bride, and walked to the time of the music, the rest of the imperial family and the court, amounting to about forty couple, following up and down the room, forming curves, and various other figures. This recreation continued an hour: a short time before it expired, I was introduced, through the favour of madame B, to the chamber of the bride and bridegroom. In front of the bed, under glass covers, were the bride's jewels, and a service of gold presented to her by her august family, and a golden salver containing a loaf and salt, which, according to the Russian custom, is presented by the empress dowager to her daughter on the night of her marriage, just before she unrobes: it is intended to express her wishes, that as the connection between parent and child is dissolved by marriage, she may never want the comforts of life.

The bed was a state one, the robes-de-chambre of the princess were placed on a stool on the right hand side, and the slippers of the prince on the left. Heavens! thought I, what a strange country this is! the postilions ride their horses on the wrong side, and the husbands sleep on the wrong side; but the remark was no sooner made than removed: it does not accord with the dignity of the empire that any prince under Heaven should take the right of a grand duchess of Russia. Hymen had touched the tapers with his torch, and a band of merry-looking pretty girls, dressed in white, and adorned with flowers, were waiting to receive the happy bride, and let loose the virgin zone. As I quitted this bower of Eden I longed to leave behind me the following beautiful recipe for preserving love:

"Cool as he warms, and love will never cool:

Then drop into the flame a tear or two,

Which blazing up like oil, will burn him through;

Then add sweet looks, soft words, some sighs, no pout,
And take my word the flame will ne'er go out."

In the evening the city was magnificently illuminated: the house of the British embassy shone with unrivalled elegance and splendour. As we rode up the Neva, after supper, we were uncommonly gratified by seeing the whole of the fortress, down to the water's edge, illuminated, which presented a spectacle the most brilliant, and completely novel, I ever beheld. Our bargemen again regaled us with one of their musical yells, the effect of which was encreased by

the addition of two tamborines struck at random. In the evening, after the nuptials, the imperial family went to the opera, when the theatre was superbly illuminated, and the court scenes were displayed, which presented the finest specimens of scenic painting I ever beheld. When the emperor was about to leave his box, the people saluted him with the most enthusiastic applause, with which he was visibly affected.

CHAP. XVIII.

APPLE FEAST-DOG-KILLERS-A BARRIER AGAINST SWINDLING-FES

TIVITIES OF

PETERHOFF-HORN MUSIC-A FAVOURITE BEAR-GER

MAN THEATRE-VISIT TO CRONSTADT-PRISON-MILITARY PUNISHMENT-THE INN-ORANIENBAUM-FLYING MOUNTAINS THE VALUE OF A BLOODY BEARD-FASTS, FAMINE AND FIRMNESS.

ON the sixth of August, O. S. the feast of apples commences, in which the common Russians frequently indulge themselves to such excess, that death is the consequence of their intemperance. About this period the dog-killers, called Foornantshicks, go their rounds and destroy every dog they find unprotected by a collar, containing the name of his master. This measure, though apparently cruel, is very necessary: some winters past, before this regulation was made, a number of fierce and voracious dogs assembled together in the gloomy ground which surrounds the admiralty, and at night have been known to attack and devour passengers.

As my time for quitting Petersburg drew nigh, I sent my first advertisement, describing my name, age, and profession, to the imperial gazette office, in which it was necessary to appear three times before I could obtain my post-horse order, without which it is impossible to stir. The object of this ceremony is to prevent persons going away in debt, by giving timely notice to their creditors, and may be accomplished in ten days; or if a traveller is in great haste to depart, upon two householders of respectability undertaking, at the proper office, to pay all the debts he may owe, he may immediately depart. A foreigner may stay one month after the expiration of the first complete notice: if he exceed that period, he must advertise again. Immediately after the nuptials the court removed to Peterhoff, a country palace, about thirty versts from the residence, situate on the shores of Cronstadt gulf, built by Le Blonde, where a magnificent ball and illumination, in honour of the nuptials, took place; at which nearly all the population of Petersburg were present.

As we proceeded in a line of carriages, extending several miles, drawn by four horses a-breast and two before them, we passed a

248

small but memorable public house, on the road side, about eight
versts from Petersburg, called the Krasnoi Kabac; the first word
meaning red, and the latter, as before related, a public house. It was
at this house that the late empress halted, when she was advancing
against her husband, and slept for a short time upon the cloaks of her
officers in one of the little rooms. Here, assisted by her then confi-
dential and enthusiastic friend, the princess Dashkoff, she consumed
We also passed the holy trinity hermi-
a great number of letters.
tage of saint Sergius, a small monastery surrounded by quadrangu-
lar cloisters, having a church and three chapels. There is nothing in
the building worthy of inducing a traveller to quit his carriage. A
little farther on we saw the palace of Strelna, a vast building of brick
stuccoed, built upon piazzas, and surrounded with indulating woods
and pleasure-grounds belonging to the grand duke Constantine, the
heir presumptive to the throne.

Upon our arrival we found the rooms, which were fitted up in a style of ancient splendour, and richly illuminated, filled with persons of all ranks and conditions in their best dresses, resembling a crowded masquerade, in which much of the costume of the empire was displayed. I was principally struck with the wives of the bearded merchants, who were rouged, and wore a head-dress of muslin, resembling a sugar-loaf, entirely encrusted with large pearls, with which their gowns were trimmed and their stomachers covered.

The illuminations were beyond any thing magnificent; in front of the palace rolled a cascade of water, over various coloured lamps, of groups which had a very novel effect, into a great pond, which appeared to be in a blaze of light, from the sides and centre of which statues threw columns of water to a great height; a canal, more than a mile long, lined with side lights of various coloured lamps, a glory at the end, and the imperial yachts illuminated in every part of their hull, masts, and rigging, stationed at a distance at sea, formed a brilliant and glowing coup d'œil. Every avenue, and every part of these extensive gardens, were in a blaze. In a recess was a large tree of copper, and flowers of the same metal, painted to resemble nature, which threw water from every leaf, and produced a very pretty effect. In another part of the gardens we heard the celebrated horn music. Each performer can only produce one tone from his instrument, consequently the skill and attention requisite to play upon it in concert must be great. At a little distance the effect was very

charming. A certain unfortunate class of miserables will hear with surprise that the horn music is a necessary appendage to the ceremony of nuptials of the least respectability.

In Russia, marriages are generally effected through the agency of a third person. During the childhood of their daughter, the parents fix upon a husband for her, a mutual female friend is sent to the gentleman with the proposals: if they are accepted, he presents the fair negotiatrix with a pelisse, according to custom. Many of the lower Russians married, as they frequently are, against their inclinations, make no scruple in taking their wives to such a scene of festivity as the one I have just described, and letting them out to prostitution for hire.

In a corner of the grand saloon, in the centre of the palace, I saw the Georgian court, composed of the prince of Georgia, and two princesses of his house, and their retinue. The prince was obliged to cede his country, a province of Asia, formerly belonging to Persia and Turkey, to the Russian empire, from which he receives a pension. I saw no traces whatever of Circassian beauty in the princesses: one was old, fat, and plain, and the other pale, hollow-eyed, and lean: the prince had a very handsome and noble appearance.

In one of the rooms are four celebrated pictures of Hackert, painted by order of count Alexey Orloff, celebrating the victory over the Turkish fleet commanded by the Capudan Pasha, the merit of which the count unjustly assumed to himself, as I have before observed. Upon the painter observing that he had never seen a ship on fire, Orloff ordered a Russian seventy-four to be cleared and burnt, to enable him to execute the subject with more fidelity.

After the imperial family, glittering with jewels, and resembling a stream of brilliant light, had walked several polonaises, in which the empress was attended by a little dwarf in a Turkish dress, they mounted their laneekas, open garden carriages, resembling Irish jaunting-cars, and visited the gardens; after which they sat down to a superb select supper under an awning, upon the top of one of the wings of the palace, at which I had the honour of being present. The guests were attended by about two hundred servants in full imperial liveries. At five o'clock we returned to Petersburg, much gratified. The houses and gardens that line the Peterhoff road are very beautiful.

K K