
 has eyer been offered one franc paper notes in France 
 before the late calamitous war ? I have made this same 
 early repast at Lille a dozen times on my visits to the 
 continent, but silver coinage was always in abundance ; 
 but now, alas ! those barbarous Germans have despoiled 
 poor France of all its silver and gold, and she has been 
 obliged to retrograde to a small paper currency, while 
 the victorious Prussians have reconverted their paper 
 thalers into delightful little gold pieces of 5, 10, and 
 15 thalers each. 
 
 First night passed in railway carnages ; second night in 
 bed at Cologne, and glad we were to get out of the place 
 next morning, famed as it is for its typhoid disagreeables, 
 which no number of their Jean Marie Farinas, with 
 any quantity of their famous eau, is capable of dispelling 
 from the olfactories. The cathedral tower, however, I 
 am glad to inform you, has much progressed since your 
 last visit. The King of Prussia, I hear, pays towards 
 its completion a million thalers a year, which, poor 
 fellow, he can well afford now, if Bismarck lets him in 
 for a share of the French spoil. Now, for Berlin, 
 passing on the way Krupp's cast steel factory, famed for 
 the production of colossal ordnance of the most 
 scientific kinds. The enormous scale of his works is 
 shown by the fact that they cover 450 acres of ground, 
 and employ 8,000 men and 195 steam engines. Let 
 Manchester and Birmingham look to their laurels, 
 or rather to their pockets ; but I can give them 
 one scrap of comfort, that on trial, Krupp's have been 
 surpassed by Armstrong's, and I read in the paper that 
 
an enormous steel gun of Krupp's burst the other day 
 at Cronstadt, and killed a few people, but, unfortunately 
 for Armstrong, Krupp wasn't there. 
 
 Through the pass called Porta Westphaliae. In the 
 neighbourhood of this pass is supposed to have occurred 
 the great battle in which the German general Arminius 
 defeated the Roman army under Varus with terrific 
 slaughter. It is well known that this defeat put a stop 
 to the advance of the Romans into northern Germany ; 
 Varus killed himself after the battle, but his head was 
 sent to the Emperor Augustus, at Rome, who was 
 so dejected by the news, that for several days he 
 scarcely spoke except to say, " Vare, Vare, ubi sunt 
 legiones mem" 
 
 On, on, through Hanover and Brunswick, with a 
 sympathetic feeling, as we pass, for the poor blind king 
 and his troubles, and the warlike race of Brunswick, 
 nine of whose princes are interred in the vaults of the 
 cathedral of St. Blaize, all of them having perished in 
 the field of battle ; among them are the bodies of the 
 duke who was mortally wounded at the fatal battle of 
 Jena, and of his son, who fell at Quatre Bras, having 
 nobly avenged his father's death at the head of his 
 devoted black band. First view of the Elbe at 
 Magdeburg, frozen into blocks of ice. There Luther 
 went to School, as a poor chorister, often sung at rich 
 men's doors to earn a scanty pittance, ^and here the 
 ferocious Tilly, after carrying the citadel by assault, 
 after two year's siege, massacred 30,000 of its 
 inhabitants, without regard to age or sex, and burnt the 
 church of St. John, where many hundred women and 
 children had taken refuge. Is it not Milton who our 
 father used to quote, as saying that " Man's inhumanity 
 to man makes countless thousands mourn " ? 
 
8 
 
 Through Potsdam, the Prussian Versailles, (when we 
 had a view of some of its magnificence, but which we 
 shall visit more particularly on our homeward journey) 
 into Berlin, about eleven o'clock at night, where 
 carriages awaited us (by telegraph) to convey us to the 
 Hotel du Xord, Unter den Linden. Now, my dear 
 John, I don't know what your idea is of Berlin, but 
 my first impressions are those of disappointment as 
 regards the town in its external aspect, but I may be 
 more pleased on our return, when we shall have time 
 to visit its art treasures, &c. The great Brandenburg 
 gate, an imitation of the Propylaeum at Athens, is 
 grand ; but when I remember the magnificent triumphal 
 arch at Milan, the comparison is not in favour of 
 Berlin. They both exhibit cars of victory on their 
 summit, but the Milanese is by far the superior work of 
 art. The statue of Frederick the Great, the colonnade 
 of the Museum, the Arsenal, and one or two other 
 public buildings, comprise the principal architectural 
 and artistic beauties ; but I must not forget to mention 
 the beautiful statues by Kiss, the Amazon which we 
 had at our great exhibition, and another of St. George 
 and the Dragon, which I had never seen before, and 
 shall never forget. I went to gaze at it three times in 
 twenty-four hours ; but I don't intend to weary you 
 with descriptions, all of which may be found in Murray, 
 but rather to jot down little things as they occur on 
 our route. Let me advise you, if you come abroad, 
 not to go to Prussia for some little time, as although 
 we have personally experienced no discourtesy, I feel 
 sure there is a latent unfriendly feeling towards the 
 English by the Prussians since the late war, an opinion 
 which has been confirmed by several with whom I have 
 lately spoken on the subject. In fact, I witnessed it on 
 
9 
 
 more than one occasion, notably at the railway station, 
 when we were leaving for Russia. There happened to 
 be some dispute between a Prussian Droshki driver 
 and an Englishman, and soon a crowd gathered round 
 and became very insolent and even menacing to the 
 Englishman, who in this case was clearly in the right, 
 but who had Prussian hands laid upon him, which I 
 fully expected would have ended in a fight. If such 
 had happened, our party of four men were quite prepared 
 to take his part and save him from maltreatment, 
 however unpleasant or undignified it might have been 
 to be hustled by a lot of Prussian roughs. The upper 
 classes do not, of course, show it in this fashion, but it 
 exists, whatever be the cause of it, and the lower orders 
 manifest physically that which the superior orders 
 incline to mentally. The Imperial Palace, or 
 " Schloss," built by the father of Frederick the Great, 
 is a fine old palace, used chiefly now for Court ceremo- 
 nials, the King inhabiting a smaller, but probably more 
 comfortable place of residence ; but I was really 
 surprised that his majesty should allow the exterior of 
 his ancestral palace to remain in such a disreputable 
 state. It is in a disgraceful state of want of repair. 
 Again I hope that some of the Frenchman's " shekels of 
 gold and of silver " may be applied to the re-adornment 
 of his Majesty's heritage. 
 
 Next night, eleven o'clock p.m. — Take our place from 
 Berlin to St. Petersburg — two nights' and two days' 
 travel. Let us look about us and see what our 
 arrangements are. Louise and I have a double com- 
 partment-carriage, each opening out into the other by 
 a door between ; the one making up into beds for the 
 night and the other forming our compartment for the day, 
 all heated most genially by hot water pipes laid on from 
 
10 
 
 the engine boiler. Good. Our commissionaire who 
 we sent to engage this extra comfort for us carried out 
 his instructions well. What have Colonel Money and 
 our other companions got ? After settling ourselves 
 we issue forth to find them out ; nothing could be 
 better. A large saloon carriage, heated by a wood- 
 burning stove, and all of them seated round smoking 
 their cigars, with another companion who I have not 
 mentioned before, but whom I will introduce to you 
 now. A tremendous, large, handsome mastiff dog, 
 bought by Colonel Isenbeck of the famous Bill George, 
 of Canine Hall, Kensal New Town, lay stretching 
 himself at full length in the middle of the saloon, 
 and what do you think they had christened him, 
 painting his name in large letters on his temporary 
 leather collar, Roger ! Was it not too bad of the 
 Eussian colonel ? Some of the fellows had put him 
 up to it, to have a joke with me ; however I patted 
 him on his back and said he was called after a very 
 good fellow, although a political opponent, and Eoger 
 has fared sumptuously every day, and formed one of 
 our party, travelling in first-class carriages right through 
 to St. Petersburg. And, now, returning to our carriage 
 and settling ourselves for the night, I will reserve the 
 remainder of our journey until my next letter. 
 
 I remain, your affectionate Brother, 
 
 B. RICHARDSON-GARDNER. 
 
 John C. Richardson, Esq. 
 
 Glanbrydan Park, Carmarthenshire. 
 
11 
 
 Hotel de Russie, 
 
 St. Petersburg, 
 
 Dec. 23, 1871, {Jan. 4, 1872). 
 
 My dear John, 
 
 I hope you received my last letter all right, 
 as although I believe letters are safely carried to their 
 destination, newspapers suffer a different fate ; those 
 not in the official list are destroyed, and those 
 which are, have to pass through a censorship at the 
 frontier before continuing their journey, and sometimes 
 lose a column or two. To-day we received The Times 
 of Thursday, the 28th December, and on the eighth page, 
 end of third column, there was a large black patch, obliter- 
 ating something, at the end of which I could only read 
 Mall Gazette, thus depriving the poor Pall Mall of its 
 christian name, from which paper The Times had copied 
 the article in question, whatever it may happen to have 
 been. With true feminine curiosity, Louise, assisted 
 by Bateson, began to consider how they could 
 circumvent the enemy and restore the legibility of the 
 print : but all in vain, the more they tried to get the 
 Satanic colour off, the faster it stuck, and the blacker it 
 became. So having given it up as hopeless, and not 
 wishing to be beaten, Louise wants you to cut it out 
 and send it in a letter, and thus do the censor at the 
 frontier. 
 
 Here we are as you see by the dates of my letter 
 living a double existence. As English men and women 
 we have had our Christmas -day, and our New Year's- 
 
12 
 
 day ; but as temporary Eussians we are still in the year 
 1871, and are going in for more roast beef and plum 
 pudding next Saturday — the Russian Christmas - day ; 
 the classical reason for our double jollity being that the 
 calendar in use in Russia is the Julian or Greek, which 
 is twelve days behind the Gregorian or Latin, so that 
 as we are now situated, I have the advantage of being 
 twelve days more your junior than you thought I was. 
 
 But now a truce to fun : let's to business and be 
 serious, as Money says, when nobody is listening to 
 him. Pomerania ; that's were we are supposed to be 
 on our journey travelling from Berlin to the Prussian 
 frontier of Eydkuhnen, and longing to be the other side 
 of it, at Wierzbolow, our first Russian town : but we 
 have yet several hundred miles to get there, so I 
 must "jot" down a little by the way. Just as we 
 started from Berlin we made another acquaintance 
 besides "Roger," an officer in the Blues, height, 
 6-ft. 4-in., wrapped up in a splendid Astracan 
 " Shuba," and to whom I had previously called 
 Chambers' attention, as being a magnificent Russian. 
 It seems he had previously travelled with Isenbeck, 
 and added materially to the pleasure of the 
 saloon party as far as Wilna. Our Guardsman is a 
 perfect marvel, he speaks nine living languages — 
 Russian included — and has travelled over pretty nearly 
 the whole of this world, occupying all his " leave " in 
 so doing ; and if he can only get " leave " in the next, 
 there is no knowing where he would not go. 
 
 Now, I have no doubt hundreds of English railway 
 directors have travelled on these German lines and if 
 they are not deprived of the means of observation, 
 they must have noticed many little things — small in 
 their way — but calculated to be of great service and 
 
13 
 
 convenience to railway travellers, which they might 
 have very easily introduced on their own railways. 
 Here's one, — In this North Prussian carriage there is a 
 pasteboard card, about one foot square, headed 
 " Fahrplanmassige " (travelling plan regulations), and 
 underneath, " Aufenthaltszeiten " (stopping times), and 
 it proceeds to give you for the train you are in, its 
 time of arrival at the stations, time of departure, 
 difference carried out in another column as stopping 
 time, and all times between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m., have a 
 blue shade painted across them, leaving them quite 
 legible, but intended to show you that those are night 
 times, without adding the p.m. or a.m., which sometimes 
 carried through two or three days and nights, confuses 
 you. It is well known that the Jews begin their day at 
 6. a.m., and their night at 6 p.m. each lasting twelve 
 hours. The recurrence to this old mode of dividing 
 the day and night, and the darkening of the hours 
 indicating the latter, is a great improvement on our 
 railway time tables. On another side you are informed 
 where there is to be a Table d'hote, and other species 
 of refreshment, what are the " Schlafvorrichtungen," 
 or sleeping arrangements in the carriages, and the 
 " Zollabfertigung," or revision of luggage in the Custom 
 Houses, besides other information, valuable to the 
 traveller on the line. 
 
 By Jove ! Here we are at Dirschau, a town in 
 ancient Poland, and crossing the frozen Vistula, a river 
 familiar to my school days, and now we are going over 
 its magnificent bridge, half a mile long, leaving Dantzig 
 on our left, where the deals come from ; De'il take it ! 
 as on opening the window to look out, there came such 
 a cold blast from its gulf ; if he had it, he might warm it 
 up a bit ; and now we look out for Marienburg, and 
 
14 
 
 its Palace of the Ancient Grand Masters of the Teutonic 
 Order, who nearly had their own house about their ears 
 on one occasion when they were besieged in it. The 
 Meisters Remter, or chapter house of the order, in 
 which assemblies of the order were held and foreign 
 ambassadors received, for they were great swells in 
 those times, rests on a single pillar of granite in the 
 centre. The Poles, while besieging the City in 1410, 
 endeavoured to aim a cannon ball so as to shoot away 
 this pillar, and overwhelm at one blow beneath the 
 ruins, the. Grand Master and all his Knights, whom 
 they knew from the information of a deserter, to be at 
 the time assembled in conclave. The ball missed its 
 aim, but lodged in a corner of the chimney where it still 
 remains. 
 
 Konigsberg, once the capital of Prussia-proper, and 
 now third city in the Prussian dominions. There, in 
 the Schlosskirche, Frederick, Elector of Brandenburg, 
 in 1701, placed the crown on his own head, assuming 
 the title of Frederick I. King of Prussia, just as the 
 present King William of Prussia, and now Emperor of 
 Germany, is reported to have done when he came to 
 the Throne, and coronetted himself by the Divine will, 
 following the example of his ancestor. I am informed 
 there is a considerable quantity of amber found all along 
 the coast near Konigsberg, and this is how they get it. 
 The high winds throw up a vast accumulation of sea- 
 weed. The amberfishers go up to their necks, provided 
 with nets, by which they draw the weeds to land. The 
 amber accumulates in the lower beds of the sea sand 
 extending under the Baltic, and when the storms bear 
 up the amber earth, the amber is carried to the surface. 
 
 Now we are traversing the frontier of Prussia and 
 Kussia, and when we get to Wilna I shall have some- 
 
15 
 
 thing to say about Napoleon and his calamitous invasion 
 of Russia in 1812 ; but although these broad flat plains 
 on which we now gaze, covered with snow, are not very 
 interesting, there is a talk among us all, that it may not 
 be very long before they will have the attention of all 
 Europe attracted to them, because here Prussia and 
 Russia meet, and their broad and flat expanses of land 
 must be the future battle ground, if ever these two 
 enormous empires close in deadly conflict, which pray 
 God avert. We have seen how the Prussian officers, 
 lately invested with the Russian order of Knights of 
 St. George, were received by the Emperor Alexander 
 at St. Petersburg, and subsequently at Moscow, and 
 with what hearty good will the Emperor of all the 
 Russias has addressed them on all occasions, winding 
 up with his paternal speech at the banquet ; and as 
 long as His Majesty lives I trust nothing will occur to 
 change his present good feeling towards the Germans ; 
 but " here's the rub." The Czarewitch is known to be 
 anti-German, and from what I learn here, does not 
 smother his sentiments. He is married to the Danish 
 Princess Dagmar, sister to our Princess of Wales, and 
 in this country, the Czar, when he comes to the throne, 
 is an autocrat, and declares war or makes peace on his 
 own responsibility, and my observation (limited, 
 certainly, but, as far as it goes, trustworthy) is that the 
 Russians are beginning to be jealous of the Prussians 
 and their late doings, as the Prussians seem to be 
 giving themselves " airs " everywhere, which creates 
 an antagonistic feeling in the persons " aired," and is 
 not calculated to inspire them with a peaceful feeling 
 towards their " airers ; " — so do not let us be so sure 
 that the French people and the French press are insane, 
 in imagining that some day or other the Russians and 
 
16 
 
 French may not become allies; but here is the bond fide 
 frontier at last, and we step out on Russian soil at 
 Wierzbolow. Bravo, you Russian Tartars ! I like the 
 look of you ! " Good buffet, and plenty of time for 
 refreshment ! " I like that, too ; so does Louise, and 
 so does Bateson, who, like Dickens' Marchioness, 
 " liked her meals in quiet and plenty of 'em." " Change 
 carriages, passports and luggage examined." All right, 
 we have only nine large portmanteaus and boxes in the 
 van, and twelve little parcels in the carriage, which 
 have altogether cost to St. Petersburg a mere trifle of 
 £.18 or so in excess of the allowance ; but I would not 
 be so mean as to say that Loui has had anything to do 
 with this limited " baggage ; " however, business first 
 and pleasure afterwards, so we at once go about our 
 luggage, and then pay our warmest respects to the 
 buffet. But now, before I in imagination go into that 
 buffet, I will perform my first duty towards the Russians, 
 by suggesting to any English custom-house officer, that 
 here, in what our true bom Briton might call an 
 outlandish place, he would learn a good lesson as to 
 how his duty ought to be performed. First of all, 
 everything in Russia is colossal, and yet convenient, 
 and we find that in a spacious douane, surrounded by a 
 circular counter, numbered in divisions, without any 
 hurry, bustle, or confusion, all our luggage is taken by 
 the porters to a certain definite place, corresponding in 
 duplicate to our numbered register ticket ; there the 
 van luggage is deposited, and to the same place all the 
 small parcels find their way, the officer on duty specifies 
 to his Douaniers what his requirements are, and, finding 
 that we are a party of British subjects travelling for 
 pleasure, and not for trade, he deals most gently with 
 our wardrobes, barely regarding even, some new ball 
 
17 
 
 dresses, which Louise had had separately packed by the 
 milliner, fresh from her establishment, in large deal 
 boxes. 
 
 The gentlemen of our party, after acknowledging the 
 courtesy of the Russian Douane officer, by saluting him 
 with their raised hats, all wended their way to the 
 " refreshmenting department," as poor Charles Dickens 
 called it, and found there yet another example for our 
 English, " Mugby Junction." Half-a-dozen hot viands 
 to choose from, accompanied by soup, coffee, or wine, 
 and all of the best quality and description, served at a 
 moment's notice, on table-cloths white as snow, with 
 most attentive and respectful waiters ; add to this 
 lavatories, with the requisite accompaniments of soap, 
 towels, &c, and I leave you to judge of what has been 
 talked about as barbarous Russia. 
 
 Here we are, on our first introduction at a frontier 
 station, finding more civilization than has happened to 
 my lot in many an old country through which I have 
 travelled, and you will find that when you have received 
 other letters from me, describing our future progress, 
 and stay, at all events at St. Petersburg, they will 
 contain similar continued experiences, supporting our 
 first agreeable impressions. 
 
 Wierzbolow, I find, is 560 miles from the capital, 
 where we shall arrive to-morrow evening, so we are 
 beginning to be near the end. And now time is up, 
 and we must get ourselves into Russian railway quarters 
 for the first time. Let me count how many we are : 
 Louise, myself, and Bateson, Money, Chambers, 
 Isenbeck, and the giant of the blues ; and now let me 
 next make a survey of a first-class railway carriage ; 
 here it is before me, and it appears to be something 
 entirely novel. It has two ends and a middle. Well, 
 
18 
 
 so have most things ; but how are they arranged ? At 
 each end there is a compartment, for say, five sitters, 
 but comfortably containing only three passengers, and 
 the middle has four small square compartments (two 
 on each side of the centre passage), large enough for 
 one comfortably to curl up and sleep in although 
 evidently intended for more. Well, now outside, just 
 in advance of the end compartments, there are doors 
 by which you enter a cross passage, leading to a centre 
 passage, which takes you to your respective compartments, 
 so that by securing for Louise, her maid, and myself, one 
 end compartment, and the others taking unto themselves 
 the four centre small compartments, we leave the other 
 end for stray passengers on the way, or others getting 
 in at Wierzbolow. There are two stoves, one of which 
 is fixed in the interior division of each of the end 
 compartments, so that half the stove is in the carriage, 
 and the other half in the cross passage, and as the 
 temperature was about 70° Fahrenheit on entering, we 
 began to think we should not, at all events, suffer from 
 cold on our journey. 
 
 If you can follow this plan, so difficult to describe, 
 you will perceive that our party were all, as it were, 
 together under one roof, and that we could pay each 
 other visits in our respective cabins, as our lumbering, 
 old, rolling, but still comfortable carriage, put me much 
 in mind of a steamer of the olden time ; and its wheels, 
 as they rolled over the frozen rails, sounded just like 
 the paddles beating against the waves. 
 
 Louise strongly objected to be stifled with heat in 
 Russia, where she had expected to have met her fate by 
 frost, and requested me to address myself to the " stove- 
 keeper," who accompanies every first-class carriage, to 
 reduce it by machinery which they have for that 
 
19 
 
 purpose, and so I " unearthed " our Eussian fireman 
 from a corner of the cross -passage, in which he had 
 doubled himself up for a nap ; and now began a series 
 of amusing signs and symbols, which continued, with 
 varied intermission, between this interesting old man 
 and myself during the next twenty-four hours of our 
 journey. He was a character in his way, and seemed 
 to be a Russian originally from the far interior of 
 Siberia, of the Tartar race — brawny and muscular, with 
 high cheek-bones, small bright eyes, terribly shaggy 
 hair, and a face as broad as it was long — a complete 
 parallelogram. We soon got friends after arranging the 
 stove to Louise's satisfaction, and with the help of a 
 Russian vocabulary I entered into conversation with 
 him, and asked him about his age. Answer : His 10 
 fingers held up six times and finishing with seven more 
 — 67. Are you married ? Answer : Pointing to the 
 wedding-ring finger and running round it three times. 
 Why, three wives ? Answer : Broad grin and several 
 affirmative shakes of the head. How many children ? 
 Answer : 19 fingers held up, one hand after the other, 
 and then three fingers gently and mournfully doubled 
 down — 16 alive and three dead. And so we continued, 
 I racking my brain, and sometimes going to Louise for 
 inspiration as to how I was to convey to him my 
 symbolic questions, which took me some time to invent, 
 and then more time to express. Poor old fellow ! We 
 treated him to a " go " of our fine old Cognac' out of 
 the picnic basket, and his wistful looks towards it when 
 he came for directions about the stove, which he 
 frequently did, induced one or two more on the journey ; 
 but the climax of all occurred when we were nearing 
 our destination, when I procured about a dozen small 
 Russian silver pieces, and then, concealing them in my 
 
20 
 
 left hand, I doled them out to him in our cabin one 
 after the other. Louise says she shall never forget the 
 expression of his face as I proceeded. When animated 
 with a smile it became slightly broader than it was long, 
 but, when the pieces of silver repeated themselves 
 towards the last, the broadness of his face became most 
 ludicrous, and even ridiculous, to behold ; his eyes 
 brightened, and his mouth extended itself to unusual 
 dimensions. At length a revulsion of feeling came over 
 him, and brushing away a tear, he caught up both our 
 hands, kissed them, retired to his little den, and we 
 shall probably see hi-m no more. 
 
 550 miles from St. Petersburg, at " Kowno," where 
 on the 22nd June, 1812, the French army crossed the 
 Niemen on their advance to Moscow, and some rising 
 ground on the opposite bank is still called Napoleon's 
 Hill. The town of Kowno was occupied by a large 
 corps cVcmnee, and suffered considerably. The remnants 
 of the army recrossed the river at the same spot on the 
 13th December, in a very bad state of discipline. 
 There is a monument existing commemorating this 
 retreat, and bearing the following inscription in Russian, 
 which, translated, is as follows : — " In 1812 Russia 
 was invaded by an arniy numbering 700,000 men. The 
 army recrossed the frontier numbering 70,000 ! ! " 
 
 441 miles from St. Petersburg, at " Wilna," occu- 
 pied by the French on the 28th June, 1812. It had 
 been evacuated by the Russians during the night. The 
 Emperor Napoleon occupied the Episcopal Palace, the 
 rooms which the Emperor Alexander had left the 
 previous day. The country all along here is covered with 
 snow, so I cannot form an idea as to its cultivation, but 
 the villages are few and far between, and those do not 
 exhibit any high degree of prosperity. They are mostly 
 
21 
 
 composed of wood, somewhat resembling, only in a 
 
 poorer degree, the Swiss mountain chalets. Birds are 
 
 scarce, not liking, probably, to face the deep snow. 
 
 We have only seen two magpies for miles ; but as the 
 
 old couplet says, 
 
 " One magpie is sorrow, two mirth, 
 Three a wedding, and four a birth." 
 
 Our two are symbolical of what is going on inside our 
 carriage, where we are the j oiliest of parties ; Louise 
 holds her levees, when the gentlemen are invited by her 
 to our cabin, where the floor is cheerfully occupied by 
 those who cannot otherwise be accommodated, and 
 cigars and cigarettes are the order of the day, combined 
 with pleasant instructive conversation by travelled men, 
 interspersed with merry stories. I won't repeat what 
 pretty things are said by our fellow travellers to Louise, 
 but by general acclamation she is declared to be the 
 life and soul of the party, and a splendid traveller. 
 
 Between stations separated by long distances, we 
 amuse ourselves with the contents of the picnic basket, 
 and having Liebeg's essence, and Fortnum and Mason's 
 compressed beef tea, with other delicacies, our Etna 
 boils up some water, and we get a capital entertainment 
 in the Swiss Family Robinson style. Our cabins are 
 now kept by our old friend (if he will allow me the 
 privilege of calling him so ; as they say at public 
 meetings), at a delicious temperature, but when we issue 
 forth at a station, we all don our complete suit of furs, 
 as the air is nipping cold, but full of oxygen, and ozone, 
 as the country is overlaid for hundreds, and even 
 thousands of miles, with its wintry covering of snow, 
 and we are warned by a notice not to put our heads out 
 of the little window of our cabin, which is only a foot 
 
22 
 
 square, as " Cette imprudence pouvait avoir des con- 
 sequences grc But with our splendid shubas, caps, 
 boots, and gloves, it is impossible even to feel a shiver, 
 with many more degrees of frost than we have had yet. 
 "We get most delicious coffee at the buffets, and still 
 more delicious tea, served in tumblers for the gentlemen, 
 and cups for the ladies, with milk, that the Russians 
 are not jet sufficiently civilised to adulterate with 
 unwholesome materials, and notice is given you of the 
 starting of the train by three bells first pealing on: side 
 the station, and repeated by an official at the refresh- 
 ment-room door, rung successfully at intervals of a few 
 minutes — the first a notice, the second a warning, and 
 the third, we're off. All along the line the men live in 
 wood huts, which are all numbered outside with white 
 paint, starting from the capital, so you can count off 
 your approximation to the end of your journey as you 
 go along. And now the numbers are gradually diminish- 
 ing, until at length St. Petersburg bursts upon our view, 
 with its colossal public buildings, its gorgeous palaces, 
 and churches with gilded cupolas ; Sleighs with fast- 
 trotting horses are awaiting us, into which we get with 
 alacrity, leaving our luggage to the commissionaire of 
 the hotel to bring after us, and we drive off at the rate of 
 twelve miles an hour over the frozen snow to the E . /. 
 de Puissie. where we find, as we ordered by telegram, 
 wami baths, comfortably heated rooms, a dinner a la 
 :■:, all awaiting our kind attention; more of which 
 anon. 
 
 I remain, my dear John, 
 
 Your affectionate brother, 
 
 E. RICHABDSON-GABDNEB. 
 
23 
 
 Hotel de Russie, 
 
 St. Peteksburg, 
 
 29th Dec. 1871-10*7* Jan. 1872. 
 
 My dear John, 
 
 I think I bade you " Adieu " in my last as our 
 sleighs dashed up to the door of this hotel, and we all 
 dismounted, to find everything prepared for our 
 reception, including a Diner -a-la-Russe, served Russian 
 fashion ; but as we have already received the hospitality 
 of our Russian friends by assisting (as the French say) 
 at more than one entertainment of that kind on a more 
 elaborate scale, I will reserve a description of that 
 important ceremony until I come to such events in the 
 natural course of things, and now only describe our 
 domicile to you as we find ourselves inhabiting it. 
 
 We are located on the belle Stage of this hotel, which 
 being the first hotel in St. Petersburg, is probably the 
 best in all Russia. Our suite of rooms is, as it were, 
 a little house all within itself, as we have a reception 
 room about sixteen feet high, and large in proportion, 
 elegantly, and even sumptuously, famished ; ditto bed- 
 room, servants' rooms, and an entrance lobby, with 
 front door and bell, where visitors disrobe themselves 
 of their huge fur shubas and overboots, and where our 
 Russian dragoman is in attendance to assist when we 
 are " at home." We have two excellent lithographs of 
 the Prince of Wales in our windows, of which we 
 
24 
 
 procured twenty copies before leaving London to present 
 to our friends here, who are delighted to receive them. 
 They are excellent likenesses by Maclure and Macdonald. 
 We had a capital letter from James the other day, in 
 which he said he should be prepared to hear from us, 
 that, " In Russia cold was not cold, snow was not snow, 
 and that ice was not ice, except in the shape of ice 
 creams." But I can assure you, paradoxical as it may 
 seem, that d either I nor Louise, who is peculiarly 
 sensitive to climate, have felt a shiver since we have 
 been here. Our rooms are kept at an invariable tem- 
 perature of 65 degrees Fahrenheit; the windows are 
 all double and airtight, so thus there are no draughts. 
 When the front door opens, as the passages are all 
 heated alike, there is no rush of cold air, and when we 
 go out we wear all the warm furs that I have previously 
 described to you. As you wish me to give you all details 
 with regard to our sojourn in Russia — a country so 
 little known, and not half appreciated — I will comply 
 with your request by giving you, to begin with, the 
 price of our rooms as 12 roubles (equal to 33s. a day), 
 taken for three or four weeks certain. 
 
 I do not say Russia is a cheap country to live in, 
 either for native or foreigner ; on the contrary, I must 
 admit at once that it is very dear, as there are 
 comparatively only two classes in the country — the 
 nobles, or wealthy landowners, and the working classes, 
 or peasants. The first are, for the most part rich, 
 profuse, and reckless — extravagant, sometimes even to 
 folly, and totally regardless of the prices paid by them 
 for anything that they want, and which, when required, 
 must be had irrespective of cost. The second, until 
 lately absolute serfs, have not yet attained even to the 
 
25 
 
 comforts of life beyond the natural requirements of 
 existence. For the first, St. Petersburg has become the 
 emporium of all the refinements and luxuries that 
 not only the length and breadth of Europe can produce, 
 but to which Asia has also largely contributed, so that, 
 whether it be summer or winter, fruits of the rarest quality, 
 vegetables, and flowers, and all the delicacies in season, or 
 out of season, can equally well be procured for the bit of 
 paper stamped with the Imperial arms and Crown, and 
 representing roubles, more or less. Under these 
 circumstances, ''Put money in thy purse " when thou 
 comest to Russia, and I will back the Russians to 
 empty it for you ; " 'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been 
 slave to thousands." 
 
 Well, now, where shall I begin ? My head is full of 
 the thousand and one things I have to tell you about, 
 and the very multiplicity of them is my difficulty. We 
 are in St. Michael's Square, in the very heart of 
 St. Petersburg, with the Nobility Club adjoining us, and 
 the splendid Corinthian Palace of the Grand Duchess 
 Helen opposite us ; and as I get up to consider and 
 look out of the window, and wonder how I am to 
 begin, my attention is arrested, or distracted, by the 
 Grand Duchess's seven dogs, just let out for their 
 morning's gambol into the square, to disport themselves 
 in the snow. They are playing with an old hat, and 
 the " little wee dog " has got inside, and the others are 
 bowling him over and over, and enjoying the fun. 
 
 I have made up my mind that I must take my text 
 from the Admiralty — not Childers', or Goschen's, but 
 someone's with a precious long name, which I fear to 
 write, and endeavour from that point cfajjpui to give 
 you a slight idea of the topography of the town. 
 
26 
 
 The Admiralty is an oblong square, -with its back to 
 the iiver Neva on its north side, and its front of half 
 an English mile in length on the south side, facing a 
 large square or place bearing its name. Its fcwc sides 
 or ends are each 650 English feet long. In the middle 
 pari of this edifice is the principal entrance, over which 
 floats, as it were, a light and graceful spire, centred 
 in which is a clock. Now, tonsider yourself loc.te a 
 in this clock, and I will endeavour to direct its long 
 hand so that it may point out to you the great town in 
 front of it, and its short hand the lesser town behind it. 
 
 By making the long hand point at a right angle to the 
 face of the clock, over the Admiralty "Ploschad" or 
 square, it will shew you a street in a direct line with 
 itself, stretching straight away for a distance of about 
 two miles. This street is called Gorokhovaia Sbeet 
 The long hand must now t saz a little to the right, and 
 it _ ~11 point straight down anothe- street, abou: fcwc 
 and a half miles long, which street is called Yosnesenski 
 Prospekt. Again, it bears as much to the left of the 
 centre as i: did to the right, and it will point straight 
 down the largest and longest street of the three. This 
 is t'ae principal street :: Si Petersburg, half as wide 
 again as Regent Street, and about three miles long, and 
 lied the Nevsfci Prospekt. These streets start :."_ 
 the Adm ir alty place, not far from each other, but, by 
 bearing away from one another, form themselves into 
 the shape of a fan, of which the clock might be the 
 handle, so that if you place yourself at the forth 
 end of either of them, you would still have a view of 
 the clock, and from the clock you can see to their 
 remotest end. All the other streets are, without 
 option, broad and convenient, blind alleys and 
 
27 
 
 i 
 narrow lanes being wholly unknown. The cross streets 
 
 even would be thought, in most continental towns, to 
 be quite spacious enough for main streets. 
 
 Surrounding and contiguous to the Admiralty 
 Ploschad, we have a succession of palaces, noble build- 
 ings, and monuments. Among them are the Winter 
 Palace, the residence of the Emperor and his Court 
 during winter. The huge pile is four stories high, or 
 about 80 feet, the frontage is about 455 feet in length, 
 and the breadth 350 feet. The Hermitage, a grand 
 museum, erected in the Greek style, and which for 
 elegance, purity of architectural form, and for the 
 beauty, as well as for the costliness of the materials 
 employed, has scarcely an equal in Europe. It forms a 
 parallelogram 515 feet by 375, and is approached by a 
 noble vestibule, supported by ten immense Caryatides of 
 grey granite, measuring 22 feet with their pedestals. 
 It is connected with the palace by an arch in the form 
 of a bridge. The Isaac Cathedral, dedicated to St. 
 Isaac, of Dalmatia, a building of grand proportions, and 
 of a simple but lofty style of architecture, with noble 
 porticoes, supported by huge Monolith pillars of Finland 
 granite, 60 feet high, and seven feet diameter, said to be 
 the largest Monoliths in the world. The Hotel de 
 l'Etat-Major, the Foreign Office, the War Office, the 
 Senate, and the Synod, the Statues of Peter the Great, 
 and Alexander the First. As I do not intend to enter 
 into long descriptions, I can only say that wherever the 
 long hand of the clock can point on the south side of the 
 Neva, it could not cover one hundred yards of ground 
 without encountering marble palaces, churches, monu- 
 ments, and public buildings, which must be seen to be 
 appreciated. 
 
28 
 
 And now, if we suppose the short hand to be pointing 
 towards the north, right across the river Neva, it will 
 show you the Fortress and Cathedral of St. Peter and 
 St. Paul, the Exchange, the Academy of Sciences, the 
 Academy of Arts, the School of Marine Cadets, the 
 School of Mines, &c. The most interesting features of 
 the interior of those buildings and churches, I shall 
 touch upon in the course of my epistle. 
 
 The first thing to do when you arrive here is to engage 
 a " Dragoman," who can speak your language and his 
 own ; and the second thing is to know how to hail a 
 " Droshki Sleigh." Well, we have done the first by 
 engaging a native, of the name of Ivan Michael 
 Timofeieff, during our stay in the country, at a salary 
 of three roubles a day, and all expenses paid. (N.B., 
 three copecks are about one penny, 100 copecks make 
 one rouble, and one rouble is two shillings and nine- 
 pence ; this is all the information you require about the 
 Russian coinage). As Ivan is likely to go with us to 
 Moscow, Smolensk, Wilna, and Warsaw, and will neces- 
 sarily have to be occasionally mentioned, you might like 
 to make his acquaintance, so I beg to inform you that 
 Ivan is a true born Russian, 42 years of age, exactly 
 five feet nothing high in his boots (I measured him by 
 stratagem), is married to a very tall woman, and has a 
 family of six children. He was born, and continued to 
 be a serf until emancipated by the present Emperor 
 Alexander's ukase, was several years Chasseur of the 
 American Embassy, more especially when Cassius Clay 
 was minister, speaks English pretty well, Russian I 
 suppose better. Although a very small man, he has a 
 wonderful presence, and orders about the big Droshki 
 men, and porters, with a most distinguished air of 
 
29 
 
 superiority, and what's more they obey him. They 
 have christened him John the Terrible, after one of 
 Russia's most autocratic despots. His success comes, 
 I think from his intellectual head, which is immense 
 for his size, in fact, the whole contour of his person 
 reminds me, on a small scale, of the great Emperor 
 Napoleon, so much so that when he draws himself up 
 to give his commands, I honour him with the designa- 
 tion of that great general. By means of copecks 
 judiciously administered, he can always get the guar- 
 dians of public places to give us good positions, to see 
 what is to be seen, and when these guardians are 
 beyond the reach of Ivan's bribes he accosts them with 
 his hat off and bowing to the ground, saying, " An 
 Englis nobblemann and nobbleladye presents their com- 
 plements," &c, &c. Oh, Ivan ! Ivan ! He knows 
 everything and everybody, or pretends to, which is 
 much the same, and he is so clever and has such a good 
 memory, that if ever he tells me a " white one " he 
 remembers it, and although I occasionally lay a trap for 
 him I can't catch him. He is an honest little fellow in 
 money matters, and that is a great virtue here, perhaps 
 I might say anywhere with men of his class, or perhaps 
 with other classes too ; so that if any of our friends 
 come to Russia and want a dragoman they could not do 
 better than write to Ivan Michael Timofeieff, Hotel 
 Klee, St. Petersburg, and he will engage rooms at the 
 hotel or meet them at the railway, or do any other 
 commission that may be required ; and now I have 
 done Ivan a good turn I will proceed. Where was I ? 
 Oh ! the droshki sleigh, and how to hail it ; convert the 
 final P of his worship into K, pronounce it as one word 
 quickly, rolling the R, and you get my elegant invention 
 
30 
 
 of a Eussian word hisworshik, which will bring you a 
 droshki sleigh in a moment, and you will be surprised 
 at the progress you have made in the language. But 
 you will say, what is a droshki sleigh ? It is a cab, not 
 a four-wheeler or a hansom, but a little box, which is 
 the droshki, fitted on to two slides, which is the sleigh, 
 altogether about 2| feet from the ground. The seat is 
 very narrow, and can only be intended for one person 
 to sit on, and the driver perches himself in front of you 
 on a curious apparatus in a semicircular form, with one 
 leg in a receptacle and one dangling out over the side, 
 with a great horse " displaying immense symmetry of 
 bone " dragging you along at a tremendous pace, whose 
 tail is considerably higher than your head. If you are 
 a small party of two you may still manage, after some 
 experience, to sit in the droshki sleigh by holding on by 
 each other ; but it is attended with some risk, especially 
 round the corners, until you are Bussianised, and con- 
 sequently expert. 
 
 Our square is just out of the principal street, Nevski 
 Prospekt, about 1^ mile down from the clock, and now 
 let us step out into the Nevski and see what is going 
 on. Fortunately, there is a large, two-horsed droshki 
 sleigh, licensed to carry two or more, so I hail him with 
 hisworshik, which brings him to us immediately, and 
 as this is all the Eussian I know Ivan bargains with 
 him for a drive round the town per hour. (By-the-bye, 
 I must omit from all things dear the droshkis, they are 
 the only reasonable things in Eussia.) We have two 
 good, black horses, and they take us down the Nevski 
 at a rattling pace over the snow, the road being wide 
 enough for a division into two roads, one for updriving 
 and one for downdriving ; and now I will mention a few 
 
31 
 
 of the following objects of interest as we go along : — 
 The Palace of the Czarevitch, fortunately meeting the 
 Princess Dagmar just coming out in her sleigh, who 
 looked so well and returned our respectful salute. You 
 may always know the Czaritsa's (the Empress's) 
 carriage and the Czarievna's (the Crown Princess's) 
 carriage by their Cossack footmen being special to them. 
 The Alexander Nevski Monastery and Church, the 
 archiepiscopal seat of the metropolitan of St. Petersburg, 
 the Taurida Palace, built by Catherine II. in 1783, and 
 given by her to Field Marshal Potemkin after he had 
 conquered the Crimea and received the submission of 
 the King of Georgia; the Prosbragenski Church, which 
 belongs to one of the oldest regiments of guards, founded 
 by Peter the Great, and is adorned within and without 
 with trophies taken from conquered nations. The 
 railing that surrounds the churchyard is formed of 
 Turkish and French cannon, looped together by large 
 chains gracefully twined, producing a very pleasing 
 effect. The Palace de Justice, where justice is now 
 administered on the basis of open trial by jury, a reform 
 which came into operation at Moscow and St. Peters- 
 burg in 1865, during the present Emperor's reign. A 
 great mansion, where the Emperor's servants and their 
 families are lodged. The Emperor employs the unpre- 
 cedented number of 2,000 servants, half of whom are 
 always on duty, the other half off, and their families are 
 all lodged under one roof. What would Sir Charles 
 Dilke say to this small establishment ? The New 
 Arsenal ; and then we come to the Summer Garden, the 
 Hyde Park of St. Petersburg. In former days the sons 
 and daughters of Russian merchants and tradesmen, 
 dressed in their best apparel, assembled in this garden 
 
32 
 
 on Whit-Monday to choose partners for life; but the 
 custom is now almost obsolete. At the entrance of the 
 garden, facing the river, is a chapel, dedicated to the 
 patron saint of the Emperor, marking the spot where 
 he stood when his life was attempted by Karakozoff in 
 1866. The chapel was raised by public subscription, 
 and is therefore a monument of the love and sympathy 
 of the Eussian people, to whom the present Czar has 
 much endeared himself. I give you the story s of this 
 attempt as it has been communicated to me. 
 
 It seems there was a peasant, who had intended to 
 cross the frozen river Neva, to proceed to the Cathedral 
 of St. Peter and St. Paul to attend the service there ; 
 but, finding the ice breaking up, he changed his mind, 
 and was directing his steps to another cathedral, that 
 of Kazan, on this side of the river, when, observing a 
 crowd standing near the gate of the Summer Garden in 
 order to catch a glimpse of the Czar, he stopped too, 
 and got himself into a good place. Presently the Czar 
 came out of the garden, accompanied by his daughter, 
 when the peasant felt himself rudely pushed by some 
 one on his right, and looking round, was just in time to 
 knock up the uplifted arm of the assassin Karakozoff, 
 whose finger was on the trigger of his pistol, and the 
 ball of which thus passed harmlessly into the air instead 
 of into the body of the Czar. The assassin was seized, 
 and the peasant, frightened out of his life, took to his 
 heels. With the celebrated General Todleben in 
 pursuit, he was soon overtaken, led to the Palace, and 
 presented to the Emperor and Empress as the peasant 
 who had saved the Emperor's life. They both embraced 
 him, and the Czar then and there proclaimed him 
 hereafter as a noble of the land. Special emissaries were 
 
33 
 
 immediately despatched for the new noble's wife, who 
 lived in a house which we have seen, and is situated in 
 a street leading out of " Sadovaia " Street, and called 
 "Apraxin Pereulok," to acquaint her with her good 
 fortune, and to take her by order of the Czar to the 
 Palace. The poor woman was busy preparing her own 
 and her husband's dinner against his return, and when 
 the officers entered was terribly frightened, believing 
 her husband had fallen into some trouble and had been 
 sent to prison, and they were come to fetch her also. 
 However, she was soon undeceived, but the orders were 
 she was to return with them immediately, so the noble lady 
 was not even allowed to " tidy herself," but was carried 
 straight off to the Empress, where we must leave the 
 two women of high and low degree to feel that " touch 
 of nature which makes the whole world kin." The 
 peasant and his wife now rank among the nobility of 
 Russia, and the peasant is an officer in the Emperor's 
 service. 
 
 And now we drive along the Court quay and the 
 English quay for a distance of two or three miles, 
 passing palaces and magnificent mansions facing the 
 river, which are occupied by the Grand Dukes and 
 other scions of the Royal House, besides the Russian 
 nobles, and wealthy landowners, bankers, and merchants. 
 The Grand Duke Constantine's palace is of marble, and 
 there is a beautiful new palace just built for the Grand 
 Duke Yladimir, the Czar's second son, and so on, with 
 a never ending variety of grand architecture of all styles 
 and ages. While we are fighting at home about a 
 design for our law courts, why do not some of our 
 architects run over here and copy a style if they can't 
 invent it. 
 
 Over • the Neva, frozen three feet deep, driven in our 
 
34 
 
 sleighs, with our horses at a gallop, there's a sensation 
 for you ! It was for us, and Louise, although a little 
 alarmed at first at beincr actually on the surface of a 
 great river in a chariot, soon became familiarised with 
 it, and would have another turn. Back again, over a 
 bridge of elegant iron arches, on magnificent granite 
 piers, which was erected by the late Czar Nicholas, 
 and cost a very large sum of money. The poor people 
 here think that it is in the power of the Czar to print 
 as many bank notes as he likes for the use of himself 
 and his friends, so Ivan informs us, that it is commonly 
 said among them that the bridge only cost the Czar 
 •401bs. of old rags. And now across the Admiralty 
 Place, past your friend the clock, and down the Nevski 
 to our hotel, having seen more marvellous modern 
 architecture than you can possibly see in any other city 
 in Europe, or any other two put together. 
 
 The Russians date their civilisation from Peter the 
 Great, and worship his memory ; and well they may, 
 as this great place has been all built from its foundations 
 in 168 years, St. Petersburg being founded by Peter in 
 1703, and converted by his indomitable perseverance 
 from a swamp into a palatial city, now containing a vast 
 population, the Czar himself superintending the works 
 in person, and dwelling in a small cottage, which we 
 have this day visited. 
 
 The day after our drive, we took a walk, and found 
 at every step something to interest us. I know no 
 place where your attention is so unceasingly occupied 
 by ordinary sights in the streets as at St. Petersburg, 
 and what is it which strikes us first ? Why, the great 
 number of shrines of Saints, which are constantly 
 meeting your eye, and the marvellous devotion shown 
 by the people as they pass them ; not one but takes 
 
35 
 
 his hat off and crosses himself, bowing three times as 
 he does so to the Shrine which engages his attention, 
 and they do this not only when immediately near, but 
 even in passing at the end of a cross street, and they 
 see a Shrine in the distance, so that one is constantly 
 wondering what the people can be bowing to ; but, 
 remember, that is all done from perfect devotion to 
 their faith, an example of which we witnessed on the 
 Russian Christmas-day in their Cathedral, and which I 
 shall describe to you further on. 
 
 One curious little incident occurred to me during our 
 perambulation. I must tell you that during the 
 election at Windsor, there was a queer old fellow, an 
 Eton College waterman, of the name of Cannon, more 
 familiarly known as " Sparrow," who never missed 
 attending any of my political meetings, and when I had 
 been holding forth for some time, he invariably brought 
 me a glass of ale, saying, " Colonel, you can't give me 
 one, but I can treat you," and I always accepted it 
 with much satisfaction. Well, poor old Sparrow had a 
 little wife, * a very tidy, neat, little woman, who had, of 
 course, seen better days, and her peculiarity was to 
 always stop in the street when she saw me coming a 
 long way off, and commence a series of bows, which 
 seemed as if they would never come to an end. Of 
 course I always spoke to her, and asked kindly after her 
 beneficent husband. Now, crossing a street here, I 
 came suddenly upon a little woman, the exact counter- 
 part of Mrs. Sparrow ; and there she was bowing 
 away just like my little old friend. Well, with what 
 Mr. Pickwick would call, my " Native politeness," and 
 my Windsor experiences, I forgot for the moment where 
 I was ; so up I went to the little old woman, and said, 
 " How dy'e do, mum ? How is Sparrow ? " when she 
 
36 
 
 crossed herself three times, and not even noticed me ; 
 and then I remembered I had never seen Mrs. Sparrow 
 do the one or neglect the other, and the conscious- 
 ness of the little old woman being a Eussian, and a 
 Devotee, immediately recnrred to my mind, and I sidled 
 off as best I could. 
 
 And, so, farewell until my next, 
 
 Your affectionate brother, 
 
 E. EICHAEDSOX-G-AEDXEE. 
 
37 
 
 Hotel de Russie, 
 
 St. Petersburg, 
 
 1-lSth January, 1872. 
 
 My dear John, 
 
 At length we have both got into the year 
 1872. This is New Year's day in Russia, on which 
 occasion the Czar of all the Russias holds a grand 
 levee in the Winter Palace, at which all the Diplomatic 
 Corps, the great Ministers of State, the heads of the 
 different departments, the highest naval and military 
 officers, and the grandees of all kinds from his immense 
 dominions are present, to do homage to the Chief of 
 the State and the head of the Church, and a very 
 splendid ceremony it is. You are aware that we had 
 some excellent introductions to Russians of position at 
 St. Petersburg, who have done everything in their power 
 to make our visit agreeable to us, and it was suggested 
 that as we had both been presented at our own court, 
 if our names were sent to Prince Gortchakoff by the 
 English representative at this court, His Majesty the 
 Emperor would probably receive me, and her Majesty 
 the Empress receive Louise at a presentation ; and 
 further that through the influential friends we possess, 
 it might be followed by an invitation to the grand new 
 year's ball which takes place next week at the Palace. 
 Well, all this has come about, as I had the honour of 
 being presented to His Majesty the Emperor this 
 morning, and was thus enabled to witness the mag- 
 nificent and gorgeous state by which he is surrounded. 
 
38 
 
 Louise is to be presented to the Empress at the ball, to 
 which we have both received invitations. 
 
 As you would probably like to know something of 
 the state kept up in the northern capital of Europe, I 
 will give you a short description of how things appeared 
 to me. I left my hotel in my uniform of deputy- 
 lieutenant, and proceeded to the Palace, alighting at the 
 entrance for the Diplomatic Corps, where I met our re- 
 presentative, who is acting as Charge d'affaires, until 
 the arrival of Lord Augustus Loftus, who is the lately 
 appointed xlmbassador, and we proceeded to the recep- 
 tion room appointed for us, after which we were even- 
 tually ushered into the throne-room where the presenta- 
 tions take place, passing by on our way, a magnificent 
 suite of rooms, adorned by pictures of the reigning 
 Royal Family, and other rare works of art. There I 
 had the honour of being presented to, among many 
 others, Prince Dolgorouki (grand master of the 
 ceremonies), Count Schuvaloff, and the man of all others 
 I much wished to see, Prince Gortchakoff (the prime 
 minister of the Czar), and of course a European 
 celebrity — his latest feat being the haK-persuading and 
 half-frightening the western powers — England in par- 
 ticular — with Gladstone at its head, into annulling that 
 part of the Black Sea treaty for which England's gold 
 was expended, and England's blood was shed in the 
 Crimean war. 
 
 After waiting some time, a grand cortege approached, 
 and the procession, reaching the whole length of an im- 
 mense ball-room, ushered into our room their Imperial 
 Majesties the Czar and the Empress, accompanied by 
 the Crown Princess (the Princess Dagmar, sister to the 
 Princess of Wales), with the Crown Prince, the Grand 
 Duke Vladimir, the Princess Mary, the Grand Dukes 
 
39 
 
 Nicholas and Constantine, and the remaining members 
 of the Royal family at St. Petersburg. Preceding them 
 came the officers of state, then an army of grand 
 chamberlains, and chamberlains in court dress, elegantly 
 overlaid with gold embroidery, and bearing wands -of 
 office, and after their Majesties came a bevy of beauty, 
 consisting of about fifty of the ladies of the court in 
 attendance on the Empress, wearing the rarest jewels 
 and gems. The mode of presentation here is different 
 to that adopted at our Court, and I think very much in 
 favour of the Court at St. Petersburg. The Czar and 
 the Empress both proceed round the room one after 
 the other, with a little interval, and after conversing 
 with the leading diplomatists, at length arrive where 
 you are anxiously awaiting them. They then each, on 
 your being presented to them separately, converse with 
 you, on your name, &c, being announced, and I need 
 not say have the tact to say something that is agree- 
 able to yourself or your nation. The Czar spoke to me, 
 among other things, of the Yolunteers, admired the 
 patriotic spirit they had displayed in enrolling them- 
 selves, and especially their motto of " Defence not 
 defiance," and the Empress also very graciously ad- 
 dressed me subsequently. Her Majesty wore a low 
 dress, with a long train of blue velvet, trimmed with 
 Russian sable, and such diamonds and pearls. The 
 Princess Dagmar has the same beautiful intelligent eyes 
 as her sister, and I should have known her from the 
 similitude in that feature alone, among all the ladies of 
 the Court. She wore a white silk dress, covered with 
 rare silver embroidery, and her ornaments were also 
 diamonds and pearls. The Empress alone wore a train. 
 After the presentations the Royal Family proceeded 
 through the remaining rooms, "where there were hundreds 
 
40 
 
 ranged on each side to receive them, bowing as they 
 went, and receiving the respectful salutations of all. 
 
 The guard of honour was composed of Cossacks 
 in one room, and of the Chevaliers of the Garde in 
 another, and I was very much struck to-day, as I was 
 some time ago, to see what a physiognomical resem- 
 blance there is among the men composing the regiments 
 here. Passing by a barrack the other day, when the 
 regiment of the Emperor Paul was just marching in, I 
 stopped to observe them, and looking into their faces 
 was intensely amused to see they were each " alike as 
 two peas." One fellow with a celestial nose has a 
 comical appearance, but fancy 500 passing before you, 
 all with noses looking towards Heaven. After they had 
 gone in, I had a good laugh, and turned to Ivan for the 
 explanation, when he informed me that the men, bearing 
 a resemblance to each other, are draughted into the 
 same regiments, and that this one especially is a 
 " celestial," the late Emperor Paul, who founded it, 
 having been a celestial. 
 
 This brings me back into the streets again, and to 
 the market here, where we were offered one night by 
 the industrious vendors, anything, from a sucking pig 
 to a defunct wolf, which we were invited to buy, and 
 take home in our pockets. You need not go far here to 
 find what you want, as the shops in the principal 
 streets have everything displayed in tempting variety, 
 and in the market streets, the outside of the shops, 
 doors, balustrades, porticoes, &c, are covered with 
 actual pictures of almost each article they sell. If you 
 take your stand before a boot shop, and require a 
 certain kind of boot or shoe (you need not enter if not 
 inclined), until you have discovered they have the 
 
41 
 
 pattern you require, which you can do by examining 
 all the pictures outside of every variety of boot and 
 shoe they have within, but if you do enter, do not 
 forget, however humble the dwelling, to take off your 
 hat, first of all, out of respect to the tenant, and 
 secondly, to the Shrine of the Virgin, or of the Saint 
 which you always find placed in a corner of the room, 
 whom the tenant particularly patronises, or who 
 patronises him. 
 
 Wet nurses are a grand institution here, and when 
 engaged in a lady's family, have a fine time of it, if 
 one may judge by the magnificence of their appearance 
 when they are out for an airing. They are arrayed in 
 very pretty and very remarkable looking dresses, 
 consisting of the Russian head ornament, which rises 
 two or three inches above the forehead, and is covered 
 with narrow silver braid, the gown and pelisse of bright 
 blue or red cloth, ornamented also with broad silver 
 braid, and the remainder of the costume quite in" 
 keeping with the above. When dressed in blue, it 
 denotes that it is a little boy, who is the recipient of their 
 bounty, and when in red, that it is a little girl. The 
 Tartar hawkers are queer looking fellows ; they sell all 
 kinds of cotton goods in the streets, slung over their 
 shoulders, and combining the gayest and most fantastic 
 colours. Observe " Hisworshik," the Droshki man, 
 bargaining for a sash he wants to present to his 
 sweetheart for a New Year's gift. He is very cautious, 
 and wets the sash with his finger, and rubs hard to 
 ascertain whether the dye is hard and fast. We hear 
 a tremendous hallooing in the distance, and presently 
 comes past a fire brigade man, mounted on a galloping 
 steed, clearing the way for the fire engine, which is 
 
42 
 
 following closely after him. (We might adopt the 
 " avant courier" with advantage). There are a score 
 of fire towers all over the town, on top of which are 
 located watchers night and day, and by signals by day, 
 and by lamps at night, give notice from each tower to 
 he other when and where a fire takes place. (This 
 system we might also adopt with still farther advantage). 
 The police are fine fellows here, and are admirably 
 constituted. Some time ago a brave member of the 
 force stopped a Troika, the three horses of which were 
 running away and making for the crowded " Nevski," 
 which, if it had reached, several persons must have 
 been killed. The poor fellow was knocked down, but 
 held on, though severely and mortally wounded. He 
 was carried home, where he survived for some weeks, 
 during which the Emperor visited him in person, gave 
 him a distinguished order of merit, and assured him 
 that his wife and children should have his especial care. 
 This makes heroes of the men, as they know that 
 their Czar's eye is, as it were, upon them, humble though 
 they be. The Czar is the father of his people, and 
 always addresses his soldiers as "my children," and 
 the orphans of the military, as well as of others who 
 have served the state, have establishments provided 
 for their maintenance and education. 
 
 We were stopped on our walk this morning by a 
 friend, who asked us if we had heard about the accident 
 which had happened to Rushem-Pacha, the Turkish 
 ambassador at this court, and he went on to relate that 
 the ambassador had gone bear-hunting, and after having 
 lodged a shot in the animal he attacked, the bear 
 rushed upon him, and after discharging his revolver a 
 second time without effect, the ambassador was obliged 
 
43 
 
 to have recourse to his poignard, and as the bear 
 advanced, he drove this instrument down the animal's 
 throat, but his own arm went with it, which Bruin 
 terribly mangled before he could extricate it. At the 
 same time the ambassador got his face much torn by 
 one of the animal's paws, which, it is feared, will 
 very much disfigure the ambassador. The Russian 
 peasant who was with him took to his heels, but the 
 bear was eventually shot by another attendant, and 
 thus released the Pacha from any further trouble with 
 the monstrous brute. Now, you must not think by this 
 account that there is always as much danger in this 
 sport as attended this particular instance, but the 
 ambassador wanted all the glory by going comparatively 
 alone, and the consequence was he got all the pain; 
 they usually go out in large numbers, and the Emperor 
 is very much addicted to it and is an excellent bear shot. 
 And now I must confide a secret to you. A friend of 
 mine who is in possession of a bear's lair has formed a 
 party to hunt him, and I have gladly accepted an in- 
 vitation to join them, as it is the thing to do in Russia, 
 but I much fear that after this unfortunate accident, 
 Louise will not exactly consent to it. However, " Nous 
 verrons." If I do go I will give you a full account of 
 our adventure if the bear will •permit me. Wolves 
 form also very good sport. They are found in con- 
 siderable numbers not far from St. Petersburg, as well 
 as all over Russia. Another of my friend's expeditions, 
 in which I am invited to take part, is a trip to Finland 
 in a troika for the purpose of shooting the wolf. It 
 seems that you take with you in your troika a live pig 
 in a bag, and that when you get near the woods where 
 you expect to find wolves you squeeze the pig, which 
 
44 
 
 makes him squeak, hearing which out come the wolves ; 
 the party then secure their opportunity by taking a 
 shot at them. If one or more is killed you can't get at 
 them, because if a male the rest of the pack remain to 
 devour him, and if a female she is left where she falls, 
 but war to the death is now waged between you and the 
 wolves, their gallantry is called upon to revenge the 
 premature death of one of their ladies, and you must 
 keep on shooting a male, whom they will always stop 
 to devour or get away from the scene of your exploits 
 by galloping to more open country. In cases of 
 difficulty, where the sportsmen are nervous and not 
 good shots, or when ammunition is expended, in order 
 to stop the wolves the pig is thrown overboard, and 
 then if necessary one of the horses is killed and cast 
 adrift, and sometimes even a second horse, leaving only 
 one to pursue the journey, but all this is of course to 
 give you time to get away, and to continually stop the 
 wolves in their pursuit when they are infuriated and 
 famished ; because as long as you oblige the wolves 
 with one of themselves, provided it is a male, or any 
 other animal, yourself included, they remain to partake 
 of your generous liberality. 
 
 But I don't think I have told you anything about 
 the famous carriages of the country, the "troika" and 
 the " chetverka." The first is a large car on a sleigh, 
 drawn by three horses abreast, and holds four people 
 inside, besides the driver, who stands in a sort of 
 receptacle for his legs just inside the splash board. 
 The centre horse has a grand and gorgeous yoke, 
 which attaches him to the shafts, and the outside 
 horses run along in traces. The harness is brilliant 
 with silver plating, but, best of all, the pace they go 
 
45 
 
 at is most exhilarating, when you get into the open 
 country, where the snow is in good condition for 
 sledging, or, still better, on the ice on the river, or on 
 the Gulf of Finland, and the driver exhorts his horses 
 to increased action simply by his voice and the 
 language he uses to them, which they seem perfectly 
 to understand. Off they go at full gallop, which gives 
 you the nearest idea to what must be the delightful 
 sensation of flying, of which you can possibly conceive, 
 and for miles and miles they will continue stretching 
 away at a glorious pace, although, from the appearance 
 of the animals, you would hardly consider them capable 
 of it, but they are "very little fellows, and as hard as 
 nails." 
 
 A " chetverka " is a four-horse carriage, but not 
 used so much on a sleigh as on wheels in the summer. 
 The four horses are harnesed abreast, but their 
 position and action while in motion is most curious. 
 The pair in the centre do most of the work and the 
 outsiders represent effect, and in order to give you an 
 idea of the appearance they present, first of all, 
 imagine them to be all looking and standing straight to 
 the front. Well, we will leave the centre horses in 
 this position, and give our word of command to the 
 near and off horses one after the other. Now for the 
 horse on the near side. Attention ! Left face ! Left 
 wheel ! March ! And just as he has complied with your 
 instructions, and put out his left or near leg, to 
 commence the march and wheel, halt him. And then 
 you have him as he commences his gallop when started 
 off. For the horse on the off side you reverse your 
 word of command as regards his wheel, which must be 
 right wheel, and you get both your horses facing 
 
46 
 
 outwards, and causing the four to present from the 
 front the shape of an extended fan. Messrs. Passmore 
 & Son, of Windsor, are bnilding a new char-a-banc for 
 Louise to drive her team of ponies in, bnt we are so 
 delighted with the appearance of the chetverka, that 
 she has asked me to break her little Exmoors into 
 going four abreast, so that she mar drive them 
 occasionally in her char-a-banc in the Russian 
 fashion. 
 
 We had a delightful drive in our troika one evening 
 last week to the " Ice Hills,"' which afford much 
 amusement here in winter. We had a few friends to 
 dine with us, and after dinner our troikas were ordered 
 round, and away we went up the Xevski, over the 
 river Xeva, with temporary lamp-posts erected on the 
 ice, to direct the way, and arrived at fall gallop at our 
 destination. When we had mounted an immense flight 
 of steps to get to the top of the ice hill, we reached a 
 platform, from which you perceived a very precipitate 
 lescent of glittering ice, extending for some consider- 
 able distance. There you find the Russian guides, 
 with their long flat pieces of board, covered with cloth, 
 and fixed on to irons underneath exactly resembling 
 skates. This is long enough for two people to sit upon, 
 but very narrow, the guide behind to direct it in its 
 flight over the ice, and you in front with nothing to 
 hold on by. When thus arranged at the edge of the 
 platform, your skating board is pushed forward, and in 
 a moment you are off at the rate of at least sixty miles 
 an hour, as hard as you can tear, down the ice hill. 
 We hesitated some time before trusting ourselves to 
 this amusement, but, summoning courage, I took the 
 lead, and enjoyed it so much that I induced Louise and 
 
47 
 
 all the rest of the party to follow suit ; and away we 
 went, one after the other, helter skelter down the ice, 
 almost taking your breath away before you eventually 
 stop at the bottom, by a judiciously-placed layer of 
 snow. Then up again, continually renewing the 
 pleasurable excitement, until it was with difficulty we 
 could make up our minds to enter the restaurant and 
 take some tea, where we found music and dancing 
 going on among the natives, which was another source 
 of interest and gratification. At length we betook 
 ourselves to our troikas about midnight, and, by the 
 light of the moon, raced home over the snow and ice, 
 each of us bribing our drivers to go as hard as they 
 could tear along, and pass the others. 
 
 Just as I had got to this part of my letter, our door was 
 opened, and Ivan brought in a large document, which, 
 on opening, I found to contain invitations for Louise 
 and myself from " Le Grand-Maitre des ceremonies," 
 dating from " La Cour Imperiale," inviting us to be 
 present at the palace on Thursday, the 6th of January 
 (OS), to see the religious ceremony which takes place 
 on the day of the Epiphany ; so as, of course, we 
 proposed to attend, I thought I would leave this letter open 
 until to-day, and now we have been to the palace, and 
 returned, I can give you a short account of it. 
 
 This day is the Kussian 6th of January (the 
 Epiphany), kept very sacredly by the Russian Church 
 as the day on which our Saviour was baptised by St. 
 John. Accordingly every year the Metropolitan, or 
 Archbishop of St. Petersburg, accompanied by the 
 Emperor, his sons, and all the male members of the 
 Royal Family, form a grand religious procession, headed 
 by representatives from all the Russian regiments with 
 
48 
 
 their colours, and proceed in state to a beautiful temple 
 erected for the occasion immediately opposite the 
 Palace, on the banks of the river Neva, to celebrate the 
 baptismal ceremony. Such a sight of regal magnificence 
 combining all the splendour of the grandest court in 
 Europe, with a full display by a most pageantistic 
 church, and realising to your mind a spirit of soul-felt 
 devotion, I have never before witnessed. The long 
 line of galleries, gorgeously decorated rooms, guards of 
 soldiers from every regiment in St. Petersburg, hundreds 
 of officers in full dress uniforms, with orders glittering 
 with jewels, ambassadors from every court in Europe, 
 and then the Emperor, with military music striking up 
 by band after band as he passed along, created a 
 sensation more easily felt than described. From the 
 windows of the Palace we watched the ceremony. The 
 Emperor, with all his court, the high priests of the 
 Russian religion, countless thousands of his subjects, 
 all stood bare-headed, with eight degrees of frost, while 
 the archbishop offered up his prayer, and afterwards 
 blessed the banners of the regiments of all Russia, by 
 which he was surrounded. The religious ceremony 
 terminated, the procession returned to the palace, 
 passing through the rooms, the Emperor bowing to us 
 all as we lined the way. To give you an idea of the 
 liberality of the court as well as of its magnificence, 
 there were upwards of 2,000 covers laid for a 
 champagne dejeuner a la fourchette for those who were 
 invited, and as we were in the circle of the diplomatic 
 corps we had at our table the French, Austrian, and 
 Portuguese ambassadors, Louise being seated next to 
 General Le Flo, with whom I heard her discussing 
 politics in connection with the future of the French 
 
49 
 
 nation, but as the ambassador might object to his con- 
 versation being repeated I must refrain, although there 
 was much in it that was deeply interesting. 
 
 I remain, my dear John, 
 
 Your affectionate Brother, 
 
 R. RICHARDSON-GARDNER. 
 
50 
 
 Hotel de Russie, 
 
 St. Petersburg, 
 
 10-22 January, 1872. 
 
 My dear John, 
 
 I have said in a previous letter that the 
 Russians date their civilization from the reign of Peter 
 the Great, and now I propose to take you through 
 St. Petersburg, following those relics which appertain 
 to his memory, from his cottage by the side of the 
 Neva, built by himself, to his grave in the Cathedral of 
 St. Peter and St. Paul. 
 
 Peter was a Romanoff, and was proclaimed Czar of 
 all the Russias in 1689, being at that time only 
 seventeen years of age. It is well known that, finding 
 Russia much behind the rest of the world in mechanical 
 and other arts, for which he personally had a great 
 natural gift, he left his country for a time, much against 
 the wishes of his family and friends, to make himself ac- 
 quainted with the arts and inventions of other European 
 nations, and used his tools as an ordinary workman in 
 their principal dockyards. He visited England, and 
 was well known in Gravesend, London, and other 
 places on the banks of the Thames, and afterwards 
 stayed some time in Holland, where he not only built, 
 but sailed his own boat, which we have seen here, as 
 well as specimens of his engraving, turning, and 
 carpentering work. He rose at four in the morning, 
 at six he was either in the Senate, or the Admiralty ; 
 he succeeded in forming and bringing into a high state 
 
51 
 
 of discipline a large army ; he found Russia without a 
 fishing smack, and bequeathed to her a navy, to which 
 that of Sweden, long established and highly efficient, 
 lowered her flag ; he built St. Petersburg — turning a 
 swamp into a great and magnificent city ; he caused 
 canals and other works of public utility to be construc- 
 ted in various parts of the country; endowed colleges 
 and universities ; and generally promoted the advance- 
 ment of his great empire. 
 
 And now we will go to his first work in Russia — the 
 erection of his own hut, choosing a site from which he 
 might superintend the mighty works he had carried out 
 under his care. Here it is, for the most part just as he 
 left it, with its three apartments — dining-room, recep- 
 tion-room, and bed-room — the first about ten feet 
 square and the second about twelve feet square, the 
 bed-room being smaller than either. The dining-room 
 is now formed into a chapel or shrine, where hangs a 
 picture of our Saviour, which always accompanied 
 Peter in his travels ; but the other rooms are unaltered. 
 One arm-chair of his own make stands in a corner. 
 The whole cottage is now enclosed for preservation by 
 an exterior shell, leaving passage room between. His 
 next thought, after his home, was his church, and he 
 therefore had a small church of wood erected, which 
 was the original cathedral, and here it stands in its 
 primitive form, and in which there is service at this 
 present day. When the building of St. Petersburg had 
 progressed, it became necessary for Peter to have 
 a larger domicile than the cottage, as he had no 
 convenience even to receive people for the transaction 
 of business, so he selected a large piece of ground, 
 and planted the present Summer Garden, and in one 
 corner of it had a house built, which is about the size 
 
52 
 
 of a very small French chateau, and in which also a 
 few articles of furniture used by Peter are carefully 
 preserved. 
 
 We will now go to the Museum of Imperial Carriages 
 and look round us for something commemorative of 
 Peter. What do we see first ? On the top of the stair- 
 case is the skeleton of a horse, not Peter's, but that of 
 the late Emperor Nicholas, whose favourite charger he 
 was. An inscription attached to the skeleton states 
 that the horse was twenty-five years old when he died, 
 and had been ridden by the Emperor for many years. 
 Inside this gallery we find the Imperial Coronation and 
 other gala carriages, all of the most costly description, 
 with ornamented panels containing exquisite pictures by 
 Boucher, Gravelot, and other eminent artists. These 
 carriages are only used at the coronation of the 
 Emperors or Empresses at Moscow, to which place 
 they are carefully transported. It is interesting to look 
 at the carriages, which have been used by a line of 
 sovereigns, while on their way to be crowned autocrats 
 of dominions extending over one-half of Europe and 
 nearly one -half of Asia. At last we come to the 
 greatest curiosity in the gallery, a covered sledge made 
 by Peter entirely with his own hands. It is a small, 
 close carriage, fitted as a sledge, with broad, strong 
 slides ; the windows are made of isinglass, and it is 
 lined with green baize. Behind there is a small trunk, 
 which contained the clothes and provisions of the great 
 Czar when he travelled. An extra fee to the custodian 
 gained us permission to enter this remarkable carriage, 
 built by an Emperor, and in which he is said to have 
 traversed his dominions. 
 
 The Imperial library contains a room of engravings 
 dedicated to Peter the Great's time, among which are 
 
53 
 
 many of his own likenesses, but the most amusing one 
 of all is on a common, ordinary, swing sign board, such 
 as they used at taverns and hostelries in times past, and 
 which may still be seen swinging in English country 
 districts. One Edward Wilde kept a tavern at Graves- 
 end, which was frequented by the Czar, and the said 
 Edward Wilde, seeing the advantage such a customer 
 gave him, and being a bit of an artist, slyly painted the 
 portrait of Peter and hung it up outside his house, with 
 the inscription of " The Czar of Muscovy " on the top, 
 and his own name of Edward Wilde, as landlord, at the 
 bottom. Peter was good natured enough to allow it to 
 remain, and report says Edward Wilde drove a good 
 trade, people coming from miles round to see the wonder- 
 ful " Czar of Muscovy " without, and within. We were 
 much interested in examining the rare MSS. and missals 
 in this famous collection, they bore picture engravings 
 of almost every celebrated person that has lived in 
 Europe, whatever has been his calling, and underneath 
 one or more letters, or at least autographs of each. 
 Great Britain is partly represented by letters or auto- 
 graphs of Henry VII., Henry VIII., Elizabeth, James I., 
 Charles I., and Queen Henrietta, Robert Devereux 
 Earl of Essex, &c, but probably the most interesting 
 of all are several letters of Mary Queen of Scots, ad- 
 dressed by her to different people of her time, as well 
 as a missal, or diary, where you may read the passing 
 thoughts of her mind during her great trouble. Near 
 the beginning is written, " Ce livre est a moi Marie 
 Heine, 1553." Letters from English statesmen, men 
 of letters, and anyone celebrated in any way, are here 
 placed under glass cases, and beautifully arranged, so 
 that you can easily and comfortably read them. I 
 copied one from Richard Cobden, and here it is : — 
 
54 
 
 " Mr. Cobden presents his compliments to Messrs. 
 Pritt, Yenables, and Co., and begs to say that with his 
 strong opinions against any further railways being 
 authorised at present he will not be justified in having 
 his name on the Barnsley Bill." 
 
 We will now go to the Hermitage, where I won't 
 detain you with any lengthened description of its 
 splendid collection of pictures, more than to say that it 
 contains a rare selection, numbering 1635, including 
 the Italian, Spanish, Flemish, Dutch, German, French, 
 Russian, and English schools, each artistically classed ; 
 besides an extensive numismatic collection, as one also 
 of rare gems, and lastly, Peter the Great's gallery, 
 which is replete with his personal effects and relics, 
 among which are the turning lathes, and instruments 
 for carving with which the Monarch worked ; his 
 telescopes, mathematical instruments, books, and walk- 
 ing sticks, are all objects of great curiosity. A rod 
 giving his height, shows him to have been of the 
 gigantic stature of seven feet. Here is a dress worn by 
 him, and embroidered by his wife Catherine the First, 
 for the ceremony of her coronation, and is appropriately 
 placed in the centre of this interesting workshop and 
 museum. And now we approach the last resting place 
 of this marvellous man, near which in an outside 
 building exists, quite as complete as he left it, the boat 
 he built with his own hands, and on the stern of which 
 he carved a picture of its launch, himself standing by, 
 and the priest blessing it as it lay on the water. In 
 the cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul, lies buried 
 Peter the Great, and all the sovereigns of Russia since 
 the foundation of St. Petersburg, excepting only Peter II. 
 who died and was interred at Moscow. The bodies are 
 deposited under the floor of the church, the marble 
 
55 
 
 tombs above only marking the sites of the graves. The 
 following are the names of some of those members of 
 the Romanoff Royal family who are here interred : — 
 Peter the Great, and Empress Catherine the First, his wife. 
 Empress Elisabeth, daughter of Peter the Great. 
 Empress Anne, niece of Peter the Great. Emperor 
 Peter the Third, nephew of Peter the Great. Empress 
 Catherine the Second. Emperor Alexander the First, 
 and Empress Elisabeth, his wife. Emperor Paul, and 
 Empress Mary, his wife. Emperor Nicholas, and 
 Empress Alexandra, his wife. Grand Duke Constantine, 
 brother to Emperor Nicholas. A baby of the present 
 Crown Prince. A daughter of the present Emperor. 
 The Czarewitch (Grand Duke Nicholas), eldest son of 
 the present Emperor. 
 
 The late Czarewitch, the eldest son of the present 
 Emperor Alexander, you will remember, died at Nice, 
 and round his tomb and those of the more recently 
 deceased, exotic and other plants are grouped. He was 
 the pride and hope of his house, and beloved by the 
 Russian people. I cannot do better than to give you in 
 conclusion of this part of my letter a very graphic 
 description from Free Russia : — " One dark December 
 day, near dusk, two Englishmen hail a boat on the 
 Neva brink, and push out rapidly through the bars of 
 ice towards that grim fortress of St. Peter and St. Paul, 
 in which lie buried, under marble slab and golden cross, 
 the Emperors and Empresses (with one exception) 
 since the reign of Peter the Great. As they are push- 
 ing onward they observe the watermen drop their oars 
 and doff their caps, and looking round, they see the 
 imperial barge, propelled by twenty rowers, athwart 
 their stern. The Emperor Alexander sits in that barge 
 alone, an officer is standing by his side, and the helms- 
 
56 
 
 man directs the rowers how to pull. Saluting as he 
 glides past their boat, the Emperor jumps to land, and 
 muffling his loose great coat about his neck, steps 
 hastily along the planks, and up the roadway leading 
 to the church. No one goes with him. The six or 
 eight idlers who he meets on the road just touch their 
 hats, and stand aside to let him pass. Trying the 
 front door of the sombre church, he finds it locked, 
 and striding off quickly to a second door, he sees a man 
 in plain clothes, and beckons to him. The door is 
 quickly opened, and the lord of seventy millions of 
 subjects walks into the church that is to be his final 
 home. The English visitors are near. ' Wait for an 
 instant,' says the man in plain clothes, ' the Emperor 
 is within ;' but adds, ' You can step into the porch, 
 His Majesty -will not keep you long.' The porch is 
 parted from the church by glass doors only, and , the 
 English visitors look down upon the scene within. 
 Long aisles and columns stretch and rise before them ; 
 flags and trophies, won in a hundred battles, fought 
 against the Swede and Frank, the Perse and Turk, 
 adorn the walls ; and here and there a silver lamp burns 
 fitfully in front of a pictured Saint. Between the 
 columns stand, in white sepulchral rows, the Imperial 
 tombs, a weird and ghostly vista, gleaming in this red 
 and sombre light, alone. The Emperor passes from 
 slab to slab ; now pausing for an instant, as if conning 
 an inscription on the stone ; now crossing the nave 
 absorbed and bent ; here hidden for a moment in the 
 gloom ; then moving furtively along the aisle. The 
 dead are all around him ; Peter, Catherine, Paul ; 
 fierce warriors ; tender women ; innocent babes ; and 
 overhead the dust and glory of a hundred wars. What 
 brings him hither in this wintry dusk ? He stops and 
 
57 
 
 and kneels at the foot of his mother's tomb ! Once 
 more he pauses, kneels, kneels a long time, as if in 
 praj r er ; then, rising, kisses the golden cross. That 
 slab is the tomb of his eldest son ! A moment later he 
 is gone." 
 
 And now, my dear John, to what ordinary subject 
 can I descend ? How am I to glide from the grave to 
 the gay ? Theatres ? No ; too sudden. The ball at 
 the Palace on Monday last ? Worse still. I will keep 
 that to finish with. I have it ; something I will tell 
 you about some Laplanders, or more properly Samoyeds, 
 who have just arrived, and are encamped on the river. 
 We went down to pay them a visit, and entered one of 
 their shanties, where a small family of two mothers, one 
 father, and a heap of children were congregated, feeding 
 on raw fish, and picking the bones of a deceased rein- 
 deer. They were a curious lot. What a world this is ! 
 as a friend of mine used constantly to remark. Here 
 was this Samoyed family before us, where we were 
 quite safe from their rapacious eyes and stomachs ; but 
 if they had happened to have got one of us alone in 
 their own particular country, they might be picking our 
 bones instead of those of the reindeer ; because this 
 same race are reputed to be cannibals, when they are 
 hard up for food, which is their normal state. These 
 Samoyeds are nomadic, cowering through the winter 
 months in shanties, sprawling through the summer 
 months in tents, their shanty is a pyramid with a roll 
 of reindeer skins, drawn slackly round a series of poles, 
 and an opening at the top to let out the smoke. The 
 women, looking anything but lovely in their sealskin 
 tights and reindeer smocks, are infamous for magic 
 and second sight. In every district of the north a 
 female Samoyed is feared as a witch, an enchantress, 
 
58 
 
 who keeps a devil by her side, bound to obey her will. 
 Over the greater part of their country the snow never 
 melts, but in June the slopes of a few favoured valleys 
 grow green with reindeer moss. On this the reindeer 
 feed, and on these, when he can get them, and on raw 
 fish, the wild men of the country live. Samoyed means 
 cannibal, — man eater ; — they use no fire in cooking food, 
 and hence, probably, the horrible fame they have 
 acquired, which, after all, like many other ill used 
 people, they may not deserve ; but I would rather not try. 
 They are evidently brought to St. Petersburg by an 
 enterprising entrepreneur who gathers unto himself 
 many copecks for the exhibition ; and one of the 
 amusements we entered into for a consideration was a 
 drive in the reindeer sleigh.; quite in the "Chetvertka" 
 style, four reindeer abreast, down the Xeva and back, 
 all for the small charge of ten copecks each. 
 
 Well now, I said I would finish with the ball, and as 
 ladies can describe such festivities with a great deal 
 more grace than gentlemen, I have, with Louise's 
 permission, extracted from a letter she has just written 
 a friend, her pretty account of it : — 
 
 " The ball is already an event of the past, inasmuch 
 as it came off on Monday night, and how I am to 
 describe it is a mystery to me, as no language T can use 
 can give you the faintest idea of the reality. If you 
 have read the ' Arabian Nights,' you will remember the 
 story of Aladdin's wonderful fairy palace. Try and 
 imagine a suite of some nine or ten large galleried 
 rooms, supported by white marble pillars, richly 
 decorated ceilings, white and gold, adorned also with 
 much looking-glass, opening each out of the other, 
 lighted not only by the wax candles in the massive 
 crystal chandeliers, but by, I may literally say, myriads 
 
59 
 
 of candles placed in circles around each column from 
 base to pinnacle, and also surrounding the galleries and 
 windows like an illumination. Add to this, beautiful 
 exotics, from floor to roof, in the four corners of each 
 room, with two palm trees in the centre of the principal 
 ball-room, bands of military music striking up in suc- 
 cession, sixteen hundred of the haute noblesse of the 
 Empire, in all the variety of ball attire and military full 
 dress, and you may, perhaps, in some degree imagine 
 the scene which our eyes and senses took in upon our 
 first arrival at the Winter Palace, at half-past nine 
 o'clock, on Monday evening. Of course, Eoyalty had 
 not yet entered, as all the guests must be in waiting to 
 receive them, and a right Eoyal party they did look 
 when, a few minutes later, there was a commotion 
 among the masters of the ceremonies, and a ' hush ' 
 from all, and then the Emperor, leading the Empress, 
 the Crown Prince, with his wife, the Princess Dagmar 
 (our Princess of Wales' sister), the grand Duchess 
 Mary (the Emperor's only daughter), with the other 
 princes, and all the other members of the court enter, 
 and after having been received by deep obeisances from 
 all, the ball commences by the Crown Prince leading off 
 the Empress, and the Emperor the Crown Princess ; 
 but here I must say one word relative to the Empress's 
 diamonds. The tunic of her dress was embroidered 
 with the Imperial bee in diamonds ; the under skirt em- 
 broidered with bouquets of raised flowers, the petals of 
 each flower diamonds ; a fringe of diamonds surrounding 
 the low body of her dress, a bouquet of diamonds form- 
 ing the stomacher ; and as for the diamond pendants to 
 her necklace, and the diamond tiara on her head, I can 
 give you no idea of their costliness. But now the first 
 
60 
 
 dance is over ; the ladies to be presented to the 
 Empress are conducted to an adjoining room, where 
 they are placed in a circle, and the Empress, with one 
 gentleman in attendance to announce our names to her, 
 enters, and on being presented in her turn she finds 
 something graceful and amiable to say to each, as she 
 slowly walks round the expectant circle. This ceremony 
 over, we all return to the ball-room, and dancing 
 continues until midnight, the Princesses entering into 
 the spirit of it with evident enjoyment, meanwhile the 
 Emperor and Empress talking, and making, in course 
 of time, the whole tour of the numerous rooms. The 
 whole evening refreshments of every variety are to be 
 procured at a buffet, extending along a gallery, which 
 runs parallel to the three largest ball-rooms. Here 
 heaps of gold plate are piled up in pyramids at intervals, 
 the whole length of the gallery ; and now to supper. 
 A hot one, and everyone seated. The tables are so 
 sumptuously decorated with gold and silver plate, the 
 only thing I can think of to compare it to, would be an 
 exhibition of all the race cups of the last fifty years. 
 There are three supper rooms, but as we are " dis- 
 tinguished strangers," we sup with the diplomatic corps, 
 at a table adjoining the Emperor's, which is slightly 
 raised upon a dais. After supper, which lasts nearly 
 an hour, the Boyal party retire, and we leave soon 
 after, being most delighted, and wonderfully impressed 
 by the magnificence of the Royal entertainment we 
 have attended. I feel I have told my story but ill, 
 but it is impossible to give in words any description, 
 or any idea of the great luxury at this court, which 
 combines Oriental and Asiatic splendour with European 
 taste and civilisation. Everyone is equally impressed 
 
61 
 
 by it, therefore, you must not think it any excited 
 enthusiasm on my part, as the Greek minister said to 
 me, ' It is magnificent,' and I repeat ' magnificent ; ' 
 and all I can say is that it is magnificent, as there is 
 no other word to convey my feelings, and so I must 
 conclude by repeating it, ' magnificent.' " 
 
 I remain, my dear John, 
 
 Your affectionate Brother, 
 
 R. RICHARDSON-GARDNER. 
 
62 
 
 Hotel Dusaux, 
 
 Moscow, 
 
 18-30 January, 1872. 
 
 My deae John, 
 
 Moscow ! holy Moscow ; the ancient capital 
 of Muscovy, the idol of every Eussian's heart, whose 
 shrines are to him the holiest in the empire, hallowed 
 by centuries of grand historical events. "What as- 
 sociations do not arise at the name ? Moscow ! the 
 beautiful ; Moscow ! the unfortunate. What vicissitudes 
 of good and evil fortune has this city not passed 
 through ? Four times nearly consumed by fire — in 
 1536, by accident ; in 1572, by the Tartars, when over 
 100,000 persons perished in the flames, or by the sword ; 
 in 1611, by the Poles, who destroyed by fire a great 
 portion of the city ; and lastly, in 1812, when the 
 Muscovites gave up their ancient, holy, and beautiful 
 city to the devouring element, the grandest sacrifice 
 ever made to national feeling. The plague of 1771 
 diminished the population by several thousands, from 
 which it has never recovered, and the history of its 
 battles and its sieges would alone fill many volumes. 
 Take for instance one of the entrance gates to the 
 IiremHn, say the Nikolsky gate, under whose arches 
 the troops of Tokhtamysh, of Sigismund III. and of 
 Napoleon, have all marched within four centuries. In 
 1408, it witnessed the siege of Moscow, by Edigei ; 
 in 1551, the invasion by the Crim Tartars ; and in 
 
63 
 
 1611-12, the battles between the Poles and the Kussians 
 for the possession of holy Moscow; and in 1812, 
 Napoleon passed through it when it was partly des- 
 troyed by his orders, but subsequently restored, by 
 order of the Emperor Alexander I. of Russia. 
 
 But in this letter it is not my intention to revert to 
 much of its ancient history, only so far as it is connected 
 with its modern aspect. And now let me place myself on 
 top of the tower of Ivan Veliki, and take a bird's-eye 
 view of the town, and dot down what appearance it 
 presents. In my various wanderings, I have travelled 
 through Asia Minor, and the North of Africa, and I have 
 floated on the Golden Horn, with Constantinople 
 within my view, but I have never yet seen any town or 
 city which presented a coup d'ceil, so truly Oriental or 
 Asiatic as Muscovy's honoured capital, the view from 
 the summit of this tower being certainly one of the most 
 striking and unique in Europe. I have immediately 
 under and about me the most ancient and most historical 
 part of Moscow, and four of probably the most interest- 
 ing buildings in the world, all within a stone's throw of 
 each other. First, the Kremlin, for centuries the palace 
 of the ancient Tsars of Muscovy, which has been the 
 happy home of many, but also the scene of the most 
 deplorable and wicked acts of which history is cognizant. 
 Second, the Blagoveschenski Sobor, or Cathedral of the 
 Annunciation, where the Tsars were baptized and 
 married. Third, the Uspenski Sobor, or Cathedral of the 
 Assumption, where the Tsars were, and are still crowned. 
 Fourth, the Arkhangelski Sobor, or Cathedral of the 
 Archangel Michael, where the ancient Tsars were buried, 
 the present dynasty finding their last resting place as I 
 have in a former letter informed you, in the cathedral 
 of St. Peter and St. Paul, at St. Petersburg. Thus 
 
64 
 
 truly you may pass from the " cradle to the grave," for 
 here lie buried Emperors of such good repute that they 
 have been immortalised by their subjects as Saints, 
 with others whose characters are too truly depicted by 
 the cognomen they bore, and such a one was John the 
 Terrible. All these buildings are in the Oriental style 
 of architecture, with scores of domes and gilded minarets 
 sparkling in the mid-day sun. The late Emperor 
 Nicholas added a large and handsome facade to the 
 old palace, much extending its interior accommodation 
 for modern requirements. The Kremlin Palace, with 
 its cathedrals, monasteries, and other buildings, is 
 enclosed within battlements of solid masonry, and 
 pierced by five gates, the principal of which is the 
 Spaski, or Kedeemer gate, which is the " Porta Sacra " 
 and " Porta Triumphalis " of Moscow. Over it is a 
 picture of the Redeemer, held in high veneration by the 
 orthodox. An omission to uncover the head while 
 passing under this gate was anciently punishable, and 
 the traveller should not fail to pay the respect to old 
 traditions here exacted, since the Emperor himself 
 conforms to the custom. Criminals executed in front of 
 this gate offered their last prayers on earth to this 
 image of the Redeemer. Beyond we see a city, whose 
 circumference is about twenty English miles, built 
 totally irrespective of form, but presenting to the eye a 
 pleasing negligence and picturesque irregularity ; houses 
 large and small, public buildings, churches, and other 
 edifices, are mingled confusedly together, and the streets 
 undulate continually, and thus offer from time to time 
 points of view, whence the eye is able to range over the 
 vast area of housetops, trees, and gilded and coloured 
 domes. The profusion of churches (370 in number) is 
 a characteristic feature of the city. The other objects 
 
65 
 
 which most attract the observer, are the Foundling 
 Hospital, the Treasury, the Arsenal, the Bazaar, the 
 University, the Museum, the great Eiding School, the 
 Strastny, the Donskoe, the Simonoff, and Novopaski 
 Monasteries, and the Novo-Devichi Convent, the 
 Petrofski Park and Palace, and the Hermitage and 
 Zoological Gardens. 
 
 And now I descend from the Ivan Veliki tower, and 
 enter the ancient part of the Kremlin Palace by the 
 red steps, which are now only used on important 
 occasions, such as when the Emperor goes to the 
 Cathedral of the Assumption. Now, here is a trifle of 
 history for you to ruminate over. " From the top of 
 these stairs the Tsars of old allowed- the populace to 
 see the light of their eyes ; here John the Terrible 
 gazed at the comet that seemed to foretell his speedy 
 end ; and it was here also that he committed the 
 inhuman act of transfixing with his pointed staff the 
 foot of the trusty messenger and friend of Prince 
 Kurbski, a valiant leader of his armies, who, in the 
 apprehension of unmerited punishment and death, fled 
 to the Polish camp at Wolmar, whence he wrote to the 
 Tsar, setting forth the crimes and atrocities of his 
 reign ; the tyrant rested on his staff while the letter 
 was read by his comrades, the messenger meanwhile 
 standing motionless and silent. From the red stair- 
 case the mangled body of the false Demetrius was 
 thrown down in the court below by the infuriated 
 people of Moscow, in 1606, and it was from the same 
 steps that the rebel Streltsi, in 1682, tore the obnoxious 
 Boyar Matveyeff, and cut him to pieces before the eyes 
 of the terrified mother of Peter the Great, and 
 numerous other noblemen and adherents of the court. 
 By these steps, also, Napoleon, followed by his marshals, 
 
 E 
 
66 
 
 ascended to take possession of the Palace of the Kremlin." 
 However, these steps lead to a gold court, an audience 
 chamber, and banquetting-room, and also to the Hall of 
 St. Vladimir, to which the Tsars proceed immediately 
 after their coronation, and take their seats upon the 
 throne for the first time, adorned with all the Imperial 
 insignia, and afterwards dine amidst their nobles, 
 crowned heads being alone seated at the same table. We 
 now come to a very interesting part of the palace, the 
 Terem, anciently devoted to the Tsarevna and her 
 children. The rooms - contain many objects of great 
 curiosity, among which are the bed of Alexis, father of 
 Peter the Great, just as he left it when carried to his 
 grave ; seals of many of the sovereigns, especially a gold 
 seal of John the Terrible, which has sealed the doom of 
 thousands, and which is almost painful to behold from 
 its unhappy associations. Then more rooms, such as 
 the Hall of the Patriarchs, &c, too numerous to par- 
 ticularise, on to the modern part of the palace, built by 
 Nicholas. There we have on the ground floor all the 
 private apartments of the Emperor and Empress, and 
 the upper floor, containing the State apartments, which 
 are as grand and as gorgeous as an autocratic emperor 
 like Nicholas, with untold means at his command, could 
 make them. There are several large halls, among which 
 are the hall of St. Andrew and the hall of St. George, the 
 latter 200 feet long, 68 feet broad, and 58 feet high, where 
 the names of each individual decorated with this order 
 since its foundation is to be found inscribed upon the 
 walls in letters of gold ; the furniture is black and 
 orange — the colours of the order. There is also a 
 picture gallery, containing, among others, some fine 
 pictures brought here from the Royal Castle at Warsaw, 
 upon seeing which Louise pitied the poor Poles, and, 
 
67 
 
 addressing herself to Ivan, lamented that Russia should 
 so have despoiled Poland, upon which Ivan asked us 
 where was the Kertch collection ? and entertained us by 
 the following narrative : — He said " when he was at the 
 American Embassy at St. Petersburg, as chasseur, it 
 became his duty to attend Governor Seymour, the 
 American Minister, to Kertch, after the Crimean War 
 as interpreter ; and when there Governor Seymour, 
 without giving his name, visited the museum, and 
 inquired of the Russian director of the museum what 
 had become of certain objects of interest which he had 
 expected to find there ? upon which the Russian 
 director asked Ivan confidentially whether the gentle- 
 man was an Englishman, and on hearing from Ivan 
 that he was an American, the Russian director broke 
 out into great lamentation and anger, and said that the 
 English had despoiled his museum to enrich their own 
 at home." Aliena nobis nostra plus aliis placent. 
 
 And now we enter the treasury, which is the de- 
 pository of venerated historical objects and of treasures 
 hereditary in the reigning house, as the immense riches 
 amassed here, consisting of gold and silver plate, of 
 antique pattern and shape, precious stones of the rarest 
 quality and value, and costly manufactures of different 
 kinds, take hours to see. I cannot attempt to give you 
 any definite idea of them in detail, but will only men- 
 tion one or two objects which are more striking because 
 of their historical associations. Fowling pieces, in- 
 scribed as having been presented in 1614 to the Tsar 
 Michael (the first Romanoff) by Favian Smith, an 
 Englishman ; the standard of John the Terrible, 
 planted at Kazan in 1552 on conquering that Province, 
 as well as the pointed spear stick, which he did not 
 hesitate to drive into the foot of anyone who offended 
 
68 
 
 him ; also the Order of the Garter and the patent for 
 it, sent by our Queen Elizabeth to this horrible ruffian. 
 The sword and spurs of Charles XII. of Sweden, which 
 he wore at the battle of Poltava ; coronation chairs of 
 the Empress Elizabeth, Paul I., Alexander II., and 
 several others bearing their respective ciphers ; the 
 throne of Poland, removed from Warsaw and used by 
 Nicholas as King of that conquered country ; the 
 insignia of Alexis, of Peter the Great, and his brother 
 John. An ivory throne, date 1472 (just four hundred 
 years old), which the present Emperor Alexander used 
 at his coronation. Near it a throne used by Alexis, 
 studded with 876 diamonds and 1223 rubies, besides 
 turquoise and pearls. An orb of great historical im- 
 portance, sent by the Greek Emperors Basilius and 
 Constantine to a Prince of Russia ; it is most splendidly 
 studded with 58 diamonds, 89 rubies, 23 sapphires, 50 
 emeralds, and 37 pearls, all of immense size and lustre. 
 Next come different objects, viz., the actual coronation 
 robes worn by several of the Tsars and their Empresses, 
 military uniforms, and the ordinary jack boots of Peter 
 the Great, Peter the Second, and Paul. Then come the 
 crowns of the different monarchs, and among them we 
 find those of Poland, Kazan, and other conquered 
 kingdoms, and if our Government pusillanimously give 
 way, as they have lately done on the Black Sea Treaty 
 question ("Ex uno disce omnes "), the Russians will 
 soon add the crowns from Constantinople, in the south- 
 east of Europe, and from Bokhara, in the north-west of 
 India, to their already rather extensive collection. Beds 
 of different monarchs are also exhibited here, and two 
 camp bedsteads which belonged to Napoleon, one of 
 which was used by him on the night of the battle of 
 Berezina, when they were taken by the Russians. 
 
69 
 
 And now, my dear John, as I fear I shall weary you 
 with descriptions, I will take you to a " Traktir," where 
 I have no doubt you would like to have joined us in 
 discussing a Russian dinner, accompanied by Russian 
 wines, in a Russian Restaurant. "We ordered our 
 dinner in the morning, and on arriving at the appointed 
 hour of seven o'clock, found all ready. I don't know 
 whether I have previously mentioned to you that Colonel 
 Money went off to Southern Russia soon after our 
 arrival at St. Petersburg, and Colonel Isenbeck (the 
 Russian), by rail to Nijni-Novgorod, and after that by 
 sleigh for forty days and nights to the " Amoor" river 
 to his duty there (that's a nice journey in the dead of 
 winter), but we were joined by an English friend on 
 our visit to Moscow, the pleasure of whose company we 
 had at dinner. For the amusement of the ladies I will 
 describe him as being twenty-eight years of age, fair 
 complexion, tall and elegant in figure, expressive eyes, 
 and altogether very good looking. The diner-a-la-Russe 
 commences with the " Zakuska." It consists of various 
 relishes, such as fresh caviar, raw herring, smoked 
 salmon, "Balyk" (sturgeon dried in the sun), raw 
 smoked goose, radishes, cheese, butter, and other 
 comestibles ; these need not be specified in your menu, 
 the word " Zakuska" comprehending 'everything of the 
 kind in season. A liqueur glass of Kiimmel (Alasch), 
 flavoured with carraway seeds, or of Listofka, flavoured 
 with the young leaves of the black currant, is taken after 
 the Zakuska, which is laid out on a separate table, and 
 is partaken of, all standing round. We then take our 
 seats at the regular dinner table, and here is our 
 menu : — 
 
70 
 
 GREAT MOSCOW TRAKTIR. 
 
 — ♦ — 
 
 Menu, lUh Jan., o.s., 1872. 
 
 SOUP. 
 
 {A small portion of each). 
 
 Ukha. 
 
 Eastigai. 
 
 Solianka. 
 
 FISH. 
 Sturgeon. 
 Eastikai. 
 
 Pojarskie Kotlety. 
 
 Utka y-Biabchiky. 
 
 Kuriefskaya Kata. 
 
 Nesselidde. 
 
 WINES 
 
 {From the Crimea). 
 
 Donskoe Champ an skoe. 
 
 Kraonaju Kirmsk. 
 
 Kapetinskoe. 
 
 Now there's a puzzle for you, but take my word for 
 it, it was all good and well-served by the most civil of 
 waiters, attired only in bright-coloured silk shirts, with 
 clean white trousers. After dinner we went to another 
 " Traktir " to partake of the celebrated yellow Caravan 
 tea, " Joltoi Chai," which comes overland from China, 
 and is served in tumblers with a slice of lemon and 
 sugar. Try a cup of tea in that fashion, and tell me 
 when you write how you like it, only you may not have 
 
71 
 
 the " Joltoi Chai," which is important. You must 
 know in all the tea- drinking rooms there is a large 
 barrel organ, worked by machinery, which plays the 
 most select and fashionable music from the most popular 
 operas ; and so we drank our tea to the strains of this 
 instrument, the polite attendant bringing us a list of 
 the pieces for Louise to make her selection. The 
 natives sweeten their tea with a piece of sugar kept in 
 the mouth ; perhaps that would not exactly suit you, 
 so I shall not recommend it. 
 
 But I have not yet told you how we got to Moscow, 
 which was, of course, by train, leaving St. Petersburg 
 at seven o'clock in the evening, and arriving here at 
 eleven o'clock next morning (only sixteen hours), which 
 we think a bagatelle now. There are carriages divided 
 into half- compartments, and we took one for sixty 
 roubles (about eight guineas), and made ourselves quite 
 comfortable. I seem destined to be in the company of 
 amusing stove-keepers, as our present one (a good- 
 looking young man this time, of about thirty-five years 
 of age), very soon began to speak a few English words, 
 and informed me that he was married to an " Eengleesh 
 vooman, a veery nice vooman," and she spoke a " leetle 
 Euski," and he spoke a " leetle Eengleesh," but neither 
 of them spoke a word of each other's language when 
 they married. What ceremony they went through, if 
 any, I could not fathom, nor how they managed to 
 make known " their loves," but probably it was through 
 the medium of their eyes, as he had a brilliant pair of 
 light blue. The poor fellow kept the stoves all right, 
 and was duly rewarded with copecks at the end of our 
 journey. When we arrived at our hotel we were sur- 
 prised to find that the landlord had prepared a suite 
 consisting of six rooms for us, which he said was in 
 
72- 
 
 accordance with our telegram, so we requested to see it, 
 and here it is as delivered : — " Hotel Dusaux, Moscow. 
 Prepare sitting-wom and bedrom 4 gentleman and lady, 
 leaving here seven glok hafrj thes evening. — Gardner, 
 St. Petersburg." — It appears that the clerk who sent it 
 must have imagined himself very clever, and turned my 
 " for," which he imagined to be " four," into the figure 
 4, and so prepared for us an immense reception and a 
 disappointment to our host. I could not make out how 
 our rooms were heated, as I examined all round our 
 ." sitting-wom," and could find no trace of hot-air pipe 
 or stove ; but on retiring to my little bed I soon jumped 
 out, as I touched something awfully hot with my feet, 
 and on lighting the candle again I found the stove, 
 which was lighted from the outside passage, ran along 
 level with the wall, and, although not easily noticeable, 
 was sensibly felt. I managed to intercept the heat with 
 a non-conductor, and only left enough to be comfort- 
 able, and I never slept better in my life ; in fact, I 
 began to like it, which accounts for ladies taking to 
 " hot bottles." 
 
 The next evening we had an adventure, a short 
 narrative of which I sent to The Times, and headed it 
 ''Moscow — A warning," in which I said " That as the 
 Moscow Exhibition is in the course of erection, and 
 doubtless there would be several of our countrymen here 
 in the autumn months, I considered it my duty to send 
 them a warning not to go beyond the precincts of the 
 city either on foot or in a public vehicle, unless properly 
 accompanied," but as I don't know whether The Times 
 has or will publish my letter, I send you a short account 
 of what occurred. 
 
 Ivan, our dragoman, suggested that we should go to 
 evening service in the church of the Strastny Convent, 
 
73 
 
 where all the prayers and ceremonies are performed by 
 the nuns, to which we readily assented. Issuing forth, 
 therefore, from our hotel, Ivan hails " Hisvorshik," and 
 directs the driver to take us to the convent ; Ivan in- 
 tending to follow us closely in another sleigh, as they 
 only accommodate two. The convent is within the 
 city, although we were unaware of its locale, and there- 
 fore, when the driver took us out of the city, through 
 the St. Petersburg gate, we thought it was all right, as 
 many of the monastic establishments are some way 
 beyond the town. However, I looked behind for Ivan 
 two or three times, and began to wonder why he had 
 not kept up with us, when at last I saw him galloping 
 after us at a furious rate, and on overtaking our sleigh, 
 he jumped out, caught hold of our man's reins, and a 
 serious row commenced, Ivan charging our driver with 
 not obeying his instructions, and attempting to take us, 
 knowing us to be foreigners, out to a village called 
 Sisyjatsky, a place of evil notoriety, about a mile in 
 the suburbs, for the purpose of getting us robbed by 
 his accomplices there. It seems our driver didn't know 
 that Ivan intended to follow us, so thought he could 
 take us with impunity where he pleased, and the mis- 
 fortune of the horse in Ivan's sleigh falling, facilitated 
 his designs, so that Ivan was delayed until he could 
 procure another sleigh. He then drove to the convent, 
 and finding we were not there, and had been seen going 
 down another road, his suspicions were awakened, and 
 he drove at a gallop after us, overtaking us when we 
 were within a quarter of a mile of what appears to be 
 about the worst place near Moscow, inhabited by a law- 
 less lot of ruffians. 
 
 I could hardly credit Ivan's suspicions until we re- 
 turned to our hotel, when they were entirely confirmed 
 
74 
 
 by Russians and others connected with the place, who 
 said that it was not an unusual occurrence for foreigners, 
 and even Russians (when inebriated) to be taken there, 
 hustled by these roughs, robbed of their furs and valua- 
 bles, and then let loose to find their way back to 
 Moscow as best they could. 
 
 We, however, got back to the convent in time for the 
 conclusion of the service, and the sweet silvery voices 
 of the nuns, as they chanted the responses, soon made 
 us forget all about the Sisvjatsky villagers, and our 
 narrow escape from their polite attentions. 
 
 I remain, my di;ar John, 
 
 Your affectionate brother, 1 
 
 R. RICHARDSON-GARDNER. 
 
75 
 
 Hotel Dusaux, 
 
 Moscow, 
 
 20th Jan.— (1st Feb., 1872.) 
 
 My deae John, 
 
 Foundling Hospitals ! Now, I don't intend 
 to enter upon the question as to whether such institu- 
 tions tend to recognise and increase immorality, but 
 simply to give you a short account of a most interesting 
 visit which we have to-day paid to the largest hospital 
 of the kind in existence, viz., that at Moscow. We had 
 previously gone through the Foundling at St. Peters- 
 burg, which is a branch of the institution here, and we 
 1 were so interested with the child that we determined to 
 visit its parent. 
 
 The Foundling Hospital at Moscow was opened in 
 1763 by Empress Catherine II., and in the year of 
 grace 1871, about 12,000 children were received at its 
 doors, not, as at some other institutions, in a secret 
 manner, but openly, and taken either by the mother or 
 some friend into an entrance room set apart for that 
 purpose. There the infant is at once received without 
 any further question being asked than, has the child 
 been baptised ! and if so, by what name ? The child is 
 then registered in the books of the institution, and a 
 number is assigned to it, which is henceforward worn 
 around its neck, and figures on its cot, while a receipt 
 showing the same number, is handed to the bearer of 
 the child, in order to enable her to visit, or even claim it, 
 at any future period up to the age of ten years, in which 
 
76 
 
 case all its expenses have to be paid. The infant is then 
 passed into another room, where, after being undressed 
 washed, and weighed, it is swaddled in the clothes of the 
 hospital and handed to its future foster parent, she being 
 the woman who happens at the moment to stand at 
 the head of the list amongst a number who are always 
 waiting in attendance. These women, who are generally 
 peasants from the country, have frequently, it is be- 
 lieved, themselves been the depositors of their own 
 children at the hospital, either personally or by means of 
 a friend, a few hours previously ; but be that as it may, 
 the nurses who support the children's existence are pro- 
 vided with good fare at the institution, and are paid 
 about 8c/. a day, which I fear is an attraction many of 
 the peasant women seek, at the expense of their own 
 offspring, who are left in their villages, to be brought up 
 by hand. We saw two infants arrive while we were in 
 the room where they are received, and go through the 
 operation of being washed and weighed, the poor little 
 things were respectively twenty-four and thirty hours 
 old, and looked in very good condition, being, we were 
 informed, about the average weight. One was a 
 boy, and the other a girl, the boy having a blue 
 ribbon attached to his cap, and the girl a red, which is 
 the distinction of the sexes right through the insti- 
 tution. In the first ward there were about thirty little 
 ones, all recent arrivals, with red and blue ribbons, 
 and ensconced in such neat clean little cribs, with a 
 foster mother to each, rocking it in its cradle, or 
 imparting to it its nourishment, and following on, 
 there were wards seemingly without end, all full of 
 children in cradles, and nurses attending them, the latter 
 all being clad in a hospital uniform of brown holland, 
 with clean white caps, plaited frills with narrow dark 
 
77 
 
 blue ribbon, all well behaved, who respectfully bowed as 
 our party passed. The children are all vaccinated at 
 three weeks old, from calves kept for the purpose on the 
 establishment, and passed on from ward to ward, until 
 they are about six or eight weeks old, when, if. they are 
 strong and healthy, they are sent together with their 
 nurses to the villages to which the latter belong, where 
 the nurses receive about 4s. Qd. a month for the main- 
 tenance of their charges, under the supervision of the 
 government doctor of the district. I am strongly of 
 opinion that many mothers bring their legitimate chil- 
 dren up from the country, get them in at one door, and 
 enter themselves at another as nurses ; get appointed 
 to be foster mothers to their own children, and so get 
 paid for nursing them eventually at their own domestic 
 hearths. Well, suppose they do, the humbler classes 
 are very poor in Russia, and live a very hard life, and 
 if they procure this small assistance from the Govern- 
 ment, the rich don't feel it, and the poor much need it, 
 and Russia has not yet arrived at those refined princi- 
 ples of social science which would permit a child to 
 starve if the parent was too poor to keep it alive. Poor 
 little Atoms ! In one ward there was a steam apparatus, 
 for hatching the prematures into vitality ; there were 
 four such little weeny things undergoing the process, 
 the whole four not weighing much more than a full 
 grown child, the weight of each being registered on the 
 wall over its head. The doctor who accompanied us 
 said they were very successful with them, if they ouly 
 lived long euough to get them under or rather over 
 steam. Next to the prematures there were three babies 
 (I was going to say twins, but I think they are called 
 triplets), two girls and a boy, all together in one cradle, 
 born of one mother, and brought in on Christmas Eve ; 
 
78 
 
 weight of the three on arrival lTJlbs. : they were all 
 mercifully asleep, so we had a quiet look at them, and 
 wondered where and who their mother could be. 
 
 By-the-bye, we were astonished at the quietude 
 of the place, with seven to eight hundred babies under 
 one roof, and so little ciying, which we were assured 
 was in consequence of the great care and attention paid 
 to them, and which we could not fail to perceive, as 
 nothing which good domestic management can suggest, 
 or medical art approve, has been omitted. The boys, 
 when they grow up, generally become agricultural 
 labourers. Some of the more intelligent are brought 
 up at the Industrial Schools at Moscow and St. Peters- 
 burg, where they are taught various trades, and may 
 also become hospital dressers at the School of Surgery. 
 Some of the girls are taken back to the institution, and 
 trained as nurses, and even sometimes as midwives, for 
 which a special school is attached. In taking leave, I 
 came to the conclusion that there is a political founda- 
 tion for keeping up these large foundling hospitals 
 beyond the feeling of philanthrophy or humanitarianism, 
 which is. that Russia has a larger tract of country than 
 it can conveniently populate, and population being 
 essential to the progress and advancement of the 
 Russian empire, the state protects the lives of its 
 infantile subjects, legitimate or illegitimate. 
 
 And now we find our pair horse sleigh ready waiting 
 at the door to take us into the country to visit what are 
 popularly called the " Sparrow hills/' a range forming 
 a semi-circle round Moscow, about six miles distant 
 from the city. This drive is particularly interesting, 
 both as affording a fine view of Moscow, and as being 
 the ground where Xapoleon obtained his first 
 glance of it, and being also the same route by 
 
79 
 
 ■which his army entered the city. On our way we 
 stopped at the Novo-Devitche Convent, and had 
 the pleasure of seeing all the .nuns in the Kefectory 
 enjoying their mid-day meal. This was only allowed 
 as Louise was of our party, otherwise no gentl- 
 men are admitted alone ; but they need not have been 
 alarmed, as I thought they were all extremely plain and 
 
 uninteresting, although Reginald A said he caught 
 
 a sly glimpse of a very pretty face under the black 
 fantastic and most unbecoming hood. Our sleigh fol- 
 lowed us from the convent to the hills, when we had the 
 full enjoyment of a walk over the hard crisp snow, with 
 a bracing air, and over fifteen degrees of frost. I have 
 no occasion for a bar ometer, as I can tell by my moustache 
 what the temperature is to a degree, according as it is 
 limp, stiff, or stalactic. It was the latter to-day, as 
 the frozen breath was hanging in long icicles down 
 to the bottom of my chin ; but how enjoyable 
 the atmosphere, and how interesting the spot on 
 which we are standing, for it was from here, that 
 the advanced guard of the French army caught the 
 first view of the golden Minarets and starry domes 
 of Moscow, and the Kremlin burst upon their sight. 
 "All this is yours," cried Napoleon, when he first 
 gazed upon the goal of his ambition, and a shout of 
 " Moscow ! Moscow ! " was taken up by the foremost rank 
 and carried to the rear of his army. But the Russian 
 army had marched out of the whole capital, with muffled 
 drums, and colours furled, leaving the city to its fate, 
 so that ere the night had closed in, and Napoleon arrived 
 at the gate, he learnt to his astonishment and mortifica- 
 tion that 300,000 inhabitants had fled, and that the only 
 Russians who remained in the city were the convicts who 
 had been liberated from the gaols, a few of the rabble, 
 
80 
 
 and the sick and wounded in the hospital, and it was soon 
 discovered that the fire which had commenced could not 
 be restrained, and fanned by the wind it spread rapidly, 
 and consumed the best portion of the city. " The 
 churches," says Labanne, " though covered with iron 
 and lead, were destroyed, and with them those graceful 
 steeples which we had seen the night before resplendent 
 in the setting sun ; the hospitals, too, which contained 
 more than 20,000 wounded, soon began to burn — a har- 
 rowing and dreadful spectacle — and almost all these 
 poor wretches perished ! " Also, Karamzin writes, 
 " Palaces and temples, monuments of art, and miracles of 
 luxury, the remains of past ages and those which had 
 been the creation of yesterday, the tombs of ancestors, 
 and the nursery cradles of the present generation, were 
 indiscriminately destroyed ; nothing was left of Moscow 
 save the remembrance of the city, and the deep 
 resolution to avenge its fate. At length, on the 19th 
 of October, after a stay of thirty-four days, Napoleon 
 left Moscow with his army, consisting of 120,000 men 
 and 550 pieces of cannon, a vast amount of plunder, 
 and a countless number of camp followers. And now 
 the picture of the advance was to be reversed, Murat 
 was defeated at Malo-Yaroslavits on the 21th, and an 
 unsuccessful stand was made at Yiasma on the 3rd 
 November. On the 6th, a winter, peculiarly early and 
 severe, even for Russia, set in, the thermometer 18 
 degrees below freezing, the wind blowing furiously, and 
 the soldiers struggling in vain with the eddying snow, 
 could no longer distinguish the road, and falling into 
 the ditches by the side, there found their grave. On 
 the 5th of December, Napoleon left his army ; on the 
 10th he reached Warsaw, and on the 18th Paris 
 and the Tuileries." Thus ended the greatest military 
 
81 
 
 catastrophe that ever befel an army in either ancient or 
 modern times. And who were the great Russian 
 generals who counselled the destruction of their city, 
 rather than the conqueror should possess it ? De Tolly, 
 and Kotusoff; and who was another great Russian 
 general whose name has figured in history ? Suwaroff. 
 And we have stood at their graves in the churches of 
 Kazan and Alexander Newski at St. Petersburg, and 
 read these inscriptions : — 
 
 Here lies Kotusoff. 
 Here lies Suwaroff. 
 
 In the evening Louise and I walked alone for an hour 
 on the terrace in front of this same Kremlin, with the 
 full bright moon pouring its softened rays on this now 
 peaceful city, and indulged in reflections on its past, 
 its present, and as to what its future history might be ; 
 and so ended our visit to Moscow. 
 
 I remain, my dear John, 
 
 Your affectionate brother, 
 
 R. RICHARDSON-GARDNER. 
 
82 
 
 Hotel de RrssrE, 
 
 St. Peteesbueg, 
 
 22?ul Jan.— (3rd Feb. 1872.) 
 
 My deae John, 
 
 Back again to our old quarters for a few days, 
 and then off to Warsaw, on our homeward journey. 
 We find a great difference between the climate of St. 
 Petersburg and that of Moscow, the latter being much 
 more healthy and bracing. For all that I would rather 
 live at St. Petersburg, as it is always gay and lively. 
 And now for a few words about the opera and theatres. 
 Our first visit was to the Grand Opera House, where a 
 Russian ballet, and nothing but ballet, went on for 
 nearly four hours, the subject being the adventures of 
 Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, the horse of the knight, 
 and the ass of the squire, figuring prominently in the 
 scenes. The dancing was most excellent, and I am 
 pleased to say the danseuses bear irreproachable cha- 
 racters. No one is permitted to go behind the scenes, 
 and they are all educated and taught at an academy 
 provided by Government under professors of the terpsi- 
 chorean art. There are among them a celebrated group 
 of Polish dancers, who gave us in great perfection and 
 in national costume, the Polish national dance, called the 
 " Mazur.'' This must not be confounded, as it often is in 
 England, with the " Mazurka." It is a totally different 
 thing, as it is danced throughout by four couples with 
 great esprit and aplomb. Another night we went to the 
 Russian Opera House, where we were much entertained 
 
83 
 
 "by an opera, the subject of which was the history of the 
 first Romanoff, but who himself never appeared, it 
 being forbidden that a representation of a member of the 
 present reigning family should be placed upon the stage. 
 The house was full of Russians of all ages and sizes, as, 
 it being a popular and nationally historical opera, 
 schools and children were brought to hear it. The opera 
 houses and theatres in Russia are subsidised by the 
 State, and are under the surveillance of a Government 
 officer, who appoints directors to each establishment. 
 The opera houses of St. Petersburg and Moscow are 
 under the management of " Signor Eugene Merelli, 
 Regisseur en chef de 1' Opera Imperial Italien de St. 
 Petersburg et Moscow," to whom I had the pleasure of 
 an introduction, and who very kindly sent us a box for a 
 " Patti " night (not purchasable for money, as the boxes 
 are either hereditary in families, or subscribed for the 
 season), and who afterwards invited me to a soiree at 
 his house, to meet all the artists and artistes of the grand 
 opera, which I can assure you was a great treat. We 
 had a most delightful evening, and among the guests were 
 many whose names have been familiar to me as " house- 
 hold words " for years, and others, whose melodious 
 notes have so often enchanted me at both the London 
 opera houses. We had Arditi, chef d'orchestre and the 
 following tenors : — Naudin ; Bettini, husband of Tre- 
 belli-Bettini ; Corsi, son-in-law to Naudin ; and Nicolini, 
 whose success has been greater at St. Petersburg than 
 in London, as the music is sung here half a note lower, 
 which suits his voice much better ; also, Ciampi, the 
 buffo ; Bagagiolo, the basso profundo ; and Madame 
 Bagagiolo, a magnificent type of the true Italian 
 woman ; Sinico, the pretty and piquante soprano ; and 
 the handsome Trebelli, the celebrated contralto ; and 
 
84 
 
 many others, all of whom were exceedingly polite and 
 agreeable to your English brother, and what pleased him 
 much was the enthusiasm with which they spoke of old 
 England. Le Comte Brebinske, a non-professional 
 guest like myself, gave " The health of Merelli," which 
 was heartily responded to. Schneider is here at the 
 Opera Bouffe, and we have had a Russian friend's box 
 sent us twice, so we heard her in La Grande Duchesse 
 de Gerolstein and in Barbe Blue; but I think her day is 
 over. She is much too vulgar and in bad taste to suit 
 any but Parisians. 
 
 Coming out of the opera we observed huge fires 
 ascending from great cauldrons in the street, which had 
 a very cheery effect, the object being that the servants 
 in attendance with the carriages may get a warm up 
 when the cold is intense. When the temperature is at 
 ten degrees of frost the soldiers are furnished with a 
 head-dress of Caucasian origin, called a basJdlick. The 
 ladies wear them also, made of fine materials from 
 Circassia, and create rather a pleasiug effect. Louise 
 has invested in a couple, and was photographed in one 
 last week. Talking of the cold, after twenty degrees of 
 frost the Droshki drivers are not allowed to stand about 
 in the street, as it has often occurred that after an extra 
 drop of schnaps to keep the cold out they have fallen 
 asleep in the night, and been frozen to death, the 
 horses going home of their own accord to their stables 
 with the Droshki and its unfortunate driver. 
 
 I took a Russian bath this morning, which was a 
 novelty even to me, though I am an old Turkish bath 
 bather. My bathman, who put me through the pro- 
 cess, was a great strapping fellow, about three inches 
 taller than myself. First of all, buckets of tepid 
 water were thrown over me, and then followed a good 
 
85 
 
 lathering of soap, made up in a bowl, after which I 
 was placed on a perforated board, through the holes of 
 which hot steam began to percolate, which, getting 
 hotter and hotter, and much too hot, although I can 
 stand a good deal, I was obliged to sing out and make 
 signs, when my bathman, mistaking my movements 
 for a signal as to its not being hot enough, clapped on 
 a little extra, which started me pretty quickly off my 
 perforated bed, and I could not be induced to take 
 another dose. I then observed six-foot- three provide 
 himself with a cat-of-nine-tails, in the shape of a birch, 
 made of bushes of the bay tree, and strongly suspect- 
 ing when he got me at full length on my face he in- 
 tended to administer this instrument, I respectfully 
 requested to know (by signs, mind, as we could not 
 speak a word to each other), what were his intentions, 
 when he unhesitatingly informed me that it was part 
 of the regular process, and must be proceeded with. I 
 therefore resigned myself to my fate, went flat down 
 on my face as directed, and got birched from my neck 
 to my heels in true Spartan fashion, without wincing 
 or moving a muscle ; however, it was not as bad as I 
 expected, as my tall friend took compassion on the 
 tenderness of my skin, finding it not quite as tough as 
 that of a Kussian bear. 
 
 And now, my dear John, I must conclude this letter 
 with one or two incidents which amused me while stroll- 
 ing out alone last Christmas -eve, when the Kussians, 
 like others, make more merry than usual. They are an 
 extremely good-natured people, and seem to be still more 
 so when in their cups, as most of the inebriated men 
 seemed to have a tendency towards embracing everyone 
 they met ; I saw a good many peasants and working 
 men a partially obfuscated state during my walk, 
 
86 
 
 through some rather low thoroughfares, and was much 
 entertained by finding that every man who was " half 
 seas over " had always a sober companion to take charge 
 of him. I afterwards discovered that this is a regular 
 arrangement between two friends, Damon going in for 
 enjoyment, while Pythias is held responsible for remain- 
 ing sober, and the next outing they take the positions 
 are reversed, Pythias giving way to the tempter, while 
 Damon is bound to resist. I only found one exception 
 during the night, when I saw two friends, who having 
 for a long distance lunged against each other, at length 
 lunged in the same direction, and over they went, rolling 
 softly in the snow. Another fellow went head foremost 
 into a snow heap, which had been piled up at the side 
 of the road, and I assisted in dragging him out by his 
 heels, where he would otherwise assuredly have been 
 smothered. I saw another brought out of a Traktir by 
 his sober friend, to the top of a staircase, and there he 
 remained ever so long holding on by the rail, until his 
 friend returned, but in the meantime I expected every 
 minute to see him come rolling down the stairs ; but no, 
 he held on, and it became most difficult for his friend to 
 get him away, which reminded me of a man on board 
 the steamer from Kingston to Holyhead when we were 
 crossing the Irish channel on one occasion. It was a 
 stormy passage, and this poor fellow was awfully ill, 
 and got hold of one of the foremost stays and stuck to 
 it, although he was wet through and through, and the 
 waves were continually breaking over him. None of 
 the sailors could .get him away, even by force, as it be- 
 came rather dangerous, and they wanted to remove him ; 
 but he held on as though his life depended upon his re- 
 taining his hold of the stay. In my rambles, I at 
 length heard a tremendous hallooing proceeding from a 
 
87 
 
 certain quarter, like the roar of a bull, but which I 
 found to be the sonorous voice of a male Russian, who 
 was undergoing being pinioned into a Droshki, his own 
 son assisting in the operation. It seems, by what I 
 could make out, by observation, that the son, a small 
 boy, had followed his father during his tour of inebria- 
 tion, no doubt by his mother's directions, until at length 
 he called a policeman's attention to his parent, and had 
 him brought out of the public, when the small boy duly 
 produced from his pocket sundry straps, which he had 
 providently brought with him for the purpose, and the 
 sire being helpless, the dutiful boy, aided by the police- 
 man, strapped him in the sleigh, and carried him home 
 in triumph. While the father was hallooing like a mad 
 bull, the small boy was grinning from ear to ear at his 
 success, and evidently enjoying the fan. 
 
 Our stay here is now becoming short, we shall soon 
 be " homeward bound," and so adieu until we meet. 
 
 I remain, my dear John, 
 
 Your affectionate brother, 
 
 R. RICHARDSON-GARDNER. 
 
89 
 
 TO THE KEADEE. 
 
 (Vide page 15.) 
 
 When these letters appeared last winter in the Windsor 
 and Eton Herald, I received several communications from 
 friends, questioning the correctness of my views with 
 regard to the antagonistic feeling therein described to 
 exist, between the Prussians and Russians, and the 
 eventual probability of an alliance between the Russians 
 and the French ; but agreeing with me that the tone of 
 feeling of foreign countries towards each other was 
 naturally a matter of great importance to our own. 
 
 This morning, 18th December, 1872, I have read 
 a most remarkable confirmation of some of my observa- 
 tions, in the letter of no less a person than the well- 
 informed Prussian Correspondent of The Times; an 
 extract from which I append : — 
 
 " The Times" Wednesday, December 18, 1872. 
 GERMANY AND ITS NEIGHBOURS. 
 
 (FKOM OUR PRUSSIAN CORRESPONDENT.) 
 
 BERLIN, Dec. 15. 
 
 This year's celebration of the Russian military festival 
 of St. George has been again marked by the presence at 
 St. Petersburg of some Prussian officers and the drinking 
 of enthusiastic toasts in honour of the two armies and 
 
 G 
 
90 
 
 their " ancient camaraderie." In strange contrast with 
 these official demonstrations, the language of the Russian 
 Press continues as hostile as ever to this country. When 
 I say that three-fourths of the leading Russian papers 
 are on principle opposed to their German neighbours, 
 I am rather below the mark than otherwise. Hardly a 
 day elapses without the Germans being in these organs 
 either made the object of virulent attacks, or coolly 
 charged with the design of acquiring influence and ter- 
 ritory at Russia's expense. Distrust naturally begets 
 distrust, and so we need not wonder that Russian 
 politics should of late have ' been vigilantly scrutinized 
 in this part of the world. In their estimate of Russia's 
 position and strength, the German Press cannot of 
 course overlook what has lately happened thousands of 
 miles away on the distant banks of the Central Asian 
 streams ; and the remarks indulged in on this interesting 
 topic are occasionally based upon the supposition that 
 the ill-will so steadily shown this country by the 
 Russian Press may some day influence the action of the 
 Russian Government itself. The following reply to 
 these German remarks is from the St. Petersburg Mir : — 
 
 " England regarding our position in Central Asia as more and 
 more dangerous to herself, it is only natural that she should he 
 seriously disquieted hy the progress of our arms. But we 
 confess we cannot conceive the motives of German journalists 
 in constituting themselves the allies of the Anglo-Indians, and 
 manifesting solicitude at the danger said to he threatening the 
 dominion of the Calcutta Viceroy. This policy on the part of the 
 German Press is the more startling from its heing adopted just 
 when the English journalistic agitation against us has somewhat 
 cooled down. The only inference to he drawn from this is that 
 the German Press is determined to oppose us, come what may, 
 and to criticise our action, even in regions where Germany is 
 utterly powerless to injure us Some Berlin papers 
 
91 
 
 a ctually go the length of Warning the English for permitting us to 
 d eal with Khiva as we please. We do not know how far these 
 attacks will he instrumental in heating the imagination of 
 English politicians ; but, whatever may be the result, there 
 remains the interesting fact that German hostility to Kussia has 
 become so inveterate and irrepressible a feeling, that our Prussian 
 friends have, in the midst of all their domestic troubles, time left 
 to accord England the favour of their advice, though nobody has 
 asked them for it." 
 
 It would be a work of supererogation to prove that 
 the Germans can have no interest in entangling them- 
 selves with Russia, when they have so much else on 
 their hands ; nor is it at all necessary to demonstrate 
 that the Russian Government having selected the 
 principal object of its foreign policy in a southerly and 
 easterly direction, is not particularly anxious to come 
 to loggerheads with its formidable neighbour in the 
 west. Yet so steady is the current of Russian public 
 opinion in favour of France, and so noisily does it run 
 in spiteful enmity against this people and Government, 
 that, although the relations of the two Cabinets are as 
 yet the very best, there is really no telling what may 
 occur in the future. 
 
WESXMLHSESB : 
 
 PEESTEE BY T. BEEITEEE A2H) CO. 51. BEPEBT STBEET,- — W. 
 
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