Chapter XI: Found! (2)

"January--The gardens now doing healed no posies,
And men in cloaks muffle their noses."

"March--A toast we plunged in March beer,
Being sugared well, and drunk up clear,
Revives the spirit, the heart doth cheer;
And, had for three pence, is not dear."

This old Robin shamefully pecks at the fair sex. In his notes on April he says:

"Then let young people have a care,
Nor run their heads in marriage snare;
A woman's tongue is like the ocean.
It ebbs and flows in constant motion;
But yet herein a difference grows--
Her tongue ne'er ebbs, but always flows."

No booklings have multiplied more almanacs: we have now clerical, medical, naval, military, aye, horticultural, down to children's almanacs; and amongst these almanacs there is one entitled _Almanac des Voleurs_. Magazines swarm, ranging from the highest class of religious, literary, and social-scientific, not forgetting _industrial_, subjects, to the most commonplace and trifling matters. The Gentleman's Magazine is stated to have been the first of the class published in England. Of reviews we have a long array, distinguished by every shade of uniform and badge, and from them a vast amount of useful and pleasurable information is obtainable. This class of books first appeared in the middle of the last century; one entitled the Monthly Review was the first published.

The first newspaper was published in the time of Queen Elizabeth--The English Mercury, of which the earliest number is in the British Museum, and bears the date 1588. In the reign of Queen Anne there was but one daily paper, which made a slow and tedious course of circulation; whereas in these days newspapers are everywhere, and the leading ones convey intelligence of the whole world's transactions, and issue admirable essays, affording information on every subject, and this within a marvellously short space of time.

Books are so common, that it becomes necessary to be careful in the selection of them. Tares and wheat will spring up together; the earth produces noxious weeds with the most excellent fruit. If, then, we do not reject the tainted and imperfect grains, a diseased crop is the result. It cannot be expected in this age of inquiry and the rapid progress of learning, that all books should be of an improving character, but the good greatly overbalance the evil. "This advantage," said Gregory the Great (writing so early as the end of the sixth century), "we owe to a multiplicity of books; one book falls in the way of one man, and another best suits the level or the apprehension of another; it is of service that the same subject should be handled by several persons after different methods, though all on the same principle." A superfluity of good books is beneficial; I would {110} illustrate this proposition thus: The Nile as it flows fertilizes a vast tract of land; but if it were not for the streams and rivulets that are artificially constructed to diverge from it, in order to draw from the main supply of water some portion of the alimentary matter it contains, other tracts would not be fertilized: so the great folios in their wide expanse of text and margin have their important use, while the streams and rills which issue from the parent flood are illustrative of quartos, octavos, duodecimos, 24mos, and 48mos, that refresh and enrich minds innumerable.

--------

ORIGINAL.

LUCIFER MATUTINUS.

From a heart of infinite longing the youth
Looks out on the world;
"Where, spirit of candor--where, spirit of truth,
Are thy banners unfurled?

"O chivalrous chastity! lovely as morn.
The dew on thy helmet, I hail thee afar;
Like Lucifer, beautiful angel of dawn,
I wear thy deep azure, I follow thy star.

"Not mammon, not lucre; though white as sea-gulls
The broad sails I watch studding ocean's blue deep,
To droop their gay pennons where dreamily lulls
The tropical breeze, and the lotus-flower sleeps.

"But glory! but honor! the joy of a name
Not written on sand; which for ages will stir
All hearts that are noble, or kindle the flame
Of devotion consuming the rapt worshipper."

Thus from heart of infinite longing the youth.
Looking out on the world,
Cries ever, "Woo wisdom, woo beauty, woo truth:"--
The sordid world, jaded with care, answers: "Ruth
Waits on thy wild dreamings, O turbulent youth!"
And with laughter uncouth
Mocks life's fairest banners in brightness unfurled.

O heart of the ostrich! above its own graves
Of innocent hopes the world every day raves,
And moans, with a pitiful droon of despair,
O'er candor and honor, once blooming so fair;
Yet treads, with a wanton, unpitying scorn.
To earth every sweet aspiration of morn,
True mark of a soul to infinity born;
Or leaves, to the chance of the desert, the good
Which God, at creating, charged angels to brood,
And martyrs have guarded with rivers of blood.

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{111}

Original

TRAVELLERS' TALES.

The world has been so thoroughly explored now, at feast in all but its most savage and inhospitable recesses, that it seems not unnatural to suppose that travelers abroad find it hard to get listeners to their tails of sight-seeing and adventure; and that wanderers into foreign lands should no longer deem it a part of their duty, as soon as their peregrinations are over, to come home and write a book about them. We can't expect any more Marco Polo or Mendez Pintos, unless some adventurous spirits have a mind to travel beyond the regions of the Albert and Victoria Nyanzas, and risk their lives among the dirty tribes of Central Africa, whom even Mr. and Mrs. Baker were unable to reach; and with all its little differences of manners and customs, there is after all so much sameness in the untamed negro life that we doubt whether anybody will think such a journey worth his trouble. Now that the source of Nile has been found and the costly and useless problem of the north-west passage has been solved, there really seems to be nothing very new or startling which can be added to geographical science. But for all that there is, and undoubtedly their long will be, a certain fascination in every well-told narrative of life in a distant country, even though the main features of the story were familiar to us before. We know that a second Columbus can never come home to us from across the ocean sees, with news of unsuspected continents; that old ocean has loosed all the bonds which once shut us in, and disclosed long ago all the new worlds which he wants concealed; but we like to travel again and again over the lands we have already passed, to take a few repeated peeps at the inner life of distant peoples, even though their domestic interiors were long ago laid open to our inquisitive eyes. Now and then, moreover, it does happen that a traveller has something new to tell us, or at least something which has not been told often enough to be familiar to all the world. For example, in the spirited Sketches of Russian Life [Footnote 24] which we have lately received from an anonymous hand in England, there is, if nothing very new or surprising, at least a liveliness and an air of novelty which are almost as good. The writer is an Englishman who spent fifteen years in Russia, engaged in business pursuits of various kinds, which brought him into contact with persons of all ranks and conditions, and led him long journeys back and forth across the empire--now in the lumbering diligence, now in the luxurious railway train, and many a time and for long distances in rude sledges across trackless wastes and through fearful snows. In some parts of Russia there are seasons when the mere act of travelling is a perilous adventure. In March, 1860, our author, in company with a Russian gentleman, made a dangerous journey of two hundred miles in an open sledge, through a snow-storm of memorable severity. They had been struggling for some miles through drifts and hidden pits, when the driver alarmed them with the cry of "Volka! volka!"--"Wolves! wolves!" Six gaunt-looking animals {112} sat staring at them in the road, about one hundred yards in advance of them. The horses huddled themselves together, trembling in every limb, and refused to move. The Russian, who is known in the book only by the name of Fat-Sides, seized a handful of hay from the bottom of the vehicle, rolled it into a ball, and handed it to our author, saying "Match." The Englishman understood the direction, and as soon as the horses, by dint of awful lashing and shouting, were forced near the motionless wolves, he set fire to the ball and threw it among the pack. Instantly the animals separated and skulked away with their tails dragging, but only to meet again behind the sledge, and after a short pause to set out in full pursuit. The tired horses were whipped to their utmost speed, but in forcing their way through a drift they had to come to a walk, and the wolves were soon beside them. The first of the pack fell dead with a ball through his brain from the Englishman's revolver, and another shot broke the leg of a second. At that critical instant the pistol fell into the sledge as, with a sudden jolt the horses floundered up to their bellies in in deep drift: then they came to a dead stop, and there was a wolf at each side of the sledge, trying to get in. The Englishman fortunately had a heavy blackthorn bludgeon, and raising it high he brought it down with the desperate force of a man in mortal extremity, crash through the skull of the animal on his side of the vehicle; while Fat-Sides coolly stuffed the sleeve of his sheepskin coat down the mouth of the savage beast on the other, and with his disengaged hand cut its throat with a large bear knife. The pistol was now recovered just in time to kill a fifth wolf which had fastened upon neck of one of the horses. The sixth, together with the one that had been shot in the leg, ran away.

[Footnote 24: Sketches of Russian Life before and during the
Emancipation of the Serfs. Edited by Henry Morley, Professor of
English Literature in University College, London. 16mo, pp. 298.
London: Chapman and Hall. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott and Co.]

After a day's detention at Jaroslav, where some irritating business about passports had to be transacted, our travellers resumed their journey in a "kibitka," or diligence-sledge--a rather more comfortable conveyance than the one they had left, because it had a canvas cover. There were no more encounters with wolves, but perils enough awaited them in the snow. The first day three of their horses died, and in sixteen hours, with three separate teams, they accomplished only twenty-seven miles. All along the road they passed wrecks of sledges, horses struggling in the drifts and men digging them out, and vehicles overturned and abandoned until spring. Opposite a hut in which they found shelter one night a cottage had been entirely buried, and the family were not rescued until after four days. They were none the worse for their long imprisonment; but the diggers had come upon a sledge with its horse, driver, and two women frozen to death and buried in the drift. Three months after this, when the snows disappeared from two hundred to three hundred corpses were found, all of whom had met their death in this fearful storm upon the Moscow road alone.

The wretchedness of the inns added a great deal to the sufferings of our travellers. A Russian hotel in the interior is the most filthy of all filthy places. As the floors are never washed, the mud and filth accumulate to an inch and a half in thickness; the walls are black and fetid; horrible large brown beetles, called _tarakans_, crawl in myriads over everything, invading even the dishes out of which the traveller eats and drinks; and the dirty deal tables are further defiled with a dirty linen cloth. The public rooms are constantly filled with the offensive odor of the native tobacco. The waiters are all men, dressed in print trowsers and shirts; the trousers stuffed into long boots, and the shirts hanging outside the trowsers; the particolored band or scarf round the waist completing the costume. Their hair, like that of all the peasants, is worn long, cut straight round the neck, and parted in front like a woman's, while the beard is {113} neither cut nor trimmed. We are not surprised that our author preferred to lodge with the horses and cows in the stable.

The distance from Jaroslav to Moscow out is about 160 miles, and the journey occupied seven days and the better part of seven nights.

Our author made another journey, accompanied by his wife and six children, and an amusing English "handy man", called Harry, who was for ever knocking somebody down and getting the party into all sorts of scrapes with the police. They started from Moscow, and rode about 500 miles into the interior. Their equipment consisted of two vehicles called tarantasses, each drawn by three horses. The baggage, and a good store of bread, tea, sugar, sardines, brandy, and wine, were stowed away in the bottom of the wagons, and over them were spread straw, feather beds, rugs, and other contrivances for breaking the severity of the jolting. The passengers reclined on the top. Many time they had no bed but the tarantass, and no food but what they had brought with them. Harry found plenty of employment for his fists, as well as for his ingenuity in bridge building and other useful arts. Once he detected a waiter, in the end where they stopped at Tula, stealing a bottle of castor-oil from the medicine chest. It was only fit punishment to make the thief swallow a large dose; but when the effects of the drug began to show themselves, the man declared himself poisoned, and was carried to the hospital, while the travelers and their effects were placed under the charge of the police.

"We were prisoners for nearly 2 hours, when a doctor from the
hospital, fortunately for us, a jolly Russ, came with a captain of
police. While the captain of the police tackled Harry, who, ignorant
of the language, answered 'da, da' (yes, yes) to everything. I
explained to the doctor of what had really happened. The worthy
doctor having gotten hold of the oil bottle cried,

"'Bravo! Poison! The most excellent medicine in pharmacy. Look here,
captain. The pig' (meaning the waiter) 'was taken ill with cholera,
cramps, spasms, vomiting here--mind you, here in this room--before
madame and mademoiselle. They run to the next room, so does my
friend here, a great English my-lord. What could they do? But, sir,
the case was desperate. This gentleman' (pointing to Harry) 'is a
great doctor, accompanying my-lord and his family; there was no time
to send for me. What does he do? He opens his great
medicine-box--look, there it is--and gives the dying moushick a
great dose of apernicocus celantacus heprecaincos masta, the best
remedy in the world for cholera. I tell you, "Yea Boch!" there now,
that's the truth.'

"'But,' said the captain, 'the moushick, doctor, how is he?'

"'Ah! the pig!' (and here he spat on the ground in contempt), 'I
left the beast quite well and sleeping. I will answer for him. Come,
captain, let us go. Poison! That is a good joke! Come, captain. Safe
journey. Good-bye!'

"The police captain was satisfied, however reluctantly. With two
bottles of something better than castor-oil, and a fee, which the
doctor might or might not divide with the captain, I paid the cost
of Harry's thoughlessness."

Having reached their destination, and purposing to remain in that part of the country for some time, our English friends obtained a house, and went to housekeeping. The torment they suffered from thievish and idle servants is pitiful to read. The lower-class of Russians seem to have no more idea of working without an occasional application of the stick than a sluggish horse; and an honest servant is the rarest thing in the empire. Our author began housekeeping with four--a key-keeper (housekeeper), cook, room-girl (housemaid), and footman. The dishes were put upon the table dirty, just as they had been taken away after the previous meal, because it was nobody's business to wash them; so a dish-washer was added to the retinue. At the end of a week it was found that nobody had time to scrub the floors; so scrubbers had to be hired. Then another was wanted to wash clothes (though nobody could be found who knew what it meant to get up linen, and the authors wife had to do it herself); another to clean boots; a man to cut and fetch wood; and another man to {114} split it and keep up the fires. Thus in one week the establishment increased to thirteen souls. Their wages, it is true, were small, but their pilferings were great. One day the master and mistress resolved to examine the servants' boxes. In the first one opened they found a canvas bag filled with lump-sugar, parcels him and of tea and coffee, needles, pins, buttons, hooks and eyes, tape, laces, soap, candles, children's toy», sealing-wax, pens, note paper, and a keep of small articles, all of which had been stolen. Every box had been opened in turn, and not one contained less than the first, and many of them contained more.

Dishonesty, as may be supposed, is not confined to the lower classes, but infects all ranks. The traders are the greatest cheats in the world; we were going to say the greatest except the government officials; but these are not exactly cheats, because their extortion is open and unblushing. When our author once told a Russian baron that English magistrates were incorruptible, the assertion caused an incredulous laugh, and a remark from the baron that he could buy any country magistrate in Russia for 50 kopecks (about 35 cents). Certainly our friend often found it convenient to prove their venality, especially when Harry of the strong arm had been giving his fists a little more exercise than was strictly according to law. Trade is a system of lying and cheating. The commonest purchase can rarely be made without a tedious and vociferous process of bargaining, very much such as goes on when a veteran jockey sells an old horse at a country fair. Our author had occasion to buy a pair of boots and a portmanteau at Tula. After over an hour's wrangling the price was reduced from 48 roubles to 16, and the letter some afterward proved to be about twice as much an the articles were worth. "How shameful of you," said the buyer to the seller when the transaction was concluded, "to ask three times more then you would take, and then to tell so many lies!" "Oh!" he replied, "words do not rob your pocket. I am no thief. It is all fair bargaining." The larger operations of commerce, if not so noisy, are at least no more honest then the retail dealing. It has been remarked that profitably to understand trading in Russia would require a course of many years training at university teaching the principles and practice of chicanery, bribery, smuggling, and lying. A rich trader of St. Petersburg gave our author of good deal of information about the way business is carried on. Contracts with the government, especially, are managed in a very curious fashion. Some one is appointed by the state to draw up plans and specifications of the work to be done, and to fix and "upset price." The contract is then offered at auction, and the lowest bidder under this upset price takes it. As there is a tacit understanding that the successful competitor shall pay the official who fixes the upset price a commission of 10 per cent on the gross amount of the contract, it follows, as a matter of course, that this price is always ridiculously high.

Smuggling is carried on very extensively, not as commonplace rascals do it, across the frontier, but through the custom-house itself. "Just look," said the merchant, "at this piano-forte--a first-rate 'grand' from Broadwood. Had that instrument come through the 'Tamoshny' a as a 'forte-piano,' it would have cost me 100 rubles, that is 15 pounds of your money. But, sir, I shipped it as a threshing machine--my children have certainly made it one--and it cost me no duty at all; machinery, you know, is the only thing duty-free. I paid my expediter his little commission, and he managed to convince the examining official, by what means I do not stop to inquire, that a threshing machine it was, and as such it passed." Not only is the temptation to dishonesty so strong, but honesty, on the other hand, is fraught with great danger. {115} A tradesmen, who was beginning business in St. Petersburg, imported a quantity of plain glass-ware, the duty on which was two roubles and twenty-five kopecks per pood. He meant to pay the duty in an honest, straightforward way; but this did not suit the custom-house officials, who wanted their little commission. They discovered by some singular optical delusion that the plain glass was all colored and gilded, the duty being thus raised to ten roubles per pood. Nor was this all, for the unfortunate tradesman was moreover fined fifty per cent for a false declaration, and his dear loss by the importation was about $500. This and a few similar transactions with the custom-house, in which he stood out for the payment of just dues and no corruption, ruined him. There is no redress for such outrages in Russia.

We have no space to go into details of the condition of the serfs, which our author represents as miserable in the extreme. The stewards on many of the estates are German adventurers of the worst description, who cheat their employers, oppress the serfs, and do all that man can do to ruin the country. Many of the lower class do not thoroughly understand the czar's ukase of emancipation, and even those who do understand what great things it does for them, show little or no gratitude. That is a virtue of slow growth in a Russian bosom. Some of the wisest land-owners anticipated the time set by the decree for the abolition of serfdom, and immediately began to work their estates with paid labor. The result was perfectly satisfactory. In a few districts, however, the publication of the emancipation ukase was followed by tumults and disorders, and now and then the peasants took a bloody vengeance on their oppressors. Our author witnessed one scene between a villanous steward and his emancipated serfs, which came near being tragical. The steward was roused from his slumbers one morning by a big strong mooshick, or peasant, who acted as his coachman. Entering the room rather unceremoniously, the man bawled out, in a peremptory voice:

"'Come, master, get up quick! You're wanted in the great hall.'

"The steward started at the unusual summons, and stared at the
fellow in blank astonishment, unable to understand what he meant.

"'Come, I tell you; rise--you're wanted.'

"'Dog!' roared the steward, almost powerless with rage--'what do you
mean by this insolence? Get out!'

"'No,' said the man, 'I won't get out. You get up. They are all
waiting.'

"'Pig! I'll make you pay for this. Let me get hold of you, you
villain!' and he jumped out of bed; but as he did so he perceived
three of his other men-servants at the threshold ready to support
the coachman.

"'Oh! this is a conspiracy; but I'll soon settle you. Evan, you
devil, where are you? Come here.'

"Evan thus called--he was a lacquey--appeared at the door with a
broad grin on his face.

"'Did you call, master?'

"'Yes, villain; don't you see? I am going to be murdered by these
pigs. Go instantly for the policemen.'

"'No, no, baron; I have gone too often for the stan's men. We can do
without them this morning.'

"'Come, come, master,' again struck in the tall coachman, 'don't you waste our time and keep the company waiting. Put on your halat; never mind the rest of your clothes; you won't need them for a little. You won't come--nay, but you must.' And he laid hold of him by the neck. 'Come along!' and so they dragged their victim into the great dining hall.

"There, sitting round the room on chairs and lolling on the sofas,
were all the souls belonging to his domestic establishment, about
thirty in all. Pillows were spread on the floor in the middle of the
room; to these the steward was dragged, and forcibly stretched on
them face down, with two men at his feet and two at his head.

"The coachman, who had been pretty frequently chastised in former
times, was ring-leader. He sat down on a large easy-chair, the seat
of honor, and ordered a pipe and coffee. This was brought him by one
of the female servants. When the long cherry-tree tube began to
draw, in imitation of his master's manner he puffed out the smoke,
put on a fierce look, stretched out his legs, and said, 'Now then,
go on. Give the pig forty blows! creapka (hard)!'

"In an instant the halat was torn up, and two lacqueys, standing at
either side, armed with birch-rods, slowly and deliberately
commenced the flagellation. The coachman told {116} off the blows as
he smoked in dignity, 'one, two, three,' and so on to forty.

"'Now, then,' said coachee, 'stop. Brothers and sisters, have we
done right?'

"'Right!' they all said.

"'Is there one here whom he has not beaten?'

"'Are you satisfied?'

"'Then go all of you home, and leave this house. Not one must
remain. Release the prisoner.'

"Up jumped their tyrant, little the worse bodily for the beating he
had got, but he was livid with rage. His face turned green and
purple, he gnashed his teeth, and spat on his rebellious slaves.
Speech seemed gone, and they all laughed in his face.

"'Master,' said the coachman, walking leisurely towards the door,
'we have not hurt you, but have given you a small taste of your own
treatment of us for many years; how do you like it? We are free now,
or will be soon, and will not be beaten any more. Good-bye; don't
forget the stick. And listen. It you whimper a breath against any of
us for this morning's work, your life is not worth a kopeck two
hours after.' Each made a respectful bow as he or she went out, and
the tyrant was left alone in the deserted house."

This, however, was not the end. In a short time the peasantry from a long distance began to collect in the courtyard. A mill belonging to the state stopped work, and its thousand hands joined the gathering crowd. The steward appeared among them, and in a terrible rage ordered them to work, They simply shrugged their shoulders and made him no answer. He struck one of them with his open hand, and the peasant in return spat in the steward's face.

"The Russian spit of contempt, the most unpardonable of Russian
insults, is unlike any other kind of spitting. The Yankee squirt is
a scientific affair; Englishmen who smoke short black pipes in bars,
on rails, and elsewhere, expectorate in an uncleanly, clumsy way.
But with an intense look of detestation, as he says 'Ah pig!' the
Russian, with the suddenness and good aim of a pistol shot, plunges
a ball of spittle right into the face or on the clothes of his
adversary, making a sound like the stroke of a marble where it hits.
It is a weapon always ready, I have frequently seen a duel
maintained with it for a considerable time at short range.

"Matt, having thus shown his contempt, coolly leaned himself up
against the gate, but the steward, insulted as he had never been
before in this characteristic manner, before so many of his cringing
slaves, lost any remains of reason his rage might have left him. He
used hands and feet on the crowd of passive and hitherto quiet
surfs, and seeing the old starost--Matt's father--coming up the
road, he ran and colored the old man, dragged him to show where his
son stood, and roared out his orders to take the devil into the
stan's yard for punishment.

"'Old devil!' he said, 'you are at the bottom of all this rebellion,
you and your son. You shall flog _him_; and then I shall make him
flog _you_. Go, pig, and take him away!'

"The old man, for the first time in his life, openly disobeyed his
tyrant's orders. He folded his arms across his sheepskin coat, gave
the usual shrug, spat contemptuously on the ground, and said, 'No,
steward, that is your work. Now, I will not.'

"'Dog! Devil! do you refuse to obey your master? I will, if it is my
work, drag you to punishment myself.'

"With that he sees the starost by his luxuriant white beard, and
began pulling him towards the next house, which, I have said, was
the magistrate's and the police station. The old man resisted with
all his might, and in the struggle he fell leaving a large mass of
grey or rather white hair in steward's hands. The steward, finding
he could not pull the starost by main force, lifted his foot, shod
with heavy leather goloshes, and struck the old man twice on the
head. The blood immediately ran down. Up to this moment the crowd of
peasants, which had increased enormously, had been quiet spectators
of the scene; but the site of the old man's blood gave the finishing
touch to their patience. Without a word the crowd began slowly to
move and concentrate itself around the steward and his fallen
official. There might then have been five or six hundred people, and
the numbers were increasing every moment, as the men came in from
the stopped works. A rush took place, and the centre space was
filled up with the mass. The bleeding starost was passed to the
outside. The steward was surrounded, and many hands were laid on
him. I do not believe there had been any premeditated designed to
hurt the steward, cordially as they all hated him. Had he applied
the listen given him that morning, and apprehended the changed
feelings and circumstances of the serfs, he might have been passed
from among them without further injury. But his passions were
ungovernable, and he was slow to believe in the possibility of any
resistance on the part of the poor slaves he had so long driven. The
crowd swayed heavily from one side to another, tugging and pulling
the poor steward about; and now he was in peril of his life. My
window was wide open {117} He made a mute appeal to me for help. I
signed to him to try the window. By some extraordinary effort he
broke loose, and major rush and a spring to catch the sill. He
succeeded so far, and two pair of strong arms were trying to drag
the fat body through into the room; but we were too late, or rather
he was too heavy for us. The crowd tore him down, and held him fast.
Then a voice was heard, clear and decided as that of an officer
giving the word of command--'to the water!' The voice was
Mattvie's. A leader and an object had been wanted, and here there
were both. Instantly the order was obeyed. The crowd, dragging the
steward, left the front of my house and took the direction of the
lake.

"We hurried through the court-yard down to the end of the
cotton-mail, and came out on the banks of the lake, just as the
raging crowd of serfs were tying a mat with a large stone in it to
the stewards neck.

"Around the margin of the lake the ice was to some extent broken,
and their evident intention was to throw him in. We ran to meet
them, and if possible prevent the horrid act of retribution. But we
were too late; they had selected the part of the bank nearest the
road, as it was higher than the rest; and just as we came painting
up, we saw the body of the steward swaying in the hands of a dozen
of the man, and heard the fatal words given out by Matt: '_Ras, dwa,
tree_' (One, two, three); then a cry of despair, above the yelling
of the crowd; than a plunge in the water; no, two plunges. The
ragoshkie, or bark mat, containing the heavy stone which was to keep
the steward down, had not been a good one; for as the body passed
through the air, the stone fell from the mat, splashing a second or
two before, and a little beyond the spot where he came down. He
disappeared under the water for a moment or two, then made desperate
efforts to scrambled to his feet, in which he succeeded, standing up
to his shoulders in the shallow water, and with the mat bag,
drenched and limp, hanging from his neck. There he stood within
twenty feet of the bank, facing a thousand yelling enemies. Outside
was plenty of firm ice; but between him and them there might be
thirty feet of deep clear water, the bed of the lake dipping many
feet immediately beyond where he stood. He seemed to comprehend his
position, and was evidently making up his mind to contend with the
deep water rather than with the turned worms upon the bank. He had
raised one arm, either for entreaty or defiance, and had taken off
few steps toward the ice, when one of the many stones thrown at him
struck the uplifted arm and it fell powerless to his side. Another,
but a softer missile, struck him on the head. He fell down under the
water, and again recovered his feet; but the stones were now--like
hail about him. The serfs were as boys pelting a toad or frog--and
their victim in the water did look like a great overgrown toad.

"Saunderson and I had made several attempts to be heard, or to
divert the attention of the people; but it was spending idle breath:
'Go away; it is not your business,' some of the men said; others,
more savage, asked how we would like the same treatment."

The contrivance is by which the unfortunate was rescued from his perilous situation was so theatrical that we can hardly help suspecting that the incidents of this story have been arranged with a sharp eye to effect. The man's fate seemed certain when our author espied a sleigh approaching at a considerable distance. No doubt it contained young Count Pomerin, the owner of the estate. If a little delay could be obtained, the steward might be saved. At this juncture are friend Harry interfered. "I'll try," he exclaimed; "blow me if I don't. The buffer's bad lot, but I sha'n't see him killed;" and with that he jumped into the water, and was by the steward's side in a moment. The noise and stoning ceased, for Harry was a prime favorite; but the mob was not to be baulked of its vengeance, and after a vigorous exchange of expostulations, in the course of which Harry made several remarks that were more forcible than polite, the chivalrous Englishman was pulled out of the water, kicking stoutly, and the pelting was about to be renewed.

Just at this moment the sleigh, drawn by three magnificent greys, dashed into the centre of the crowd. Three gentlemen occupied it. Two were in official costume. The third, a tall, well-built man, rose, and threw off Is rich black fox-skin cloak, and the mob beheld, dressed in the uniform of a general, not the young count, but his father, who had been exiled years before, and was thought to be dead. He had now come hack, with an imperial pardon, prepared to resume the management of his estates. The steward was extricated from the water, and immediately called upon to {118} settle his accounts. The old count had visited the estate before in disguise, and knew how it had been mismanaged. He had witnessed and all ready to Convict the steward of peculation, and the result was that the wretched man was compelled to refund on the spot $750,000 of stolen wealth, and then allowed twenty-four hours to leave the place.

The next scene in this pretty little drama was between the count and his serfs. He called them all together, and told them they were free from that moment. He did not intend to wait for the period of emancipation fixed by the ukase. Moreover, he gave to each male peasant three acres of land, free of price--parting thus with one-sixth of his estate. The whole assembled multitude then went down on their knees, and cried, "Thanks, thanks, good count, the illustrious master--God bless you!" And here, according to all dramatic rules, unless there was somebody to be married, the thing ought to have ended. But behold, ten grey-bearded peasants, who evidently had no idea of propriety, stepped forward and wanted to know what they were to do with their cows? Three acres would be enough for garden and green fields, but it would not give them pasture. Would not his excellency add to his gift? and so might God bless him! Well, the count allotted them pasture for ten years; and then the ten grey-beards advanced again, with the cry a Russian always raises when you give him anything--"prebavit" (add to it). Pasture was very good, but how were they to get firewood? "If it please your high-born excellency, add to your gift firewood. Prebavit!" So his high born excellency added firewood; and the incorrigible peasant stepped up again. "Prebavit! How were they to get fish? Would it please his high born excellency to let them fish in the lakes?" There were the usual thanks and the prostrations when this was granted; and then "prebavit" again; they wanted something else; but they did not get it, and the meeting broke up. A little while afterward our author revisited the estate, and found that it had undergone a marvellous change. The village was no longer a collection of mud huts, but a thriving town. The people were not like the same beings; and there was decided evidence of the rise of a middle class--a class once unknown in such places.

Our author gives us an obscure glimpse of a curious religious sect in Russia called the _starrie verra_, or "old faith," of whose peculiarities be knows little, and of whoso history be confesses that he know a nothing at all. It's members deem the present Russian Church an awful departure from the primitive faith and practice; deny the emperor's claim to be the head of the church; believe to any extent in witches; fast, scourge themselves; meet in secret, generally at night (for they are rigorously proscribed); hate the established religion of the realm has much as the old Scotch Puritans hated prelacy; and, if they had their wish, would probably advance the Czar to the dignity of martyrdom. It is said that many distinguished personages privately adhere to them, and submit to dreadful midnight penances, by way of compounding for the sin of outward subserviency to the modern heresy. People of the old faith are distinguished by a grim gravity and opposition to all dancing or light amusement. Our author had a woman-servant of this sect, who was remarkable for never stealing anything, and for continually smashing crockery which she supposed to have been defiled. There was a community of the old faith near his residence? An old wooden building like a Druid temple, set in the side of a hill among trees and rocks, was pointed out to him as the place of their midnight conventicles. It was said to be presided over by a priestess who never left the temple by night or by day. A roving fanatic, whom the writer sometimes encountered in the village, collecting {119} peasants around him and shouting like a street-ranter, was looked up to by the sectaries as a prophet; though he was certainly not a very reputable one, being often helplessly drunk, and not very decently clad. He wore no covering for head or feet, even in the severest frost. He carried a long pole, and danced some holy dance, to words of high prophetic omen. Our author was rather surprised to find that, thanks to his crockery-smashing cook, he himself was commonly reputed a priest of the _starrie verra_; the big volumes of the illustrated London News in which he used to read were supposed to be illuminated Lives of the Saints, and the little plays and dramatic scenes which his children used to perform on winter evenings were looked upon with holy awe as religious rites of dreadful power and significance. He bore his honors without complaining, and even when the cook, on the night of a party, broke all his best Wedgwood dinner-set, brought from England at a huge expense, he endured the loss with Christian patience: it was so delightful to have a Russian servant who would not steal.

From Russian servants to Italian brigands the transition is perfectly natural. Both are rogues of the same class, only external circumstances have made a difference in their modes of doing business. An English gentleman named Moens has recently obtained a more intimate acquaintance with the robber bands of Southern Italy than any of our readers need hope to make, and has given us the result of his observations in a very curious and interesting volume. [Footnote 25] Mr. and Mrs. Moens, and the Rev. J. C. Murray Aynsley and his wife, had been visiting the ruins of Paestum, on the Gulf of Salerno, on the 15th of May, 1865, when their carriage was stopped on the way home by a band of about twenty or thirty brigands.

[Footnote 25: English travelers and Italian Brigands. the Narrative
of Capture and Captivity. By W. J. C. Moens. With a Map and several
illustrations. 12mo. pp. 355. New York: Harper & Brothers.]

The ladies were not molested, but the gentlemen were hurried off across the fields, and through woods and thickets, until nearly daylight the next morning, when they were allowed to lie down to sleep for a short time on the bare earth. As soon as they felt themselves in a place of security the band halted, and their captain, a fine-looking fellow, named Manzo, got out paper and pen and proceeded to business. The two Englishmen were to be well treated, provided they made no attempt to escape, and on the payment of a ransom were to be released without injury. The sum demanded for the two was at first 100,000 ducats, or about $85,000, but this was afterward reduced one-half. It was now agreed that one of the two captives should be allowed to go for the money, and lots were drawn to determine upon whom this agreeable duty should fall. Good fortune inclined to the side of Mr. Aynsley, and the reverend gentleman set off under the care of two guides. He was hardly out of sight when the band was attacked by a party of soldiers, and for a short time there was a sharp skirmishing fire, in the course of which Mr. Moens came very near being killed by his would-be rescuers. He was forced to keep up with the bandits, however, and the whole party finally got away from the troops. Whatever plans he may have had of flight he now saw were futile. The brigands ran down the mountain like goats, while he had to carefully pick his way at every step. The robbers had eyes like cats: darkness and light, night and daytime, made but little difference to them. Their sense of hearing was so acute that the slightest rustle of leaves, the faintest sound, never escaped their notice. Men working in the fields, or mowing the grass, they could distinguish at a distance of miles, and they knew generally who they were, and to what village they belonged.

After four days of dreadful fatigue, during which the captive and his captors all suffered severely from hunger, {120} since the closeness of the pursuit prevented them from getting their usual supplies from the peasants, our party joined the main body of the band.

"On emerging from the trees we saw the captain and about twenty-five
of his men reclining on the grass in a lovely glade, surrounded by
large beach-trees, whose luxuriant branches swept the lawn. Several
sheep and goats were tethered near, cropping the grass. The men,
with their guns in their hands, their picturesque costumes and
reclining postures, the lovely light and checkered shade of the
trees, made a picture for Salvator Rosa. But I do not believe that
Salvator Rosa, or any other man, ever paid a second visit to the
brigands, however great his love of the picturesque might be, for no
one would willingly endure brigand live after one experience of it,
or place himself a second time in such a perilous situation.

"The band all arose, and looked very pleased at seeing me, for we
had been separated from them since the fight on the 17th, and they
were in great fear that I might have escaped, or have been rescued
by the troops. I stepped forward and shook hands with the captain,
for I considered it my best policy to appear cheerful and friendly
with the chief of my captors. He met me cordially in a ready way,
and asked me how I was. I said I was very tired and hungry, so he
immediately sent one of his men off, who returned in a few minutes
with a round loaf of bread, and another loaf with the inside cut
out, and packed full of cold mutton cut into small pieces and
cooked. I asked for salt, and was told it was salted. When cooked
the meat tasted delicious to me, though it was awfully tough, for I
and had not had meat since luncheon on Monday, in the temples of
Paestum, four days before. I ate a quantity, and then asked for
water, which was brought to me in a large leathern flask with a horn
around the top, and a hole on one side serving to admit air, as the
water was required for drinking. I had observed a large lump of snow
suspended by a stick through its center, between two forked sticks;
the water dripping from it was collected in flasks, and then drunk.
There were two or three of these flasks. The captain asked me if I
was satisfied. I answered 'Yes.'

"I was then told that there were two more companions for me. I was
taken through a gap in the trees to the rest of the band, about
seventeen in number. Here by found those who were destined to be my
companions for the next three weeks. A young man about twenty-eight,
with a black beard of a month's growth, dressed just like Manzo's
band, who was introduced to me has Don Cice alias, Don Francesco
Visconti, and one Tomasino, his cousin, a boy of fourteen years old.
I shook hands with them, and condoled them on our common fate, which
Don Francesco described as fearful. I was told to sit down on one
side, which I did and looked around me.

"The spot seemed perfect for concealment. We were at the top of a
high mountain, entirely surrounded by high trees, excepting two
small gaps serving for entrances, opposite to each other. The
surface of the ground was quite level. About twenty yards away, on
the side opposite to where I entered, there was a quantity of snow,
from which they cut the large pieces for drinking purposes. I saw
five or six men bringing a fresh block, which they had just cut, and
slung on a pole. It was now a little before mid-day, and they were
preparing a cauldron full of _pasta_ (a kind of macaroni), which was
ready by twelve o'clock. Some was offered to me, which I accepted.
One brigand proposed putting the _pasta_ into a hollow loaf, but
another brigand brought forward a deep earthenwere dish of a round
shape. I thought milk would be an improvement, so I asked for some.
Two men went to the goats and brought some in the few minutes. The
_pasta_ was very clean and well cooked. What with the meat and
bread, and this _pasta_, I made an excellent dinner, and felt much
better. The _pasta_ was all devoured in a few minutes by the band,
who collected round the _caldaja_, and dipped in spoons and fingers.
I had now leisure to examine the men; they were a fine, healthy set
of fellows.

"Here the two divisions of the band were united, thirty men under
the command of Gaetano Manzo, and twelve under Pepino Cerino. The
latter had the two prisoners, who had been taken on the 16th of
April near the valley of the Giffoni, at five o'clock in the
afternoon, as they were returning from arranging some affairs
connected with the death of a relative.

"The smaller band had for women with them, attired like the men,
with their hair cut short--at first I took them for boys; and all
these displayed a greater love of jewelry then the members of men's
Manzo's band. They were decked out to do me honor, and one of them
wore no less than twenty-four gold rings, of various sizes and
stones, on her hands at the same moment; others twenty, sixteen,
ten, according to their wealth. To have but one gold chain attached
to a watch was considered paltry and mean. Cerino and Manzo had
bunches as thick as and arm suspended across the breasts of their
waistcoats, with gorgeous brooches at each fastening. These were
sewed on for security; little bunches of charms were also attached
in conspicuous positions. I will now describe the uniforms of the
two bands. Manzo's band had long jackets of strong brown cloth, the
color of withered leaves, with large pockets of a circular shape on
the two sides, and others in the breast outside; and a slit on each
side gave entrance to a large pocket {121} that could hold anything
in the back of the garment. I have seen a pair of trowsers, two
shirts, three or four pounds of bread, a bit of dirty bacon, cheese,
etc., pulled out one after the other when searching for some article
that was missing. The waistcoats buttoned at the side, but had gilt
buttons down the center for show and ornament; the larger ones were
stamped with dogs' heads, birds, etc. There were two large circular
pockets at the lower part of the waistcoats, in which were kept
spare cartridges, balls, gunpowder, knives, etc.; and in the two
smaller ones higher up, the watch in one side and percussion caps in
the other. This garment was of dark blue cloth, like the trowsers,
which were cut in the ordinary way.

"The uniform of Cerino's band was very similar, only that the jacket
and trowsers were alike of dark blue cloth and the waistcoat of
bright green, with small round silver buttons placed close together.
When the jackets were new they all had attached to the collars, by
buttons, _capuces_, or hoods, which are drawn over the head at night
or when the weather is very cold, but most of them had been lost in
the woods. A belt about three inches deep, divided by two
partitions, to hold about fifty cartridges, completed the dress,
which, when new, was very neat-looking and serviceable. Some of the
cartridges were murderous missiles. Tin was soldered round a ball so
as to hold the powder, which was kept in by a plug of tow. When used
the tow was taken out, and, after the powder was poured down the
barrel, the case was reversed, and, a lot of slugs being added, was
rammed down with the tow on top. These must be very destructive at
close quarters, but they generally blaze at the soldiers, and _vice
versâ_, at such a distance, that little harm is done from the
uncertain aim taken. Most of them have revolvers, kept either in the
belts or the left-hand pocket of their jackets; they were secured by
a silk cord round their necks, and fastened to a ring in the butt of
the pistol. Some few had stilettoes, only used for human victims.
Many wore ostrich feathers with turned-up wide-awakes, which gave
the wearers a theatrical and absurd appearance. Gay silk
handkerchiefs around their necks and collars on their cotton shirts
made them look quite dandies when these were clean, which was but
seldom.