Page:Siberia and the Exile System Vol 1.djvu/390

368 the Sabbath-day in the city and were straggling back on foot to their respective places of abode in the suburban villages. Nearly half of them were more or less intoxicated, and the number of open kabáks, or drinking-places, that we saw by the road seemed fully adequate to explain if not to excuse their condition.

We crossed the swift current of the Angará by means of a "swing," or pendulum, ferry, and drove up from the landing into the streets of the city. I was somewhat disappointed in its appearance. Its gilded or colored domes, white belfries, and scattered masses of foliage, when seen from the opposite side of the river, give to it a certain half-oriental picturesqueness; but to an observer in its streets it presents itself as a large, busy, thriving, but irregularly built and unattractive Russian provincial town. After unsuccessfully seeking shelter in the new and pretentious Moscow House and in the Siberian Hotel, we finally went to the Hotel Dekó, where, as we were informed, Lieutenants Harber and Schuetze stayed when they passed through the city in 1882 on their way to the Lena Delta. An elderly and rather talkative servant who brought our luggage to our room introduced himself by saying that he always used to wait on Mr. Harber and Mr. Schuetze, and that the former loved him so that he called him "Zhan" (John). He seemed to think that "Zhan" was an American nickname expressive of the tenderest and most affectionate regard, and that he needed no other recommendation than this to an American traveler. I told him that if he would take care of us properly we also would call him "Zhan," at which he seemed very much gratified. From the frequency and the pride with which he afterwards referred to this caressing nickname, I feel confident that when he comes to die, and a tombstone is placed over his mortal remains, no possible enumeration thereon of his many virtues will give to his freed spirit half so much pleasure as the simple epitaph,

THE AMERICANS CALLED HIM "ZHAN."