Page:The Boy Travellers in the Russian Empire.djvu/275

Rh. The Tartars do not associate freely with the Russians, though there is no hostility between them. They seclude their wives after the Moslem fashion, and a Russian gentleman tells me that he has rarely had a glimpse

of a Tartar woman, though he has lived near these people ever since he was born."

For a general view of Moscow our friends took a drive to the Sparrow Hills, the spot whence Napoleon took his first and also his last look upon the city he came so far to conquer.

On the way thither they stopped at the Gardens, which are the property of the Galitsin family, and also at a small palace or villa which is the property of the Empress. These interruptions delayed them, so that it was near sunset when they reached the Sparrow Hills and had the city in full view. As they looked at the sunlight reflected from the hundreds of gilded domes, and the great city spread over the undulating ground, they realized what must have been the feelings of the French soldiers as they gazed upon Moscow after their long and perilous journey to the heart of Russia.