champagne and fever, what a filthy and
unwholesome place this Russian Cauldron is
when in full boil.

In the middle of the town, and in a
fashionable neighbourhood, is the favourite
promenade, which is to Kazan what the
Gardens by the Serpentine are to London,
or what the Quarry walk by the Severn is to
Shrewsbury. It is a walk under a few odd
trees that surround the Black Lake. The
Black Lake is a stagnant pond in the middle
of the town, black with a filth so concentrated,
that the stench of it in summer sometimes
even forces the inhabitants of the adjacent
streets to vacate their dwellings. During
"the season," however—, that is to say, during
the cold weather months,—it does not offend
the nose sufficiently to make its filth objectionable,
and the borders of the Black Lake form
the chosen lounging-place of the Kazan
aristocracy. The Black Lake is rather a fine
name for such a pond, but it is well to boast.
A place of resort out of town, a scanty little
garden with a few heaps and holes in it, is
called by the Kazan people "the Russian
Switzerland."

Kazan is built upon small hills; and, as
usually happens in such cases, the aristocracy
taking the uppermost ground, live in the
upper town; the poor live—it would be
truer to say die—down by the black and
fœtid water that boils in the Cauldron. The
whole place is dirty. In many streets there
are no sewers, and the ravines are filled
with every kind of filth and refuse, which
is being brought and discharged into
them night and day. The nose habitually
receives information of these things. In
the most uncleanly quarters the mortality is
frightful. But it is not only for this reason
that Death has his hands always full of work
in Kazan. We are bound to talk of the grim
old king before we come to the pink silk stockings
and champagne bottles. We must speak
of him first, because he is the real grandee of
the place.

The Kazan people have no wholesome
water supply. There is a second lake in
the neighbourhood called Kaban—it
separates the Russian from the Tartar town—
and this lake once had a supply from springs
in its bed, and a flow into the river Kazanka,
by which its waters were kept sweet and
wholesome; but the channel to the river
is choked up, and the springs in the bed of
the lake are also choked up; for the lake is
full of filth. It is stagnant now. What
sewers there are in Kazan pour their
contents into it. All the clothes of rich and
poor are carried down to it by washerwomen,
who use the lake, just as it stands, for their
common wash-tub. When it is frozen over
there is a fair held on the surface of this
lake; pollution of all kinds collects upon the
ice; and, when the thaw comes, down it goes
into the water. This is the best water to be
had in The Cauldron. That from the wells is
quite unfit for use, and the Kazanka river
water is so full of sulphate of lime, that it even
affects the bodies of those bathing in it. There
is the Volga not more than five miles distant;
and there are other means of purifying the
lake Kaban. Kazan contains a large
population of wealthy nobles and merchants, who
are profuse, as will presently be seen, in
the articles of champagne and churches.
Nevertheless, the inhabitants of this third
capital of Russia go on with the use of
stagnant and polluted water, and will
exhaust the lake perhaps—they have already
lowered it nine feet—before they introduce
anything so unusual as a Russian health-of-
towns agitation into their town-talk. It
should be added, on this subject of water
supply, that the lake water, such as it is, has
to be fetched. There are no pipes nor taps.
The family man keeps a horse and coachman
for the sole purpose of fetching water from
the Kaban, and if he cannot afford to do that,
he contracts with a peasant, who agrees to
bring the water to him daily for a certain
yearly sum. The peasant gets drunk on an
average twice a week, and disappoints his
customers. Then the tea—that beverage most
precious to the men of Kazan—cannot be
made until a neighbour has been found who
will be kind enough to lend a kettle-full of
water.

But the civilisation bubbling up among the
scum of The Cauldron is very high—oh, very
high! Let us look for a minute or two at
the bright side of things. Nothing could
be more enlightened than the aspect of Kazan
when it was illuminated for the reception
of Prince Alexander; and in the season
it is always gay. It is a place of fiddling
and of feasting; of luxurious men and
fascinating women. The nobles of Kazan
who betake themselves to their country
estates during the summer, flock into Kazan
at about the beginning of October, and
proceed immediately to plan out for themselves
a season's gaiety. They make the town alive
with masquerades, balls, dinners, sledge-
parties, and concerts. Often a déjeûner
dansant, a sledge-party and a ball, take place on
the same day, and the high-born beauty
may dance—and does dance—for sixteen
hours out of the twenty-four. There are
two balls a week throughout the season at
the assembly-rooms of the nobility; they
are an institution of the place, and fill up
Tuesday and Friday nights. Once a week
the Governor-General must give a ball; and
the other three evenings are scrambled for
by private entertainers; every Kazan noble
thinking it a duty to show what he can
do. Each of these balls is appointed
properly with wildernesses of liveried servants,
wax tapers, exotics, diamonds, and costly
supper-material. The visitor is received by
the host and hostess when he enters, and has
tea presented to him, of a kind that does not
come to England: a costly variety of which is