Page:The Tsar's Window.djvu/23

 surmounted by a round cap, ornamented about the rim with the eyes of peacock-feathers. I gazed at this curious figure inquiringly, and he ejaculated something which sounded like "Day." Grace plied him with questions in German, and then in French; but he continued to make unintelligible sounds, and finally retreated for a moment, returning with some tumblers filled with steaming tea, and some delicious bread. We blessed the intruder in all the languages at our command; and never was anything so refreshing to me as that tea! Surely, one must come to Russia to have tea served in the middle of the night.

We were so delighted with our midnight meal that whenever the tinkling of that goblin bell awoke us during the night, we put our heads out of the window and ordered tea in every language which we knew; but as Russian was not included in our repertory, we sometimes got cigarettes, or more wood for the stove, instead of the article we asked for.

The long night dragged itself away at last, and I opened my eyes upon the most desolate tract of country I have ever beheld. Flat and uncultivated, marshy in many parts, no trees except stunted pines and birches, and not a hill or a mountain. Far as the eye could reach, on either side, the same dreary expanse. Snow everywhere, of course, even in the air,—not coming down in great flakes, as in dear old New England, but sifting through the air like a mist, and falling almost imperceptibly.

We passed few villages, and no great cities. I caught 2