tolerable English, and whose perpetually-failing
tricks are of the lowest and most explainable
order of legerdemain known.

RUSSIAN TRAVEL.
SERFS OF A VILLAGE IN THE INTERIOR. A LOOK
ROUND THE CHURCH.

In outward expression the Russian serf is a
mere clod of the valley. His dress is seldom
varied. A little round low-crowned black felt
hat, with narrow turned-up rims, covers the usual
profusion of brown or carrotty tangled locks,
which are sometimes parted in front, and cut
straight at the neck. Every serf I have seen, who
had reached manhood, had a beard, whiskers,
and moustache, untouched by razor or scissors,
so that most of these natural beards were
magnificently long, rolling in soft curls, or spreading
and bushy.

Beards are in Russia the peculiar prerogative
of two classes only, but those the most numerous
if not the most potent— serfs and priests; all
other Russians crop and shave. Government
officials of all kinds— and they are a host
gentlemen, barons, and soldiers, will not allow a
hair to be seen, unless it be an imperial, a royal,
or a Napoleonic moustache on the upper lip.
Beard is the mark of servitude and priestcraft,
and is, therefore, abhorred by the "respectability"
of Russia. Count Pomerin's serfs were
profusely hairy under their hats, were dressed
in loose, often ragged, coats of grey, brown, or
black felt, or in cloth, coarse as " herland
heather," reaching a little below the knees, and
held together at the waist by a belt, like a
narrow horse-girth. Under the coat would be
found either a striped cotton, or plain linen
shirt, of the coarsest material, called "crash,"
sometimes used for kitchen towels. Trousers
of the same material were stuck into brown or
grey felt boots, and the toes within the boots
would be wrapped round with a coarse linen
rag in lieu of stockings. On their hands the
serfs wear fingerless leather mittens; and in
the girth-belt, on the right hip, carry a short-
handled axe.

After passing through the crowd of serfs, we
proceeded down the hill, crossed a morass
which caused the horses some trouble, and then
over a low wooden bridge, spanning a frozen
stream, passed to the outskirts of the village of
Evanoffsky. The peasants, who followed
listlessly, sauntering, and silent, gradually vanished
into their wooden huts. These thatched village
huts are so low, that one wonders how such
well grown men stand up in them, especially as
their walls are sunk at all manner of angles off
the square. The gables face the street or road;
no door is visible, but there is a large wooden
gateway next the house, and a small door leading
to the dwelling, somewhere in the rear. The
gateway is for horses and cattle, carts, &c., and
the allotment of each peasant is fenced in from
the road by a close high paling, which extends
to the next hut. These allotments being of
considerable breadth, a village spreads over a
great space of ground.

In some parts of Russia the huts have a
low under story, for sheltering cattle during
winter. It admits horses, cows, sheep, pigs,
goats, and poultry. The flooring is open, and
the animal heat from so many bodies, ascending
to the inmates above, helps to keep them
warm. In the summer, the quadrupeds go to
the field, and the bipeds above take possession
of the vacant cellar as the coolest place for the
hot weather. A trap-door admits from above
to this ground-floor, and a long sloping board
outside, with cross pieces of wood nailed on it,
like the temporary ladders used for building
purposes in England, is the way out into the
open air. In the villages belonging to Count
Pomerin, the cattle of the peasants are housed
in outbuildings immediately adjoining the low
huts, the communication between them being
always open. It follows that the men and
women and the cattle live very much on the
social principle, and have all things in common.
I saw cow and horse dung built up three or four
feet high from the ground, and one and a half
feet thick, all round the huts, to keep out the
coming winter frost. What windows I noticed,
were mere pigeon-holes.

The street or road between these habitations
was fully six times as broad as Cheapside in
London, and a double row of tall trees ran down
the centre, forming, no doubt, a cool and pleasant
promenade in summer. Be it remembered
that this was no roadside village, neither was it
an outskirt to a town, but a genuine Russian
feudal village, or as the Scotch would say,
" clachan," a long way from any public road or
corporate town, embosomed in the heart of a
large valley, between immense regions of forest
and the rolling plains.

After a long ride, we reached the church.
It seemed to stand in the centre of the
village; and the other long lines, of mud
streets, like the one we had passed, radiated
from it as a centre. It was a very large and
handsome new building of stucco brick, with
a Corinthian front, and constructed— as all
Russian churches are— in the form of a cross,
with gilded domes, cupolas, minarets, and two
immense belfries, each containing one large
and six small bells, fourteen in all, which
were now keeping up a most atrocious jangle.
Over the front entrance was at one end a very
fairly executed painting of the last supper, and
at the other a picture of some saint's story which
I did not understand. All the architectural
designing and outside decoration was the work,
I was told, of a serf belonging to the place.
The church was open. It happened to be a
Saint's day (St. Vladimir, I think), and the
count, with his party, including myself, entered
the sacred edifice. We were not very long
in it, the count and the other Russians of
our party getting very swiftly through their
religious observances; but the religious faith
and observances of any people have a powerful
effect in the formation of their character, and
what one sees of the Greek Church in its
practical bearing on the Russians is worth note.