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Not infrequently, respectable men belonging to the cultured classes are inferior to those belonging to the peasantry, and it is always a fact that the depraved man from the city is immeasurably worse than the depraved man from the village. This fact was strikingly illustrated by the contrast between the formerly well-educated men and the mujiks who were living in Kuvalda's shelter.
A few sat in their shirt-sleeves; and, judging by the color of their shirts, as well as their skins, did not reckon soap among the luxuries of life. Several of these savage-looking Mujiks were smoking some abominable weed, intended, perhaps, for tobacco, but very much unlike that delightful narcotic in the foul and tainted odor which it diffused over the room.
It would be all very well to take pictures with respectable subjects, such as a gentleman could hang on his wall; a general with a star, or the likeness of Prince Kutúzoff; but, here I see nothing but paintings of mujíks in their shirt-sleeves, servants, and such like cattle a mere waste of time and colours.
Police officers and a few Cossacks kept order among the crowd, and cleared the way both for the passengers who were disembarking and also for those who were embarking on board the Caucasus, minutely examining both classes of travelers. The one were the Asiatics who were being expelled; the other, mujiks stopping at Kasan.
With the assistance of a clever German conjurer named Brockhaus, from Riga, who with others helped the mock saint on the occasions when he imposed upon the credulity of the mujiks, he pretended to "heal" a child of lameness, while a female assistant of Brockhaus, having posed as a blind peasant, was restored to sight.
I never heard French words or German words used by Russian mujiks and Turkish fig-gatherers. I question whether I should find any in Iceland forming part of the vernacular. I certainly never found a French or even a German word in an old Icelandic Saga. Why this partiality everywhere for Spanish words? the question is puzzling; at any rate it puts me out " "Yes, it puts me out!"
This fact was strikingly illustrated by the contrast between the formerly well-educated men and the mujiks who were living in Kuvalda's shelter. The representative of the latter class was an old mujik called Tyapa. Tall and angular, he kept his head in such a position that his chin touched his breast.
Instead of going straight into the town by the main road they made a considerable detour and entered it by a lane that led them through a collection of miserable huts occupied by the poorest class of Siberian mujiks, half peasants, half townsfolk, who cultivate their patches of ground during the brief spring and summer, and struggle through the long dreary winter as best they can on their scanty savings and what work they can get to do from the Government or their richer neighbours.
Judging by external appearances, very little grease seems to be wasted in the manufacture of soap. Indeed, I would not trust one of these Mujiks to carry a pound of soap any where for me, any more than I would a gallon of oil or a pound of candles.
"With all my heart, for then I'm somebody," replied McShane. "You?" replied the courier. "I mean my master," returned McShane, correcting himself; "for he's an officer, and a good one, too." "Yes, that may be; but you said yourself," replied the courier, laughing. "My good friend, a valet to any one in Petersburg is no better than one of the mujiks who work in the streets.
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