BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
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 EVERYWHERE 
 
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Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924014518835 
 
STATUE OF PETER THE GREAT. AT ST. PETERSBURG 
 
Little People Everywhere 
 
 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 A GEOGRAPHICAL READER 
 
 BY ETTA BLAISDELL McDONALD 
 
 Joint author of " Boy Blue and His Friends/' 
 "The Child Life Readers," etc.' 
 
 AND JULIA DALRYMPLE 
 
 Author of " Little Me Too," "The Make-Believe Boys," etc 
 
 r 
 
 School Edition 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 
 
 1911 
 
Copyright, igio, 
 By Little, Brown, and Company. 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
 (a) 1^ \% 
 
 IPrfntetS 
 8. J. Parkhtll & Co., Boston, U. 8. A. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 If a child learns from his geography that Russia 
 is a vast country, covering one sixth of the land 
 surface of the earth, and is inhabited by one hun- 
 dred and forty million people, more than half of 
 them peasants who depend for their food and 
 clothing upon the land which they hire from the 
 government, the bare facts are soon forgotten; 
 but if he sees these peasants working from dawn 
 to dark, through the long summer days, to wrest 
 from the soil enough food for the hard cold winter; 
 if he travels over the great highways and sails 
 down the long rivers, which for centuries were 
 the chief means of transportation; if he visits 
 the cities and sees the gay throngs of people, the 
 historic buildings, the palaces, the cathedrals; he 
 has an insight into the life and customs of the 
 country which remains with him as a lasting 
 impression. 
 
 So in this story of Russian life one sees broad 
 fields of grain and flax, herds of sheep and cattle 
 grazing on the grassy steppes, slow rivers creeping 
 for hundreds of miles across the vast plains; and 
 
VI PREFACE 
 
 one feels the deep religious fervor of the people 
 and grasps the nation's wonderful opportunity 
 for power and progress. In contrast to the humble 
 home of the peasant, with its bare furnishing and 
 meager fare, there is the magnificent splendor of 
 the cathedral with its ceremonies, its jewelled 
 icons, its thousands of flickering candles, — tiny 
 flames symbolic of the flame of ambition which, 
 once kindled, burns forever in the human heart. 
 
 Boris Antonovitch, the young peasant of the 
 story, typifies the Russia which feels a stir of 
 might and looks for a place among the great 
 nations of the world. Born in a country village 
 on the Volga River, he grows to be a sturdy, 
 active lad, doing his share of the work in the 
 fields, and taking his part in the fun of the village 
 festivals. But he longs to see the world, and with 
 his father's permission he goes to the great fair 
 at Nijni Novgorod, which has been held annually 
 for over five hundred' years. Later he goes to 
 Moscow where he sees the snow fall over the city, 
 just as it fell in 1812, driving Napoleon and his 
 French army out of Russia in disastrous defeat. 
 He is in St. Petersburg for the blessing of the waters 
 of the Neva, and for the joyous celebration of 
 Easter; and it is here that he decides to find his 
 place in the work of progress for his people. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAQE 
 
 I. The New Izba i 
 
 II. In the Hay-field 7 
 
 III. Peddlers and Pilgrims .... 15 
 
 IV. A Summer Afternoon 23 
 
 V. " Mother Volga " 31 
 
 VI. The Great Fair 38 
 
 VII. Friends from Home 45 
 
 VIII. The Fire at the Fair 50 
 
 IX. Ivan's Wedding 55 
 
 X. The Harvest Festival 62 
 
 XI. On the Way to Moscow .... 68 
 
 XII. Boris's Lucky Day 75 
 
 XIII. The First Snowfall 82 
 
 XIV. Bells of Moscow 88 
 
 XV. Peter the Great 96 
 
 XVI. Blessing the Neva 104 
 
 XVII. Easter in St. Petersburg . . . .112 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 Statue of Peter the Great at St. Petersburg 
 
 . Frontisp\ 
 
 A Russian Izba 
 
 Making Hay ..... 
 
 Nijni Novgorod and the Oka River . 
 
 A Busy Street of the Great Fair 
 
 A. Russian Troika .... 
 
 The Great White Wall of the Kremlin 
 
 Bells of Moscow .... 
 
 Blessing the Neva at St. Petersburg . 
 
 Pagb 
 
 Color 
 
 5 
 24 
 
 41 
 S3 
 69 
 78 
 89 
 108 
 
BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE NEW IZBA 
 
 " Kling! Klang! " sounded the hammer in the 
 soft evening air. 
 
 " Zish! Zish! " sang the plane. 
 
 " Creak! Creak! " answered the busy saw; 
 while the broad axe chopped great chips from a 
 log, pointing the end as easily as if it were sharpen- 
 ing a pencil. 
 
 The boy who was using the plane lifted it from 
 the smooth board. " The tools sing a song of the 
 new house," he said slowly. 
 
 " What song is it that they sing? " asked the 
 man with the hammer, reaching for a wooden 
 bolt. 
 
 " The hammer tells of a full cupboard; the saw 
 sings of needle and shuttle; the plane tells of a 
 bubbling kettle, and the axe is all for the warm 
 fire that burns in the great stove," answered the 
 boy, who was large and strong for his fourteen 
 
2 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 years, and drew the plane back and forth along the 
 board with a man's skill. 
 
 " Boris is always looking ahead," said the man 
 with the saw. " It will be a good month before 
 the izba is finished, and another before the fire is 
 built in the stove." 
 
 " What matter when it happens? " answered the 
 boy. " The tools know how it is going to be. They 
 have built izbas enough before now. Is it not so, 
 Ivan? " and Boris looked up to the roof where a 
 good-looking young peasant was swinging his 
 hammer. 
 
 Ivan was going to marry pretty Grushia Alex- 
 androvna in October, and it was for her that he 
 was building the new house. It was only an 
 izba, — just four walls made of rough logs plas- 
 tered together with dried moss dipped in pitch; 
 but Ivan always looked at the two cozy rooms 
 with loving pride and satisfaction. 
 
 How hard he had worked all the previous sum- 
 mer to earn the logs! How carefully he had 
 selected each tree to be sure that the trunk was 
 strong and sound! When the harvest was over 
 he had cut and trimmed the stately pines and 
 carted the logs to the village, where they had been 
 seasoning under the snow all winter. 
 
 As soon as the frost was out of the ground in the 
 spring he had begun driving down the posts 
 
THE NEW IZBA 3 
 
 where his house was to be set; and every night, 
 after his work in the factory was done, he took his 
 axe and hammer, and chopped and pounded until 
 dark, fitting the logs together and making the 
 walls tight in the new home. 
 
 One night in June Boris Antonovitch had 
 stopped in front of the izba to watch the busy 
 workman. " I will help you, Ivan," he said after 
 a few moments, and ran home for his tools. 
 
 When he came back he brought two men with 
 him. " Maxim and Stefan are also going to help," 
 he said; and then there were four to work on the 
 new izba, but the boy worked as skillfully as any 
 of the men. 
 
 Some of the other lads in the village followed 
 B oris as sheep follow their leader. They clambered 
 over the logs, or chased one another round and 
 round the house, calling to Boris to come and play 
 with them; but Boris never heeded them. 
 
 " I want to finish this carved balcony for the 
 window before it is time to start for the fair," he 
 said to Stefan; but the only answer to his words 
 was the " Kling! Klang! " of the hammer and the 
 hoarse creaking of the saw. 
 
 Ivan put down his hammer at last and looked 
 at the house. " Yes," he said, " the tools have 
 built izbas enough before now; but none so fine 
 as this. When Grushia has made some white lace 
 
4 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 curtains to hang at the two windows, and set a 
 geranium with red blossoms on the sill, it will 
 be the prettiest house on the street. 
 
 " But it is your carving that will make the eyes 
 stare at it," he added, looking down at the design 
 Boris was cutting so carefully. 
 
 Boris turned from his work to look up and down 
 the straggling village street. There were two 
 zigzag rows of gray izbas facing each other, with 
 a wide road between them. At one end of the 
 street was a low wooden factory; at the other end 
 was the church, its round green dome standing 
 out against the sunset sky. 
 
 It was a warm night in early July, and the red 
 sun still hung like a burning ball in the northern 
 sky, shedding a drowsy light across the fields. 
 At nine o'clock it would drop below the horizon 
 for a few hours and everyone would go indoors 
 to rest for the next day's work; but now the 
 street was full of lif e and gayety. 
 
 On a plot of green grass in front of one of the 
 izbas, four or five young peasants were dancing 
 to the music of a concertina, while a crowd of 
 men and girls watched them, laughing and shout- 
 ing at their antics. Groups of children romped 
 up and down the street, and the older people, 
 who had been hard at work all- day in field or 
 factory, now sat idly watching the dancers. 
 
Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
 
 A Russian Izba 
 " A peasant woman was carrying two buckets to the well." Page 5 
 
THE NEW IZBA 5 
 
 " No doubt they are thinking of the days when 
 they were young, and sang and danced with the 
 others," Boris said to himself, as he looked at 
 them. But three of them, at least, were not 
 thinking of their youth. They were speaking, 
 instead, of Boris himself. 
 
 " It is not often that a boy leaves his play to 
 do the work of a man," said a peasant woman 
 who was carrying two buckets to the well for 
 water. 
 
 " He has never been like the other boys, con- 
 tented to play when his work was done. He is 
 ambitious," said another woman, who had sons 
 of her own that liked only too well to play. 
 
 " That is because he is the son of Anton An- 
 tonovitch, the head man ef the village," replied 
 her husband. 
 
 " That cannot be so," said the first woman, 
 " because Serge is also the son of the starosta, 
 and everyone knows that he has no ambition." 
 
 " It is said that Anton Antonovitch would like 
 to make a doctor of Boris, but the lad does not 
 agree to it. He has a fancy to travel and see the 
 world, instead of using his eyes for hard study," 
 spoke the man again. " He wants to go to the 
 great fair at Nijni Novgorod next month, and 
 his father should not forbid him, for he can sell 
 his carvings there to pay for his journey." 
 
6 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " And he will sell them fast enough," added his 
 wife, nodding her head. " Boris can talk as well 
 as he can carve." 
 
 In the meantime, Boris, not knowing what the 
 gossips were saying, studied the izbas on each 
 side of the street. " You are right, Ivan," he 
 said finally. " You will bring Grushia to the 
 prettiest house of all. I will carve an / and a G 
 together over the doorway for a sign of good luck; 
 and I will bring home an icon for you from the 
 great fair." 
 
 Ivan flushed with pleasure. In every Russian 
 house there is at least one icon, which is a sacred 
 picture of the Madonna, or one of the saints or 
 martyrs. In many houses there are several icons, 
 before which a candle is burned on feast-days or 
 holy days, and if it can be afforded, the light is 
 kept burning all the time. 
 
 No wonder Ivan was pleased to hear that he 
 would receive an icon as a gift. " You are very 
 good, Boris," he said gratefully. " I will tell 
 Grushia when I see her to-morrow." 
 
 Then the hammer sounded again, the plane 
 sang its " Zish! Zish! " and the saw creaked. 
 
 As he worked, Ivan thought of the day when 
 Grushia would start the fire in the finished izba, 
 but Boris thought about the wooden toys that he 
 would sell at the great fair in Nijni Novgorod. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 IN THE HAY-FIELD 
 
 " Wake up, Boris! Wake up, or I shall take 
 the knout to you." 
 
 It was Serge who spoke, and Boris opened his 
 eyes sleepily. " You have no knout, brother, and 
 I am not afraid of you," he said. " Let me sleep 
 a little longer. It is only three o'clock." 
 
 " But the sun is shining and all the village is 
 awake," answered Serge, who was already dressed 
 in his coarse red blouse and gray crash trousers. 
 " We must go to the hay-field again to-day." 
 
 Boris opened his eyes a little wider, and saw 
 through the open door that a big bowl of buck- 
 wheat porridge stood on the heavy wooden table. 
 The steaming samovar told him that the water 
 was ready for him to make his own cup of tea; 
 but while Serge slipped through the door and went 
 to the tea-urn, Boris lay still in his bed on the shelf 
 against the wall, yawning and grumbling to him- 
 self. 
 
 " It is only a little minute since I dropped the 
 plane and stopped working on Ivan's house," he 
 
8 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 muttered. " What can the sun be thinking of, 
 to give a boy no chance to sleep? " 
 
 Just then his eye caught sight of his knife and 
 a block of wood on the floor beside the bed. He 
 sprang up at once, and with two quick throws of 
 his arms he was dressed and ready for the day's 
 work. 
 
 While the two boys stood eating their porridge 
 and drinking their tea, their mother, who had been 
 out to the barn to feed the horse, entered the 
 kitchen. 
 
 " Ah," she said, shaking her head as Serge took 
 his third cup, " Holy Russia has never been the 
 same since we drank so much tea." 
 
 " I have heard you say that same thing many 
 times, Matushka," said Boris; " and I must ask 
 you if you remember a time when Russia was any 
 different from what it is now." , 
 
 She stopped shaking her head and looked at him 
 in surprise. " Why, no! now that you speak of it, 
 I can't say that I do," she answered. " But I 
 remember that I have often heard my own mother 
 say the same thing." 
 
 " I am going to stop drinking tea altogether, 
 and see if it will make any difference," said Boris 
 suddenly, and he passed his cup to his brother. 
 
 Serge took it and drank the tea without any 
 question. " I am contented to let things stay as 
 
EST THE HAY-FIELD O. 
 
 they are," he said; but Boris had opened the door 
 and was standing on the step, looking up into the 
 cloudless sky. 
 
 " We shall bring home some of the hay to-day," 
 he told his mother, who had followed him to the 
 door. " What we cut yesterday will dry quickly 
 in this hot sun." 
 
 Men and women, boys and girls, were coming 
 from all the houses along the street, ready to 
 begin their work in the fields. There was hay to 
 be harvested, grain to be cut, and vegetables to 
 be hoed and weeded, for Russia is the biggest farm 
 in the world, and there are millions of peasants in 
 the great country, waking at daylight every sum- 
 mer morning and hurrying off to do their farming. 
 
 The starosta and his wife were almost the only 
 persons who did not go to the fields that day. 
 They had to stay at home to receive the uriadnik, 
 should he arrive unexpectedly. 
 
 There are half a million villages in Russia 
 similar to this one where Boris lived, and because 
 the Russian peasants need to be taken care of 
 much like children, a special policeman, called an 
 uriadnik, visits them from time to time. The 
 business of this uriadnik is to order everything 
 made right which he thinks is not right. 
 
 The starosta, or head man, is chosen by the 
 other men to collect the taxes and take charge of 
 
IO BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 the village. He also reports to the uriadnik if 
 anything goes wrong. If he should report that a 
 peasant had spoken disrespectfully of the Czar, 
 the man might be punished by imprisonment. 
 
 Anton Antonovitch had lately been chosen to 
 be the starosta in his village because he knew more 
 about counting, and could read and write better 
 than the others. Then, too, he lived in a house 
 with two stories and a good chimney, and had 
 room for entertaining the uriadnik and the other 
 government officials. 
 
 Few of the peasants own any land, but every 
 family is allowed by the government to cultivate 
 a portion of the land which belongs to the village 
 commune. For the use of this land a tax is paid 
 every year to the government. 
 
 This village land is divided into strips, each 
 family having one, two, or three holdings, according 
 to its needs. When these long strips are planted 
 with rye, potatoes, buckwheat and flax, all grow- 
 ing and blossoming, they look like many-colored 
 ribbons laid across the flat fields. 
 
 As Boris and his friends reached the end of the 
 village street, they separated, each going to work 
 in his own holding. Some had to go along the 
 road for a great distance because their strip was 
 at the farther end of the village land. 
 
 Boris and Serge had to walk about two versts, 
 
IN THE HAY-FIELD II 
 
 or three miles, before reaching their father's hay- 
 field. Each boy carried a bottle of water, a loaf 
 of rye bread and a fresh green cucumber for his 
 lunch; and as they walked along the road they 
 talked about the things that happened at home. 
 
 " If the uriadnik comes to-day," Serge said, 
 " he will find our village in good order." 
 
 " Yes," replied Boris; " father is a good 
 starosta, and he looks after everything carefully. 
 To-day he is going to make a new list of the cows 
 and horses because Peter Nikovitch has bought a 
 new horse and one of the cows died last week." 
 
 " Well, it is a good thing that we have nothing 
 to worry us," said Serge, trudging along con- 
 tentedly. 
 
 As soon as the boys reached the field, they placed 
 their lunch and bottles of water in the shade of a 
 birch tree, then they took up two long forked 
 sticks and began to spread out the hay so that it 
 would dry in the hot sun. 
 
 In the neighboring fields women wearing bright- 
 colored skirts, with gay handkerchiefs tied over 
 their heads, and men and boys in red blouses, 
 were also making hay, mowing the tall grass, 
 spreading it out to dry, or raking it up into piles 
 ready to take home. 
 
 Sometimes they sang to one another an answer- 
 ing song across the fields, and again they sang 
 
12 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 all together some slow, mournful folk-song. But 
 when the sun stood high in the heavens and the 
 waves of heat shimmered across the still air, the 
 singing and laughter ceased, and only the shrill 
 cry of the crickets broke the silence. 
 
 Boris and his brother worked industriously all 
 through the long morning, until at last Serge said, 
 " I feel that I am as dry as this hay we are spread- 
 ing. Let us sit down and eat our bread. Then we 
 can have a little sleep." 
 
 But although the boys found a comfortable place 
 in the shade of the birch tree, they were cheated 
 out of their usual midday sleep. 
 
 As they sat on the fragrant hay, munching their 
 black bread and cutting off thick slices of the 
 cucumber, they hallooed to the great eagles that 
 soared and wheeled high in the air overhead, and 
 waved a friendly hand to a company of soldiers 
 that passed along the road to work at harvesting; 
 for the soldiers in Russia are so poorly paid that 
 they often work in the fields during the summer. 
 
 When the last bit of bread and cucumber had 
 disappeared, Serge stretched himself out on the 
 hay; but Boris sat up straight, looking across 
 the broad plain spread out before him as far as 
 the eye could reach. There were blue fields of 
 waving flax, patches of potatoes starred with 
 white blossoms, and long ribbons of rye and barley 
 
IN THE HAY-FIELD 13 
 
 leading toward the dark pine forests far off on the 
 horizon. 
 
 Here and there were little clusters of izbas like 
 those in their own .village, with the green or blue 
 dome of the church shining in the bright sunshine. 
 
 Not far away the lazy Volga River flowed slowly 
 through the fields of hay and potatoes toward the 
 distant city of Nijni Novgorod, and then on beyond 
 for nearly two thousand miles more to the Caspian 
 Sea. 
 
 " If you had not been born here, so near Kos- 
 troma, where would you rather have been born? " 
 asked Boris at last, looking down at Serge who 
 had pulled his cap over his eyes and was just 
 dropping off to sleep. 
 
 Serge did not trouble himself to look up. " Oh, 
 anywhere," he muttered drowsily. " One place is 
 as good as another. It doesn't matter where one 
 is born." 
 
 " That is true," said Boris, looking off in the 
 direction where he thought Moscow must he; 
 " I would choose to have been born in Moscow. 
 But it makes no difference now, I shall go there 
 some time." 
 
 " How will you go? " asked Serge with sudden 
 interest. " No one from our village has ever been 
 to Moscow." 
 
 " No one from our village has ever been to 
 
14 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 Nijni Novgorod," replied his brother; " but I 
 mean to go there next month." 
 
 " Father has not said so yet," Serge reminded 
 him. 
 
 " No, but he looks at my basket of carvings 
 every day, and counts the number of kopecks 
 and roubles they ought to bring," and Boris 
 nodded his head triumphantly. He felt sure that 
 his father would soon give his permission for the 
 journey. 
 
 " But why do you wish to go? " questioned Serge, 
 pushing back his cap and sitting up to look at 
 this brother who had such curious ideas. " You 
 will find everything strange and different." 
 
 " That is why I wish to go," answered Boris. 
 " I have never seen anything but our own little 
 village. I wish to see something strange and 
 different." 
 
 He stood up as he spoke and, turning toward the 
 green dome of the village church, he bowed his 
 head and made the sign of the cross to show that 
 he was thankful for the good lunch he had eaten. 
 • " You have your wish," said Serge calmly. 
 " Look at the road and you will see something 
 strange and different now." 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 PEDDLERS AND PILGRIMS 
 
 Boris looked in the direction in which Serge 
 pointed, and a strange sight met his eyes. On 
 the road which ran through the village land, 
 between the fields of hay and grain, a queer pro- 
 cession of people was passing. 
 
 There were both men and women in the com- 
 pany, and they were dressed in all sorts of curious 
 costumes. Some were in sackcloth, others in rags. 
 Many of the women walked with a stout wooden 
 staff, the men carried heavy packs on their backs, 
 and they were all trudging wearily along the hot 
 sandy road as if they had travelled a long dis- 
 tance and had still farther to go. 
 
 Boris sprang forward excitedly. " They must 
 be going to the great fair at Nijni Novgorod! " 
 he exclaimed. 
 
 " Yes, that must be so," agreed Serge slowly, 
 and he stood up beside his brother to watch the 
 procession. 
 
 " They will pass through our village. Let us 
 follow them," suggested Boris. " We have finished 
 our lunch." 
 
16 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 Serge glanced down at his bed of hay under the 
 tree, then he looked once more at the travellers. 
 " Well," he said finally, " we must go home and 
 get the little black horse to draw the hay. We 
 may as well go now and see what is going to 
 happen." 
 
 The other peasants who were working in the 
 fields followed the example of the two boys, until 
 a great crowd was at last moving slowly down the 
 road. As if that were not enough, just as they 
 reached the sign-post at the entrance to the village 
 a tarantass dashed up, the three horses galloping 
 at full speed. 
 
 A tarantass is a large, four-wheeled Russian 
 carriage, with a leather top; and it is fixed on two 
 long wooden bars in place of springs, like a great 
 cradle on slides. This tarantass had only one 
 seat, but there was a cushion on the floor, and 
 three or four children were crowded together on 
 it, while their mother and a nurse sat upon the 
 seat. 
 
 The driver was on the seat in front, and as it 
 was plainly impossible for the carriage to enter the 
 village because the road was completely filled 
 with men, women and children, he pulled up his 
 horses and waited for the crowd to move out of 
 the way. 
 
 " Do all these people live here? " asked the 
 
PEDDLERS AND PILGRIMS ^^ 
 
 mother of the children, looking out over the 
 crowd. 
 
 For answer the driver studied the sign-board a 
 moment. " I cannot tell, Barishna," he answered, 
 lifting his hat very respectfully. " Will you not 
 be pleased to read yourself? " and he pointed to 
 the board which was fastened to the top of the 
 post. 
 
 " One hundred men, fifty cows and sixty horses," 
 the lady read. Then, looking again over the com- 
 pany, she added, " But there must be as many as 
 two or three hundred people here." 
 
 " Some of them are the women and children who 
 live in the village. They are never numbered on 
 the sign-boards," replied the man, lifting his hat 
 again and bowing low. " But there seem to be 
 many peddlers and pilgrims in the crowd," he 
 added. 
 
 It was easy to tell which were the pilgrims. They 
 were the old men and women who were dressed 
 in the humblest of clothes. Their legs were bound 
 round with rags, and on their feet they wore bast 
 shoes like those the village peasants make of wood- 
 fiber during the long winter evenings. 
 
 Over their shoulders they carried small leather 
 bags which contained a little food and clothing, 
 and in their pockets they may have had a few 
 kopecks. Russian pilgrims seldom take any 
 
l8 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 money when they start on a pilgrimage, partly 
 because they are too poor, and partly because 
 everyone along the way is glad to give them food 
 and a lodging, for they are looked upon as holy 
 people. 
 
 There are many thousands of pilgrims to be 
 seen on the roads of Russia during the summer 
 season. Sometimes they walk several hundred 
 miles for the sake of visiting the shrine of a famous 
 saint. A blessing and the promise of future sal- 
 vation is the reward that awaits them at the 
 end of their long journey. 
 
 These pilgrims were on their way to the shrine 
 of St. Sergius at the famous Troitsia monastery 
 near Moscow. Everyone greeted them respect- 
 fully, and several of the villagers gave them money 
 which they put in their pockets. They would leave 
 the money at the shrine, and with it they would 
 leave a prayer for the good of the giver. 
 
 The peddlers were from the country villages in 
 the province of Yaroslav, and were, indeed, on 
 their way to the fair, where they hoped to sell 
 or trade their wares. Here was one with a bundle 
 of brooms on his shoulder. There was another 
 with a roll of straw mats. Some carried great 
 baskets filled with cutlery, and still others had 
 quantities of leather goods. Nothing which one 
 could mention seemed to have been forgotten, 
 
PEDDLERS AND PILGRIMS 10. 
 
 for the Russian peasants in the provinces around 
 Moscow make anything and everything that hand 
 can fashion. 
 
 There were wooden boxes, bowls, spoons and 
 cups, — painted red, black and gold, and covered 
 with varnish. There were wicker baskets, brass 
 sauce-pans, kettles, sieves, padlocks, chains and 
 fish-hooks. In fact there were too many things 
 to tell about; and all together, peddlers, pilgrims 
 and peasants, they made the most curious sight 
 imaginable. 
 
 Down the village street to meet the strangers 
 came the starosta with his bronze badge proudly 
 displayed on his broad chest, and beside him 
 walked the uriadnik himself. Passports were 
 brought out and examined, and after the con- 
 fusion of separating the pilgrims from the ped- 
 dlers, and the villagers from the strangers, all the 
 peasants threw open their doors and welcomed the 
 travellers to rest in their izbas during the heat of 
 the afternoon, and to lunch upon cabbage soup, 
 onions and black bread. 
 
 While all this was going on, the tarantass was 
 driven through the village to the house of the 
 starosta; and when Boris arrived, the uriadnik was 
 Just assisting the lady from the carriage, and the 
 starosta and his wife were bowing and inviting her 
 to enter their humble home. 
 
20 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " We are on our way to visit my brother, Count 
 Pavloff, who owns the neighboring estate," ex- 
 plained the lady, as Anton Antonovitch set a 
 chair for her, and his wife filled some tall glasses 
 with tea for their guests. 
 
 " Our count is very good," said the peasant 
 woman. " He is always ready to help us when we 
 need help." 
 
 But it was easy to see that here was a home 
 where the peasants had learned to help themselves. 
 Everything was neat and well-kept. The floor 
 had been scrubbed. There were white, hand-made 
 lace curtains at the three tiny windows. The tall 
 stove, which always fills one quarter of the room 
 in a peasant's izba, was free from cracks and had 
 just been whitewashed. The wooden table and 
 half-dozen chairs that stood against the wall 
 were clean and whole, and in front of the icon 
 on the wall opposite the door a five-kopeck candle 
 was burning. 
 
 On the floor beside the stove stood a basket 
 filled with pieces of carved wood. One of the 
 children, a boy about the age of Boris, discovered 
 this basket and pointed toward it. " What is 
 that? " he asked. 
 
 Boris brought out the basket and took from it 
 several pieces of his work, — a fruit tray, two or 
 three spoons, some wooden toys, and a box shaped 
 
PEDDLERS AND PILGRIMS 21 
 
 like a tiny izba, with window balconies like those 
 he was making for Ivan's new house. 
 
 As he showed all these things to the children 
 who clustered around him, he explained that he 
 hoped to carry them to the great fair and sell 
 them. 
 
 " I will buy the fruit tray now," said the lady 
 suddenly. " I have never seen better carving, 
 and if you will take your basket to my brother's 
 house perhaps some one there will buy a bowl or 
 a box." 
 
 Boris's eyes sparkled, and he looked up quickly 
 at his father. " Will you give your consent for 
 me to go to the fair," he asked, " if I can sell 
 toys enough to pay my passage on the river 
 boat? " 
 
 The father looked at the basket of carvings and 
 then at his son, but he did not reply at once. 
 
 " Why do you not tell him that he may go? " 
 asked the lady. " He is a sensible-looking lad, 
 and ought to be able to take care of himself." 
 
 " It is not that," answered the starosta. " I 
 need his help with the farming; and besides,' I 
 am afraid that he will get wrong ideas into his 
 head. He has never been contented, like our 
 good Serge here. He began reading the papers 
 at the time of our war with Japan, and ever since 
 then he has done nothing but talk about seeing the 
 
22 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 world. It is not natural;" and the poor man 
 looked quite disturbed. 
 
 The lady laughed gently. " Would you wish 
 to have him do nothing all his life long but work 
 in the fields all summer and in the factory all 
 winter? " she asked. 
 
 " No," said the starosta, " I want him to study 
 and learn to be a doctor; but I am not a bad 
 father, to keep my sons from having what they 
 want. If I should, they would blame me for it 
 when they are men. Yet if Boris goes to the fair 
 and gets a taste for travel, no one can tell when 
 he will have enough. I have heard him say that 
 he hopes to see Moscow, and he may even go 
 so far as to think of St. Petersburg." 
 
 Again the lady laughed. " Believe me," she 
 said, " if Boris wishes to see the world it will do 
 him no harm. He may even become a better man 
 because of it. Let me take him along with me. 
 Perhaps my brother will buy some of his carvings." 
 
 She rose as she spoke, and motioning for her 
 children to follow her, she led them, bowing and 
 crossing themselves, out of the izba and into the 
 tarantass; and Boris went with them, his basket 
 of precious wooden toys in his hand, his eyes 
 shining with expectation. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 A SUMMER AFTERNOON 
 
 All the people in the village came to their 
 doorways, or stood on their steps, to watch the 
 tarantass drive away. Dogs ran out to bark at 
 the horses, and little barefooted children chased 
 the carriage through the street. 
 
 The young people of Boris's age looked at him 
 with wondering eyes. 
 
 " He is never coming back," said one. 
 
 " His father is letting him go to the fair after 
 all," said another. 
 
 But Boris heard them and called back, " I am 
 only going to the count's house, and I shall be 
 home again at sunset." 
 
 Never before had he been to the big house 
 except on his own two feet, and now he sat on the 
 seat beside the driver, gazing ahead at the road 
 which stretched out before him, straight and 
 wide, across the flat country. 
 
 The horses trotted along at a good pace, the 
 wheels rolling noiselessly over the soft black earth. 
 The large bell on the douga, the wooden arch 
 over the middle horse, sang a silvery song, the 
 
24 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 little bells on all three of the harnesses jingling a 
 merry chorus. 
 
 After following the highway for about four miles, 
 the driver turned into a cross-country road which 
 led through the great estate of nearly ten thousand 
 acres belonging to Count Pavloff. 
 
 As they rode between two hay-fields a score of 
 men and women, who were raking the hay, stopped 
 their work and leaned upon their rakes to watch 
 the tarantass as it passed. But Boris hardly 
 noticed them. He was thinking of Count Pav- 
 loff and wondering if he would be riding his horse 
 over some distant part of the estate, or if he would 
 be at home and willing to look at the carvings. 
 
 Now the road led through great fields of cab- 
 bages, and Boris heard the nurse telling the chil- 
 dren how these cabbages would be salted and 
 fermented, and then packed away in casks, ready 
 to make soup for the winter. 
 
 Next they passed through a new growth of 
 young birches. Beyond them was a forest of 
 stately pines, and one of the boys asked Boris if 
 there were any wolves in the woods. 
 
 " Yes," he answered, but he hardly knew what 
 he said, for his thoughts were all on the end of the 
 journey. 
 
 They passed a pond shaded by enormous willows, 
 and beyond were broad fields of flax and rye. The 
 
A SUMMER AFTERNOON 2$ 
 
 children thought Boris quite stupid because he 
 said nothing during the rule; but when they drove 
 through the great gateway and along the shady 
 avenue, his eyes were the brightest and his 
 heart beat faster than any with excitement. 
 
 At last the tarantass stood still before the door 
 of the great gray house, and the lad found his 
 feet and his tongue at once. " This is the bell," 
 he said, and sprang out to pull the long rope which 
 hung down from a tree overhanging the roof. 
 
 A great bell clanged, and soon a servant came 
 from some distant part of the house to see who 
 had arrived on such a hot afternoon. She wel- 
 comed the strangers, directed the driver to take 
 his horses to the stable, and then led the way 
 through the house to a broad veranda. 
 
 There, enclosing a grassy yard, were several low 
 wooden buildings, in each of which a number of 
 peasant women were hard at work. Some were 
 making cheese, others were making wines and 
 jellies. Some were drying fruits and vegetables 
 in great ovens, and others were packing the dried 
 fruits in pretty birch-bark baskets. 
 
 The yard also presented a busy scene. In one 
 corner, near an enormous woodpile, an old man 
 was sawing up long birch logs. Each stick, as it 
 fell from the sawhorse, was just the right length 
 for the great porcelain stove in the house. An- 
 
26 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 other man was drawing water from the well and 
 filling huge tubs for the wash-house; and some 
 children, who had just come from the fields with 
 brimming pails of wild strawberries, were begging 
 him for a drink of the cold water. 
 
 Never had there been a busier day on the estate. 
 It was plain that Count Pavloff's household 
 knew how to get ready for the long cold winter. 
 
 Pointing across the yard, the servant said to 
 Boris, " Go, you, and call the mistress. She is 
 in one of the houses over there, looking after the 
 work." 
 
 But, although the lad ran from one house to 
 the other, still carrying his basket of precious 
 carvings in his hand, he did not find the mistress 
 until at last some one told him to look in the 
 storerooms. 
 
 Boris had often been in these storerooms in the 
 cellar. The very year before he had helped to 
 bury the carrots, beets and turnips in their great 
 bed of sand between the brick pillars which sup- 
 ported the center of the house. 
 
 He liked to count the barrels of apples and 
 cranberries, the tubs of butter and casks of lin- 
 seed oil, stored away here for the winter; and he 
 liked the odor of the smoked beef, hams and 
 bacon which hung from the ceiling. 
 
 Once he had even slipped into the cheese room 
 
A SUMMER AFTERNOON 27 
 
 and seen the great round cheeses standing in rows 
 on the hanging shelves where no mice could reach 
 them; but now all the doors were closed and 
 locked with clumsy wooden padlocks, and he 
 stumbled about in the dim light until, at the far- 
 ther end of the cellar, he found the lady of the 
 house superintending the packing of great pieces 
 of beef in barrels of brine. 
 
 " I wish I had a long-handled fork," she said, 
 without looking up to see who it was. " This 
 brine is so cold that I find it most unpleasant to 
 put my arm down into it." 
 
 " Here is one that I made," cried the boy 
 gladly, and he took from his basket a fork two 
 feet long, which had been standing up stiff and 
 straight and catching on everything that came 
 near it. 
 
 "It is just what I need," exclaimed the lady, 
 and she took it and poked it into the cold brine, 
 pushing the pieces of meat closely together. 
 
 Boris stood and watched her for a few minutes, 
 waiting for her to ask him his errand, but at last 
 he interrupted her work. " You have guests," 
 he said. " The count's sister and her four children 
 are in the house." 
 
 " That is good," said the lady briskly, and she 
 drew the long fork out of the brine. 
 
 " They have come from St. Petersburg. They 
 
28 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 drove all the way from Tver in a tarantass, and 
 they brought me with them from our village," 
 explained Boris, as he followed her out into the 
 open air. 
 
 " And why was that? " asked the countess, 
 looking at him to see what good reason there 
 could be for bringing one of the peasant lads 
 when there were already four children in the 
 carriage. 
 
 Boris held out his basket of carvings. " The 
 lady thought perhaps there might be something 
 here that you would wish to see, and that after 
 seeing it perhaps you would be pleased to buy it 
 from me," he said eagerly, and suddenly kneeled 
 down in front of her to kiss her dress. 
 
 "Well, well! wait until after the greetings are 
 over," she answered, and hurried across the yard 
 to the veranda. 
 
 But Boris was too much excited to wait patiently, 
 so he went over to the woodpile, and taking up a 
 saw, he was soon making it sing a far merrier tune 
 than the wheezing and creaking of the one the old 
 man pushed back and forth across the birch logs. 
 
 " Come and play with us," shouted one of the 
 boys, who had found a swing under a tall oak 
 tree, and was anxious for some fun after his long 
 journey. 
 
 Boris looked up from his work and shook his 
 
A SUMMER AFTERNOON 20 
 
 head. " I shall make no play until I know how 
 it is going with my carvings," he answered. 
 
 He was not kept waiting very long, for Count 
 Pavloff soon rode into the yard from his visit to 
 the distant grain fields. He had a cheery word for 
 everybody, the heartiest of greetings for his 
 sister, and a bear's welcome for the nieces and 
 nephews. 
 
 " And who is that, making such a racket with 
 the saw? " he asked finally, as the children led 
 him to a shady seat out under the trees. 
 
 " It is Boris Antonovitch," answered the oldest 
 boy. " We brought him up from the village, and 
 he is waiting to show you his carvings." 
 
 " Call him here then! Call him here at once! 
 Don't keep him waiting any longer," and Count 
 Pavloff laughed a great laugh that sent the chil- 
 dren tumbling over one another in their hurry. 
 
 They were back again in a moment, dragging 
 Boris between them; his basket hugged tightly 
 to his red blouse, and his eyes almost popping out 
 of his head with surprise at so much haste. 
 
 " Carvings, is it? And who taught you how to 
 carve? " asked the count, holding up a dainty 
 bdx. At the same time the children hunted in 
 the basket, bringing out first one thing and then 
 another, and laughing and exclaiming over them 
 all. 
 
30 BOKIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " See this queer domovoi! " cried Qne, holding 
 up a funny little old man with a green pointed cap 
 and a long beard. It was evidently an image of 
 the Russian house-sprite which all the peasants 
 take care never to offend. 
 
 " No one taught me how to carve," replied 
 Boris. " I used my knife whenever there was 
 time, and I soon found out how to do it. Now if 
 I can sell some of these carvings, it will pay my 
 fare on the boat, and perhaps my father will be 
 willing to let me go to Nijni Novgorod." 
 
 Count Pavloff laughed another of his great 
 laughs. " I will do better than buy your toys," he 
 said. " I will write a letter to your father and tell 
 him to allow you to go." 
 
 " Brava! Brava! " shouted all the children, 
 clasping hands and capering around him in a 
 circle. 
 
 So when Boris trudged home at last, he carried 
 the count's letter in his blouse, just over the cross 
 which hung around his neck to protect him from 
 all harm. In his pocket there were three roubles, 
 which was more than enough to pay his fare on 
 the river boat; and in his hand was the basket of 
 carvings; but the dainty box, the funny old 
 domovoi, and a flock of tiny sheep were left behind 
 at the big house. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 " MOTHER VOLGA " 
 
 The sun was just dropping out of sight when 
 Boris reached the village, and the fields were 
 flooded with a red light from the sunset sky. The 
 peasants were all out in the street, and there was 
 a buzz of excitement in the air over the arrival of 
 the strangers that day. 
 
 The moment he appeared they clustered around 
 him, eager for the story of his visit; but he went 
 at once to his father's house to deliver the count's 
 message, and they followed him like so many 
 children. 
 
 The starosta held up the letter in the fading light, 
 and read it through slowly while everyone waited. 
 Then he read it again to be sure that he had made 
 no mistake in the words, and all this time there 
 was a breathless silence in the crowd. 
 
 " Now see what I am to do! " he exclaimed at 
 last. " All the hay is to be cut and dried and 
 brought home to the barn. It is three days' 
 work for three pairs of hands, yet the count tells 
 me to send one pair away to the fair." 
 
32 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " Let Boris wait until the hay is in the barn," 
 suggested one of the old men. 
 
 " But there is the weeding, and the hoeing and 
 harvesting to be done after that," complained the 
 starosta. " Who is there in the whole village who 
 can afford to spare a pair of hands before the end 
 of the harvest? " 
 
 Who, indeed? Everyone looked at everyone 
 else, and they all shook their heads. In summer 
 Russia is the very busiest place in the whole 
 world. From the moment the frost is out of the 
 ground in the spring until it comes again in the 
 fall, eighty million peasants are hurrying, hurrying, 
 from dawn to sunset, to raise food for themselves 
 and their animals to last through the winter. 
 
 It was true that Boris was only a boy, but he 
 had a man's strength, and there were few in the 
 village who could do more work in a day than he. 
 His father needed him; that was why he had not 
 given his permission at once for the lad to go to 
 Nijni Novgorod. 
 
 The great fair is held in the merchants' dull 
 season, when the roads are good and the rivers 
 open; but it is the farmers' busiest time — in 
 August and September — and here was a letter 
 bidding Anton Antonovitch send his son off just 
 when he most needed his help. No wonder he 
 groaned and sighed. 
 
MOTHER VOLGA 33 
 
 Then up spoke a peddler, the only one left of 
 all the company that had come to the village that 
 noon; for as soon as they had rested a little, the 
 peddlers had moved eastward toward the great 
 fair, and the pilgrims had turned their faces west- 
 ward to Moscow and the famous shrine of St. 
 Sergius. 
 
 But Mikayla Mikailoff, the peddler with the 
 great pack of brass bowls on his back, did not go 
 with the others. He had a stone bruise on his 
 foot and was too lame to go farther that day, so 
 here he was now, interceding for Boris. 
 
 " I have worked at farming for thirty years," 
 he said to the starosta, " and I can toss hay with 
 the best of you. If you will let the boy go along 
 with me, I will wait and help him with the haying." 
 
 So for a week he worked in the fields with Serge 
 and Boris, and when the barn was filled to over- 
 flowing with the fragrant hay, and the long ribbon 
 of potatoes and cabbages had been hoed, the 
 peddler took his pack, Boris took his basket, and 
 together the two trudged sturdily off toward 
 Kostroma, where they would take the boat down 
 the Volga River to Nijni Novgorod. 
 
 " I will not be gone long," Boris promised. 
 " Just as soon as I have sold all my toys and 
 bought an icon for Ivan's new izba, I will come 
 back and help with the harvesting." 
 
34 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " He will make his word good," the villagers all 
 said. " Boris has always done as he agreed; " 
 and they helped Serge with his work, a little here 
 and there, when they could spare the time. 
 
 They tried to imagine what fortune met Boris 
 on his journey; but as none of them had ever 
 been on the river except when it was frozen, they 
 soon stopped thinking about it. Boris might have 
 stayed on the boat the rest of the summer for all 
 the help their imagination gave him, if it had not 
 been for the peddler. 
 
 And Boris would have been glad to spend the 
 whole summer on the river. His bright eyes saw 
 a thousand new and strange sights which he had 
 never even imagined. 
 
 To begin with, there was the river, Mother 
 Volga as she is called, the noblest river in all 
 Russia; a quiet, placid stream stretching out for 
 twenty-four hundred miles like a silver thread 
 across the flat green country. 
 
 Then there were the boats, hundreds of them, — 
 rafts, barges, sailboats, steam-tugs and launches. 
 The tugs puffed and panted up and down the 
 river, drawing heavy barges loaded fifteen feet 
 high with piles of wood. 
 
 The sailboats moved along silently, their sails 
 often flapping idly in the still hot air, and the 
 rafts crept slowly down the stream with the 
 
35 
 
 current. Whole families seemed to be living on 
 these rafts, and when, in the soft twilight, they 
 sang together the old folk-songs which Boris 
 knew so well, he hummed softly with them the 
 plaintive song which has been sung on the Volga, 
 for a thousand years, by every boating party 
 that has dipped an oar into the waters of the 
 famous river: — 
 
 "Down the Volga, down our mother river, 
 Down our broad and long river, 
 A storm is rising. 
 Not. a little storm either. 
 The waves rise high, 
 
 Nothing can be seen in the midst of the waves 
 But a small red boat. 
 White shine its sails, 
 And black are tihe caps of the rowers." 
 
 The song had a mournful sound, and Boris 
 closed his eyes and almost held his breath to 
 listen, it seemed so weird and strange. 
 
 But in the daytime his eyes were always busy. 
 When he grew tired of watching the river he looked 
 off over the land at the vast grassy steppes where 
 there were great herds of cattle, and flocks of 
 sheep tended by their shepherds. 
 
 Sometimes the steamer passed shipyards where 
 new boats were being built, sometimes it stopped 
 at cities or small towns to take on more passengers 
 
36 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 for the fair, and sometimes it swept past clusters 
 of houses like those in his own village, always 
 with a church and one or two tall windmills at the 
 end of the street. 
 
 " Look, little brother," said the peddler, " see 
 how the long arms of the windmills hang idle in 
 this hot stifling air." 
 
 " Yes," replied Boris; " but when the cold 
 winds sweep down from the north in the fall, you 
 should see them work. They fly round and round 
 fast enough to make one dizzy, and it is a fine 
 thing to take the grain and buckwheat to the 
 mills and see it ground up into meal and flour." 
 
 " Russia is a great country for windmills," said 
 the peddler. " It is a pity, with all these long 
 rivers, that there are none swift enough to turn 
 our mill-wheels." 
 
 " That is true, little uncle," said Boris; " but 
 we have the great winds, too." 
 
 When Boris said " little uncle," he did not mean 
 that Mikayla Mikailoff was in any way related to 
 him. It is just a fashion they have in Russia of 
 calling everyone little brother, or uncle, or mother, 
 partly for convenience, and partly because the 
 Russians feel so kindly toward their fellow men. 
 
 " Look again, little brother," the peddler said 
 at last, and he pointed to a distant forest of bare 
 poles that seemed to grow out of the river. " There 
 
37 
 
 are the masts and smoke-stacks of the ships, and 
 just below are the wharves of Nijni Novgorod. 
 We shall soon see the great fair." 
 
 Boris looked where the peddler pointed, and 
 saw the bristling masts of a hundred ships. He 
 caught also the gleam of a shining golden cross on 
 the dome of one of the city churches, and he 
 bowed his head and crossed himself reverently, 
 just as he always did at home. 
 
 Off in a quiet corner of the deck, a group of 
 merchants, Persians and Arabians, were also 
 bowing their heads. It was the time for their 
 sunset prayers, and each knelt upon his little 
 prayer rug, with his face turned toward far-away 
 Mecca. Again and again they bowed their heads 
 to the floor, and as Boris watched them he crossed 
 himself once more, with a prayer of thankfulness 
 in his heart that he was so near the wonderful 
 city which he had longed to see. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE GREAT FAIR 
 
 "Is there any place in Nijni for us to sleep, 
 little uncle? " 
 
 " Yes, little brother. There is no lack of places. 
 We will soon leave the boat and find one. Until 
 we do, keep your eyes open and sleep not." 
 
 Boris stood close beside Mikayla, with his basket 
 of carvings clasped tightly in his hand. There 
 was no need to tell him to keep his eyes open; 
 they looked ready to jump out of his head with 
 wonder. He had never imagined that so many 
 people could crowd themselves into one small 
 corner of the earth. 
 
 This corner where the great Russian fair is 
 held is made by the meeting of two rivers — the 
 Volga and the Oka. There is almost always a 
 city at the meeting-place of two great rivers, but 
 nowhere else in the world is there a city like this 
 one of Nijni Novgorod, where, since 1366, people 
 from all the other corners of the world have come 
 to trade their wares. 
 
 Two or three hundred thousand people come 
 here every year, — by boat, by caravan or by 
 
THE GREAT FAIR 39 
 
 train; and for eight weeks there is such a trading 
 and bartering that more than eighty million 
 dollars worth of goods are bought and sold. 
 
 No wonder that Boris longed to see the fair, 
 but it was lucky that he had come with some one 
 older than himself. As he stood on the deck 
 watching the steamer make its way slowly among 
 the hundreds of other boats in the river, he could 
 not help wondering how in the world he and his 
 friend would ever make their way through the 
 throngs of people on the shore. 
 
 " Keep close to me," said Mikayla, when the 
 boat finally made a landing; and in a moment 
 Boris found himself on the wharf, pushed and 
 jostled this way and that, losing sight of the peddler 
 and then finding him again. 
 
 The wharves were piled high with boxes and 
 barrels and all kinds of merchandise, and men were 
 busy loading and unloading the vessels which 
 lined both banks of the river. There were chests 
 of tea from China, bales of cotton from India and 
 Egypt, wool from Cashmere, boxes of toys from 
 Germany, piles of dried fish from the Caspian 
 Sea, iron and copper from the Ural Mountains, 
 hides and furs from Siberia. 
 
 " We will find a good safe place to sleep while 
 we stay here, and then we will look about and 
 see what we can see," said the peddler, hurrying 
 
40 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 Boris along toward the upper town on the low 
 hill above the river. 
 
 They passed through narrow, dusty streets, and 
 saw such dingy, tumble-down houses, that Boris 
 stopped to gaze at them, amazed that people 
 could live crowded so closely together, without a 
 blade of grass or a bit of garden. 
 
 " This is nothing compared with Moscow," 
 Mikayla told him; " there you will see what a 
 great city really is. But this is a good place to 
 hold the fair, and I know a room where our' 
 things will be safe," he added cheerfully, and 
 stopped at last in front of a big sign on which a 
 red coat and a pair of bright blue trousers were 
 painted in glaring colors. 
 
 " This man is a tailor. I have been here many 
 times before. He will give us a room for little 
 enough," the peddler told Boris; and told him 
 true. 
 
 It was only a tiny room, to be sure; but it was 
 clean and had a good lock on the door, so the two 
 friends left their bundles and hurried back toward 
 the river for a look at the fair. 
 
 Boris walked close to Mikayla, keeping his eye 
 on the pocket which held their money and the 
 key to their room; and as they hurried through 
 the steep zigzag streets he was glad, indeed, 
 that he had not come alone, for the thousands of 
 
THE GREAT FAIR 41 
 
 staring eyes that he met in the streets looked very 
 different from the honest ones at home. 
 
 " We will look for a place near the shops where 
 we can sell our wares," Mikayla suggested, as they 
 reached the long floating bridge which crosses 
 the Oka River, connecting the ancient city with 
 the lower town where the fair is always held. 
 
 This bridge, which rests on boats, is more than 
 two-thirds of a mile long, and for ten months in 
 the year it is almost deserted; but during the 
 eight weeks of the fair it is crowded all the time 
 with droshkies, tram-cars, horses, wagons and 
 foot-passengers. 
 
 Boris stopped for a moment and looked about 
 him, fascinated by all the strange sights and sounds. 
 Suddenly his attention was attracted by two 
 policemen who were stationed at the entrance to 
 the bridge. If they saw a man who was smoking, 
 they would immediately stop him and speak to 
 him. The man would look up in surprise, then 
 take his cigar or cigarette from his lips and throw 
 it into the river, 
 
 " Look, Mikayla," said Boris, pulling the ped- 
 dler's coat. " What are those policemen doing? 
 Is it forbidden to smoke in Nijni? " 
 
 " One can smoke all one wishes in the city," 
 replied the peddler; " but on the bridge or in the 
 fair grounds it is strictly forbidden, and there is 
 
42 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 a heavy fine if one is caught with a lighted cigar 
 on the streets. There is great danger of a fire 
 where there are so many careless people, and a 
 fire would destroy thousands of dollars worth of 
 property in a short time. The firemen and police- 
 men are on the watch every minute lest a fire 
 should get a start." 
 
 " But where do all these people come from? " 
 questioned Boris, after they had crossed the bridge 
 and were wandering about among the shops, 
 restaurants, booths and tents which line the streets 
 of the fair. 
 
 " I have heard that they come from every 
 country under the sun," answered Mikayla Mikail- 
 off. " From the looks of their clothes and faces 
 I think it must be true," he added, pointing to a 
 Turk who was wearing a turban and a pair 'of 
 baggy trousers. " There is a whole street of 
 shops where merchants sell the famous Chinese 
 tea, and a little village of tents where the men 
 from Siberia trade their furs." 
 
 It was long after sunset, but the summer nights 
 in Central Russia are not very dark, and there 
 was still a soft twilight in the sky. The thousands 
 of lamps in the streets and shops made the night 
 seem like day to Boris's country eyes. 
 
 " Stop and listen, little uncle," begged Boris, 
 and held Mikayla still on a street corner. 
 
THE GREAT FAIR 43 
 
 What a babel of tongues, what a riot of sounds 
 greeted their ears! It seemed as if the whole city 
 were doing business at the top of its voice. Mer- 
 chants sitting on the ground in front of their shops 
 were calling out the prices of their wares; boys 
 with trays of sweet drinks were moving in and 
 out among the crowds, begging for buyers; men 
 and women were parading up and down, laughing 
 and talking together in at least forty different 
 languages; jugglers and magicians were per- 
 forming marvellous tricks, and rival bands of 
 music were calling the people to the little theaters 
 and restaurants. 
 
 In front of one of these theaters a troop of 
 trained bears sat up in a grave family circle, and 
 four or five horses walked slowly through the 
 street, their bespangled riders bowing and smiling, 
 while a clown on a donkey kept the crowds roaring 
 with laughter. 
 
 An endless procession of people of all nations 
 pushed and passed by and came again, — pil- 
 grims, priests, nuns, travellers, peasants and 
 nobles, rich and poor, old and young. Some 
 stopped to buy, some to beg, and others to cross 
 themselves before the icons which hung over the 
 door of every shop. 
 
 Boris stood still so long, watching the crowds, 
 that he became confused and almost forgot where 
 
44 
 
 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 he was and what he was doing. He heard Mikayla 
 saying, " Let us see what is in the shops; " and 
 f ound himself looking at all the colors of the rain- 
 bow in silks and rugs and gems and beautiful 
 polished wood. 
 
 From shop to shop, from street to street, he 
 followed his friend the peddler, until at last they 
 went back to the little room in the tailor's shop 
 where there was only a pack of brass bowls and a 
 basket of wooden toys. 
 
 There was a queer feeling in his head and no 
 thought at all in his mind. He fell asleep in a 
 moment to dream of colors and sounds that went 
 whirling round and round without ever stopping. 
 Which were the colors and which the sounds he 
 could not make out, but a voice which sounded 
 like that of Mikayla Mikailoff seemed to be 
 saying, " Come with me to Moscow and you shall 
 see something better than this." 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 FRIENDS FROM HOME 
 
 " We have been at the fair in Nijni five days, 
 little brother," said Mikayla, " and your money is 
 almost all gone, but your basket is full of carvings 
 and my pack of brass bowls still hangs heavy on 
 my back." 
 
 " That is true, little uncle; " and Boris drew a 
 long sigh. " When we first left the boat I thought 
 we should sell all our wares in one day, and that 
 there would be no carvings like mine, no bowls 
 so fine as yours. But we have seen wooden toys 
 and brass bowls in nearly every shop, besides 
 all those the peddlers sell in the streets." 
 
 Boris and his friend were standing on the bridge 
 in the early morning to watch the unloading of 
 the fruit and vegetables which were brought every 
 day on flatboats to supply the little inns and 
 eating-houses. There were great piles of cabbages, 
 boxes of onions and cucumbers, sacks of potatoes 
 and turnips, and whole boat-loads of luscious ripe 
 watermelons. 
 
 These watermelons had attracted Boris's eye 
 from the first, and he looked at them longingly, 
 
46 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 thinking that he could eat a whole one that minute. 
 " Let us go and ask how much they cost, little 
 uncle," he begged; but the peddler shook his 
 head. 
 
 " Before we can buy anything we must first 
 sell what we have and earn some money," he 
 answered, and lifted up his pack, crying, "Fine 
 brass bowls! Who'll buy? Who'll buy? " 
 
 But no one paid the least attention to him, and 
 he took his way slowly across the bridge toward 
 the street corner where he had stood every day to 
 sell his wares. 
 
 Boris lagged behind to watch the people who 
 were beginning to crowd the bridge on their way 
 to the fair. What an interesting procession it 
 was! As he stood there looking at the strange 
 faces and listening to the queer foreign tongues, 
 he forgot that he was hungry, that he had eaten 
 no breakfast and had but four or five kopecks 
 in his pocket. 
 
 An Arab boy, with a red fez on his head and a 
 tray of sweets in his hand, pushed against the 
 basket of carvings, nearly knocking it into the 
 water. As Boris stooped to rescue his treasures, 
 he remembered all at once that he, too, had come 
 to the fair to sell his wares. 
 
 " Krasni, krasni! " he shouted at the top of 
 his voice. " Krasni ! " and he held up his basket 
 
FRIENDS FROM HOME 47 
 
 of toys so that everyone might see how beautiful 
 they were. 
 
 " Who says ' beautiful ' in such a hot, noisy, 
 dusty place? " exclaimed a young girl who was 
 passing. " If the whole fair is like this I am ready 
 to go home this minute." 
 
 " But you have just come," replied the man who 
 was walking by her side. Everyone stays here 
 at least a day. Wait until you see the silks and 
 laces and jewels. Then you will say ' Beautiful, 
 beautiful! ' yourself; " and he gave a great hearty 
 laugh at the look of disgust on the girl's face. 
 
 Boris heard the sound and turned quickly. It 
 reminded him of the laugh he had heard the after- 
 noon Count Pavloff gave him the letter for his 
 father. As he turned he looked straight into the 
 eyes of the count himself, and there beside him 
 were his wife, his sister, and the four nieces and 
 nephews. They had arrived on the boat that 
 very morning, and were as much surprised as 
 Boris at seeing some one from home among so 
 many strangers. 
 
 " And how are you getting on with your trad- 
 ing? " asked the count, after the greetings were 
 over. 
 
 " His basket seems to be just as full as when v/e 
 last saw it," spoke Alexis, without waiting for 
 Boris to answer. 
 
48 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " But have you sold nothing at the fair? " 
 questioned the count again. 
 
 Boris shook his head. " There are many others 
 with beautiful things to sell," he said; " and my 
 carvings — " 
 
 But suddenly his voice faltered and he could not 
 finish the sentence. His knees shook and a great 
 wheel of color and sound began going round and 
 round before his eyes, just as he saw it in his 
 dreams on his first night in Nijni. 
 
 Count Pavloff caught hold of him or he would 
 have fallen to the ground, and Alexis took the 
 heavy basket from his hand. 
 
 " The lad is faint from hunger," exclaimed the 
 countess. " See how pale he is! " 
 
 " Very well, then, let us feed him," said the 
 count, and he led the way across the bridge and 
 over to the farther side of the street, where a 
 line of eating-booths ran along beside the river. 
 
 Sitting on rough benches in front of the long 
 wooden tables were many laborers and peddlers, 
 eating cabbage soup, fish, onions and cucumbers. 
 The count found a place for Boris at one of the 
 tables, directly in front of a plate heaped high 
 with thick red slices of watermelon, and after 
 he had paid for all the food the lad could possibly 
 eat, he started off with his family to see the fair. 
 
 He had not gone far before the children, who 
 
FRIENDS FROM HOME 49 
 
 had been whispering together behind his back, 
 gathered close around him. " Uncle Peter," 
 begged Alexis, " let us take Boris with us when we 
 go home on the boat." 
 
 " Yes," chimed in Olga; " he is tired and dis- 
 couraged. I don't believe he has a kopeck in 
 his pockets, and he will never sell his toys." 
 
 " We might buy his toys, too," suggested 
 Nicholas, who hadn't a kopeck in his own pockets. 
 
 The count held up his hands in dismay. " You 
 must think that I am made of gold," he said. 
 " You will ask me next to buy one of the shops." 
 
 Pretty Olga seized her uncle's hand and kissed 
 it. " Yes, little uncle," she pleaded; " please be 
 gracious enough to let him go." 
 
 Count Pavloff shook his head. " No, no! " 
 he said decidedly. " We must not spoil the boy. 
 He is only a peasant and must learn to take care 
 of himself. Come now and I will show you the 
 toy-shops. The day will be all too short, and 
 we must be ready to take the boat home again 
 to-night. Your aunt would never consent to 
 spend the night in one of these hotels." 
 
 But after all Boris went home with them on the 
 boat that very night, and his pockets were well 
 filled with kopecks, and roubles too; but his 
 basket was not empty, and he had not sold one of 
 his precious toys. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE FIRE AT THE FAIR 
 
 After Boris had eaten his breakfast and done 
 full justice to the watermelon, he took up his 
 basket and wandered along beside the river, past 
 the wharves and warehouses, and on beyond the 
 little village of huts where the Tartars sell the 
 valuable furs and hides which they bring to the 
 fair. 
 
 To tell the truth, the sight of the count and his 
 family had made the boy homesick, and he could 
 not help wishing that he might sell his toys and 
 go home. He longed to take his rake and go to 
 work again in his father's field, and he pushed his 
 bare feet into the short dry grass beside the road, 
 thinking of the fragrant hay under the birch tree 
 where Serge would soon be taking his noonday 
 rest. 
 
 Then, as he walked slowly down the road, his 
 eyes followed a little boat which was steaming up 
 the river against the current. Great sparks from 
 the wood fire in the boiler were pouring out of the 
 
THE FIRE AT THE FAIR S 1 
 
 smoke-stack, and a light breeze was blowing them 
 toward the river-bank. 
 
 " If one of those sparks should fly into this dry 
 grass," Boris said to himself, " it would surely 
 set it on fire." 
 
 Even as he spoke the words, a great red spark 
 came whirling over his head and dropped into an 
 open field. It smouldered for a moment; then 
 tiny tongues of flame darted out into the grass, 
 and, before Boris could reach it to put it out, 
 the fire which everyone dreaded was blazing and 
 crackling merrily. 
 
 " Fire, fire! " he shouted at the top of his voice, 
 and dashed down the road, looking this way and 
 that for a stick to beat out the blaze. But there 
 was not a stick to be found, and he glanced down 
 at his bare feet, wishing that he had on his heavy 
 winter boots, — they would make short work of 
 tramping out the tiny flames. 
 
 Every moment the ring of fire was growing 
 wider, the flames were licking their way nearer 
 the fair grounds and the shops filled with valuable 
 goods. 
 
 " Fire! " Boris cried again. " Will no one come? 
 Fire! " 
 
 He took off his cap and beat down the burning 
 grass, looking wildly in every direction for help. 
 Then, as the flames raced faster and faster across 
 
52 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 the field, he threw down his basket, seized a carved 
 box and a big wooden bowl and began pounding 
 out the flames. 
 
 It seemed a long time before any one came to 
 help him, and the fire grew and spread and ate 
 its way across the grass faster than he could put 
 it out. But it was really only two or three minutes 
 before a crowd of men and boys were working with 
 him. Policemen came running up, the firemen 
 brought out their buckets and hose; and in less 
 than ten minutes the fire had been put out and not 
 one of the tiny wooden shops of the fair was even 
 scorched. 
 
 Then everyone began asking, " How did it 
 start? Who gave the alarm? " and Boris was 
 pushed forward to tell his story, a blackened box 
 in one hand, a half-burned bowl in the other. 
 
 " It was a spark from the boat," he explained. 
 " It set fire to the grass and I had nothing but 
 this to beat it out," and he held up the box and 
 the bowl. Then for the first time he remembered 
 his precious toys, and he dashed across the field 
 to the place where the fire had started. 
 
 The crowd followed to see what was the matter, 
 and found Boris sitting on the ground, soberly 
 gathering up a few pieces of charred wood and 
 putting them in a half-burned basket. 
 
 "They are my carvings," he said, when they 
 
Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
 
 A Busy Street of the Great Fair 
 This fair has been held annually for over five hundred years. Page 53 
 
THE FIRE AT THE FAIR 53 
 
 asked him what he was doing. " I came on the 
 boat from Kostroma to sell them at the fair. 
 Now they are all burned, and I have no money 
 to go home." 
 
 " But you have saved the fair from a great fire," 
 said one of the firemen, and he stepped forward 
 and tossed a few kopecks into the charred bowl. 
 
 " That he did," said a merchant whose shop 
 was near by; and he took two roubles from his 
 pocket and gave them to Boris. " Help the lad," 
 he cried, turning to the crowd; and in a moment 
 a shower of coins was pouring into the bowl. 
 
 Boris looked on, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, 
 too amazed to speak; and long after the crowd 
 had disappeared he sat still in the blackened field, 
 counting his money and gazing over the fire-swept 
 grass which had brought him such good fortune. 
 
 It was the middle of the afternoon before he 
 found his friend Mikayla to bid him good-bye 
 and tell him about the fire. He walked first 
 through all the busy streets of the fair, looking 
 in the shop windows and spending a few of his 
 precious coins. 
 
 He bought an icon for Ivan's new izba; that 
 took one of his roubles. Then he selected a bright 
 colored handkerchief for his mother and a cap for 
 Serge; that took another rouble. 
 
 For bis father he bought an umbrella, and 
 
54 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 although he paid only one rouble for that, too, 
 the umbrella lasted just as long as if it had cost 
 more, for the good man never used it. 
 
 "Why should I?" he would ask. "I have 
 been in the habit of going out in the rain all my 
 life, and it has done me no harm." 
 
 But he was always very proud of his son's gift, 
 and often brought it out to show the other peasants 
 how to use it, for no one in the village had ever 
 owned an umbrella, and it was a great curiosity, 
 He built a shelf for it, too; and beside the precious 
 umbrella he set the basket of charred wood where 
 all his friends could see it, for the starosta never 
 grew tired of telling the story of the fire at the 
 great fair. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 ivan's wedding 
 
 Summer was over. The crops had all been har- 
 vested) the patient oxen had drawn the last 
 heavily-loaded wagon to the barns, and the fields 
 were bare. 
 
 It had been a good harvest, too, and that meant 
 great rejoicing; for a good harvest means food 
 enough for the long winter, while a scanty one 
 brings hunger and starvation to the poor people. 
 
 Now it was time for the harvest festival, and 
 all over the country there was the lively bustle of 
 preparation for the great feast which comes on 
 the first day of October. 
 
 But in the village where Boris lived there was 
 more excitement than usual, for that same day 
 had been set for Ivan's wedding; and there was 
 the new izba to be decorated and blessed, the 
 bride to be dressed, and everything to be made 
 ready for the wedding ceremony, besides all the 
 cooking for the great harvest dinner. 
 
 Meat-pies were baking in the ovens, fish soup 
 was simmering on top of the stoves, jars of 
 pickled cucumbers and tall glasses of golden honey 
 
56 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 had been brought from the storerooms and, most 
 important of all, before every icon there burned 
 a candle in gratitude for so many blessings. 
 
 While all this was going on inside the houses, 
 the men were busy out-of-doors, thatching the 
 roofs with fresh straw, filling the chinks between 
 the logs with pitch-soaked moss, banking up the 
 walls with mud and dry leaves, putting on the 
 double windows and sealing up all the tiny cracks. 
 
 Everything must be made tight, for the winters 
 in Russia are terribly cold, and not even a whiff 
 of the frosty air is allowed to creep into the izba, 
 where there is only a little wood fire in one stove 
 to keep the family from freezing. 
 
 Boris and Serge had been busy all day long with 
 this outdoor work, and now they were in the 
 barn, making a good winter bed for the horse and 
 cows. This barn bed is made in the fall and un- 
 made in the spring, on St. Stephen's Day, when 
 the cows are driven out into the fields; but all 
 winter long the bed is left just as it is, with nothing 
 but a little straw added to it day by day. 
 
 Boris had been up in the loft of the barn tossing 
 down some hay, and after climbing down the 
 rough ladder he went to the door to look out at 
 the sunset. 
 
 " It will be a good day for Ivan's wedding," he 
 said, looking up into the cloudless sky. 
 
ivan's wedding 57 
 
 "And for the harvest festival, too," added 
 Serge, who cared more about the feasting and 
 dancing. " It is lucky that the grain is all threshed 
 and the wood packed away in the shed. Matushka 
 said only this morning that if all the work were 
 not done before night there would be no feast 
 day to-morrow." 
 
 " Women have long hair and short minds," said 
 the starosta, leading the horse into the stall. 
 " The feast day comes even if we are not ready 
 for it." 
 
 " And Ivan will be married, even if the house 
 is not decorated," said Boris, whose mind was on 
 the wedding. 
 
 " But it will be decorated, all in good time," he 
 added, after a moment. " Everything is always 
 done when it must be; and Grushia's friends have 
 been busy since daylight." 
 
 " You may go and help them, now that the work 
 is finished," the starosta told him, and Boris 
 hurried off down the road to the new izba. 
 
 But all the young girls had gone to Grushia's 
 home to plan for the wedding procession, and 
 the little house was empty. Boris opened the 
 door and walked in. It was beautifully decorated. 
 Masses of golden-brown ferns, oak boughs with 
 their scarlet leaves, and branches of alder with 
 their clustering red berries filled the room, almost 
 
58 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 hiding the whitewashed walls, and giving a gay 
 and festive air to the house. 
 
 Everything was ready, from the icon of St. 
 Nicholas on the wall to the shining brass samovar 
 on the table. Boris went out again into the street, 
 closing the door carefully behind him and stopping 
 to look once more at the window balconies before 
 he hurried home to his supper. 
 
 The next morning dawned clear and bright. 
 The whole village was up with the sun, and eight 
 o'clock found them on their way to early service, — 
 men, women and children dressed in their festival 
 clothes. 
 
 After the short service, Ivan's friends followed 
 him to the new izba to be sure that everything 
 was ready for the priest's blessing; Grushia's 
 friends went to help dress the pretty bride, and 
 soon the long wedding procession was walking 
 through the village street toward the church. 
 
 Ivan, who led the line of men, looked very 
 handsome in his long, glossy blue coat, with black 
 velvet trousers tucked into high leather boots; 
 and no one could have been prettier than Grushia. 
 
 She wore a blue homespun skirt with a black 
 velvet bodice, both of which she had embroidered 
 in a very elaborate pattern of red and blue stitches. 
 Her yoke and sleeves were white linen trimmed with 
 hand-made lace and tied with red ribbons. 
 
ivan's wedding 59 
 
 Her flaxen hair was braided and piled high on 
 her head, and it was covered with a red silk scarf 
 which was knotted under her chin. On her feet 
 she wore a beautiful pair of gold-embroidered 
 Torjok slippers which Ivan had given her, and 
 she held up her short skirt daintily so that 
 everyone might see them. 
 
 " Grushia is a good girl," said one of the old 
 women at the foot of the long procession. 
 
 " That she is," replied another. " She can spin 
 and weave with the best of them, and she is a 
 good cook." 
 
 " She can milk the cows and work in thejields 
 as well as her mother," added a third; " and she 
 is handy with her needle, too." 
 
 " It is well known that Grushia Alexandrovna 
 was born when the sun shone," said the first 
 woman as they entered the church. " She brings 
 three sheep and a cow for her dowry, and Ivan 
 is lucky to have her for his wife." 
 
 Then a hush fell over them all, and everyone 
 leaned forward to watch the bride and bridegroom 
 as they walked toward the altar to meet the priest. 
 
 A square of red silk, which had been given by 
 the Countess Pavloff, lay on the floor in front of 
 the altar, and when they saw that Ivan was the 
 first to set foot upon it, all the old women nodded 
 their heads and smiled. 
 
60 BOEIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " That is as it should be," they whispered to 
 each other. " The man should be the master and 
 rule the wife." 
 
 Then followed the long marriage ceremony, and 
 everyone remained standing because it is the 
 custom to stand during all the services in the 
 Russian church. After it was over, the whole 
 company marched down to the new izba, Ivan 
 and Grushia wearing the crowns wreathed with 
 flowers which the priest had placed on their 
 heads during the service. 
 
 This time the procession was headed by the 
 priest, who walked slowly, with sedate step, carry- 
 ing a brown staff studded at the handle with silver 
 knobs. His long black hair and beard fell in soft 
 ringlets over his shoulders, and he wore a tall 
 felt hat and a brown gown which hung in loose 
 folds from his shoulders to his feet. 
 
 Every building in Russia — dwelling-house, 
 workshop, sawmill, windmill or whatever it may 
 be — is blessed by the priest when it is finished. 
 Every room of the house, every portion of the 
 factory, is visited, and a special litany is chanted, 
 a special blessing is invoked for each. 
 
 In the cities this service is often followed by a 
 ball or party. If it is a new factory, the work- 
 rooms are decorated with flags and banners, and a 
 feast is provided for the workmen and their families. 
 
ivan's wedding 6i 
 
 In the country the blessing is never omitted, 
 even for the poorest izba. And so the priest 
 blessed the two tiny rooms of Ivan's house, while 
 all the villagers stood reverently at the doorway, 
 bowing and crossing themselves, and praying in 
 their hearts that no bad luck would come to pretty 
 Grushia. 
 
 " The knot is tied; it will not come undone 
 for a hundred years," said the starosta's wife, 
 turning away after it was all over. 
 
 " That is true," replied Grushia's mother, who 
 was hurrying home to see that everything was 
 ready for the wedding feast. " The wife is not an 
 old shoe to be cast off at will." 
 
 Just then the bride and bridegroom appeared 
 in the doorway, and in a moment they were sur- 
 rounded and drawn out into the street under a 
 perfect whirlwind of flying hop-blossoms; for 
 hops bring good luck, and surely Ivan and Grushia 
 deserved all the good luck that the hops could 
 bring them. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 THE HARVEST FESTIVAL 
 
 " Now for our own dinner," said Serge, when 
 the priest and all the other guests had gone off 
 to Grushia's home for the wedding feast. " Come 
 on, Boris! " he cried, and ran down the street, 
 waving his cap and shouting out in a singsong 
 voice some of the good things which they were 
 sure to have for their harvest dinner. 
 
 The starosta had invited some of his friends to 
 dine with him that day, and it did not take them 
 long to find seats at the table and help themselves 
 generously to the bountiful feast which the good 
 wife set before them. 
 
 When it seemed as if not another mouthful could 
 possibly be eaten, the guests pushed back their 
 chairs with a great clatter, and rose from the 
 table. 
 
 " Thanks," they said, bowing to the starosta; 
 " thanks for the bread and salt." 
 
 Boris wondered why they never gave thanks 
 for any of the other good things; there were cer- 
 tainly plenty on the table. But they always said 
 
THE HARVEST FESTIVAL 63 
 
 the same thing in just the same way. They had 
 said it the year before, and the year before that, 
 as far back as he could remember. 
 
 And when the guests thanked the starosta for 
 the bread and salt, he replied, just as he had 
 always done, " Sit down! Sit down and eat, that 
 the hens may brood and the bees multiply." 
 
 Then they all sat down at the table again and 
 the good wife brought out more bread and cheese, 
 more meat-pies and buckwheat pudding, and surely 
 this time they ate enough to satisfy even the 
 hungriest. 
 
 When Boris was a little lad he ran out to the 
 barn one day to see if it really made any difference 
 with the hens, and sure enough, there were two 
 eggs in one nest where, before dinner, there was 
 only one ! 
 
 But to-day he and his brother sat quietly at the 
 foot of the table, listening to the talk about the 
 crops, and the harvest, and the chances of having 
 work in the factory all winter. 
 
 At last some one asked to hear the story of 
 Boris's trip to the great fair, and the starosta told 
 it all, from beginning to end, not omitting the 
 fire, you may be sure; and he brought out the 
 basket of charred wood and the cotton umbrella, 
 exhibiting them proudly to his friends. 
 
 " Boris is a good boy," he said, after the um- 
 
64 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 brella had been passed around the table and ad- 
 mired by everyone. " Boris is a good boy," he 
 repeated, " and when he travels abroad he brings 
 home a pocket full of coins and a head full of 
 wisdom. He wants to go to Moscow now, and I 
 have given my permission." 
 
 The men looked at Boris in amazement to think 
 that he should want to go so far from home; 
 and they shook their heads sadly as if they thought 
 no good would come of such a journey. But the 
 starosta had said the word, — there was no use 
 to question it. 
 
 Just then the sound of singing was heard in the 
 street, and everyone rose from the table to see 
 what it meant. The young people of the village 
 were starting out to walk to the count's house for 
 the festival and supper, and they were singing a 
 slow wailing harvest song as they marched along. 
 
 Delka Ivanovna, a pretty girl with blue eyes, 
 rosy cheeks and two long braids of yellow hair, 
 walked in front, wearing on her head a wreath 
 made of wheat, rye, oats and barley woven to- 
 gether. All the other girls carried similar wreaths, 
 which they swung back and forth, keeping time 
 to the music. 
 
 Boris and Serge ran out to join them, and from 
 all the houses came other boys and girls. Before 
 they reached Count Pavloff's house they were 
 
THE HARVEST FESTIVAL 65 
 
 joined by the young people who worked on the 
 great estate, and then there was a jolly company 
 marching across the fields. 
 
 On the lawn in front of the house they stopped, 
 and the girls stepped forward, singing a song 
 which called the countess to the door. 
 
 Delka knelt at her feet and kissed her hand. 
 Then she raised her coronet of grain and placed 
 it proudly upon the head of the lady of the house. 
 
 " We bring you good luck, Barishna," she said. 
 " The grain ripened in the field, and there is a 
 bountiful harvest." 
 
 " It has been a good summer," replied the 
 countess. " The sun and rain have done their 
 work well." 
 
 "Praise, praise!" rang out the voices of the 
 singers in their harvest song: — 
 
 "The sun shone, 
 Rain fell on the rich, black earth, 
 The seeds awoke and sprang up to meet the light! 
 Soft winds swept over the green fields, 
 Scarlet poppies nodded in the breeze, 
 And the grain ripened in the long hot days." 
 
 Higher and higher rose the voices, the singers 
 swaying to and fro, stamping their feet and 
 swinging their wreaths to the rhythm of the 
 music. 
 
 Slowly they moved across the grass, dancing 
 
66 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 and singing, until they reached the corner of the 
 great house where a year-old wreath, now brown 
 and weather-beaten, hung on a wooden peg against 
 the wall. One of the men reached up and took it 
 down, and the wreath which Delka had carried 
 was hung in its place. 
 
 " Good luck, good luck to the house! " cried the 
 girls. 
 
 " Good luck, good luck to the house! " echoed the 
 young men; and then, singing and shouting, 
 they ran down to the yard where supper was set 
 out for them on long tables. 
 
 Boris wondered if there could ever be such 
 another glad festival day, and for a moment he 
 almost wished that he had not begged to go to 
 Moscow. What good times they all had together 
 in the country! Could there be anything in the 
 city like this? The sky was so blue, the sun 
 shone with such a golden light, and the bright 
 dresses of the girls and the gay blouses of the 
 men made such a scene of joy and color that his 
 heart swelled with happiness. 
 
 The sun was just setting as they rose from the 
 tables and pushed them back to make room for the 
 dancing. The western sky was tinged with pink, 
 and the little windows in all the houses were 
 gleaming with gold. 
 
 Then came the best part of the whole day — 
 
THE HARVEST FESTIVAL 67 
 
 the dance of the khorovod — which Ivan and 
 Grushia led at one end of the long line, while 
 Stefan and Delka danced at the other. 
 
 The khorovod is a kind of circling dance which 
 is famous all over Russia. One khorovod repre- 
 sents the reaping and harvesting of the grain, and 
 there are others which represent different occupa- 
 tions. 
 
 It was the harvest khorovod which the young 
 people were dancing now. Ivan took off his long 
 coat, showing his crimson shirt belted with a 
 narrow silver band around his waist, and Grushia 
 could not help thinking that he looked handsomer 
 than any one else in the whole village. 
 
 In the eastern sky the yellow harvest moon 
 rose slowly, slowly, over the tops of the dark 
 pines and looked down upon the dancers. Round 
 and round they circled, back and forth moved the 
 line, until at last they joined in an all-hands- 
 round, their voices ringing' with fun, their laughter 
 echoing across the fields in the still evening air. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 ON THE WAY TO MOSCOW 
 
 It was the day after Ivan's wedding and the 
 village had settled down to its usual dull gray 
 life. In the street there were no more gay cos- 
 tumes and dancing feet. Slow footsteps dragged 
 off to the factory, and workaday clothes looked 
 worn and ragged in the cold morning light. 
 
 " After the feast comes the fasting," said the 
 starosta's wife, putting her best dishes away in 
 the cupboard. 
 
 " And after the harvest comes the stubble-field 
 and the taxes," complained her husband, who 
 was toiling over his accounts. 
 
 Boris stood in the middle of the room, looking 
 from one to the other. He wore his cap and his 
 long blue coat, and over his shoulder he carried 
 a warm sheepskin coat and a bundle of clothing 
 tied up in an old blue handkerchief. In his pockets 
 were a loaf of black bread and some buckwheat 
 cakes, and sewed inside his blouse were four of the 
 precious roubles which he had received at the 
 fair. 
 
 He was starting out to walk to Kostroma again, 
 
Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
 
 A Russian Troika 
 Notice the douga over the middle horse. Page 69 
 
ON THE WAY TO MOSCOW 69 
 
 but this time he would take the train instead of 
 the boat, and go to Moscow, where he expected 
 his friend, Mikayla Mikailoff, to meet him at the 
 station. 
 
 " If only there were a basket of carvings for you 
 to sell, it would not seem so hard," said his 
 mother. " But to go to a great city like Moscow 
 with nothing to fall back upon, and perhaps no 
 money to pay for food and a place to sleep, — 
 it is bad, very bad; " and she wiped the tears 
 from her eyes with the corner of her apron. 
 
 " Boris need not go at all," the starosta grum- 
 bled. " Here is plenty of food and a good bed for 
 him at home. It would please me better if he 
 would stay here and go to school; but it seems 
 he has no wish to please me." 
 
 Boris was tender-hearted. He was troubled at 
 his father's words and might have heeded them, 
 might have remained at home and walked every 
 day to the large town, four miles away, to study 
 in the school as he had done the previous winter; 
 but at that moment a troika dashed up to the 
 door, and all the family ran out to see who had 
 arrived. 
 
 It was Count Pavloff and his wife, on their way 
 to the railroad station in Kostroma. They were 
 going to their winter home in St. Petersburg now 
 that the harvest was over, and had stopped to 
 
70 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 give the starosta some directions about the work 
 in the village. 
 
 " Is Boris going away, too? " they asked, and 
 when they found that he was going to Kostroma 
 they offered to take him with them in the troika. 
 
 " Good-bye," he said cheerfully; " I will come 
 back when the ice breaks up in the rivers. I shall 
 no doubt find plenty of work in Moscow in a day 
 or two," and he sprang into the carriage, tossed 
 his sheepskin coat on the floor and curled himself 
 up at the count's feet. 
 
 The tears which were rolling down his mother's 
 cheeks, and the sad look in his father's eyes as he 
 saw his son going away from home so happily, 
 brought a cloud to the boy's face; but Serge, who 
 Was lounging comfortably in the doorway, called 
 out, " I am well content to stay at home. No 
 doubt I shall find plenty of work in a day or two 
 myself," and he laughed so loudly at his poor 
 joke that everyone laughed with him, and Boris 
 went off with a smile after all. 
 
 The three horses dashed at full speed through 
 the village street, the big bell clanging and the 
 little bells bursting into wild laughter as the car- 
 riage rattled over the rough road. 
 
 There was a chill in the air, and the stubble 
 fields were already stiff with frost. Great shocks 
 of grain stood in soldierly rows across the bare 
 
ON THE WAY TO MOSCOW 7 1 
 
 fields, and little gusts of wind whirled the leaves 
 from the trees and scattered them beside the 
 road. 
 
 As they passed the great highway which runs 
 for hundreds of miles across Russia in Europe and 
 Russia in Asia, they saw a procession of prisoners 
 making their way slowly along the road toward 
 exile in Siberia. 
 
 Boris watched them until they were out of 
 sight, thinking how different was his own journey. 
 They were going to the coldest, dreariest, most 
 barren part of the country, and might never see 
 their homes and friends again. He was going to 
 the great city to seek his fortune. He was young 
 and free, with a pair of strong, skillful hands and 
 a brave, eager heart. 
 
 " Why are you going to Moscow? " asked the 
 count, who had been watching the boy's interest 
 in all the new sights. 
 
 " I am going to Moscow, Bareen, because it is 
 a great city, and because I want to see the world." 
 
 Count Pavloff smiled. " Moscow is a good 
 place for you to begin," he replied. " It is a 
 wonderful city." 
 
 Boris looked up into his face earnestly. " I 
 have always wondered why the people of Moscow 
 set their city on fire when Napoleon Bonaparte 
 led his French army against it in 1812," he said. 
 
72 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " They tried to destroy the buildings so that 
 the French soldiers would find nothing but a mass 
 of smoking ruins instead of a beautiful city," 
 answered the count. " There had been a terrible 
 battle between the French and Russian armies, 
 only seventy miles from Moscow, and the French 
 had been victorious. 
 
 " Napoleon then led his troops toward Moscow, 
 and as they stood on the low hill overlooking its 
 shining domes and spires, he turned to them and 
 said, ' The city is yours! ' They took up the cry, 
 ' On to Moscow! ' as they rushed across the plain 
 to the very walls of the Kremlin; but when they 
 entered the city they found that the inhabitants, 
 three hundred thousand men, women and chil- 
 dren, had gone away, taking with them all the 
 choicest treasures of the palaces and cathedrals. 
 
 " Rather than be conquered by the French, 
 our good Russians had determined to flee from 
 the city; and they set it on fire in many places 
 and left it burning, so that the flames destroyed 
 the provisions as well as the buildings, and the 
 French soldiers found neither food nor shelter. 
 
 " But King Winter entered the field, with heavy 
 snows and piercing winds, and aided our Czar, 
 Alexander I, in driving the French out of Russia. 
 By the middle of October Napoleon was obliged to 
 lead his troops Jback to France, and never was 
 
ON THE WAY TO MOSCOW 73 
 
 there such a disastrous retreat known in history. 
 The men had little food and no warm clothing, 
 and more than two hundred thousand were killed, 
 or died of cold, hunger and disease, on that terrible 
 march from Moscow to Paris." 
 
 " But Moscow is a great city now, is it not? " 
 questioned Boris. 
 
 " Yes," replied the count. " The fires burned 
 themselves out, as fires will, and left many a fine 
 church and palace still standing. At first it 
 seemed as if the city were ruined, but it rose from 
 its ashes more beautiful than ever. Then, when 
 the railroads were built, Moscow became the most 
 important business center of all Russia. 
 
 " It has now more than a million inhabitants, 
 with great cotton mills and countless other in- 
 dustries. There is little to show how terribly the 
 city has suffered from fires and the invasion of 
 the French army." 
 
 Boris drew a long breath as the count finished 
 his story. They were rolling through the streets 
 of Kostroma, and he asked timidly if it looked at 
 all like Moscow. 
 
 The countess laughed gently. " No other city 
 in the whole world looks like Moscow," she said. 
 " But there is our capital, St. Petersburg. You 
 should see that city, too." 
 
 Boris kissed her hand. " You have been very 
 
74 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 gracious to me, Barishna; and you, too, Bareen," 
 he said. " I should like to go to Petersburg some 
 day, but I must wait until I have earned some 
 money before I travel farther." 
 
 Then the troika whirled up to the railroad 
 station. The count showed the boy where to find 
 the third-class coach of the train, and in a little 
 while Boris was on his way to " Holy Mother 
 Moscow," one of the ancient capitals of Russia. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 Boris's lucky day 
 
 Boris was only a young peasant boy who knew 
 nothing about the ways of a great crowded city 
 like Moscow. When he found no friendly Mikayla 
 at the station to meet him, it was not strange that 
 he became confused and did not know what to 
 do. 
 
 He stood on the platform for an hour, pushed 
 and jostled by busy porters and throngs of hurrying 
 travellers, until, at last, he grew tired of waiting. 
 Besides, it was late afternoon and he was hungry, 
 so he decided to ask some one to tell him the way 
 to Mikayla's lodgings. 
 
 A line of droshkies was drawn up in front of the 
 station, and Boris spoke to one of the drivers, — 
 a round-faced izvostchik who wore a low-crowned 
 hat, a long, full-skirted coat and a pair of high 
 boots. 
 
 The man looked at the piece of paper on which 
 Mikayla's name and address were written, but 
 he shook his head. " I cannot read," he said. 
 " There is not an izvostchik in the whole city who 
 
76 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 can read or write. We work all day and most of 
 the night, and we have no time for study." 
 
 Then Boris told him Mikayla's name and the 
 quarter of the city where he lived, as it was written 
 on the paper. 
 
 "It is not far from the Kremlin, and I am on 
 my way now to the Red Square. Jump up, and 
 I will take you with me," said the driver, and he 
 spoke to his horses, urging them into a gallop. 
 
 There was a long drive through narrow streets 
 and wide cobbled avenues before the droshky 
 stopped at last in the beautiful square which is 
 surrounded on one side by the great wall of the 
 Kremlin, on another by a magnificent bazaar, 
 and on a third by the church of St. Basil the 
 Blessed. 
 
 " Here we are," said the driver, pulling up his 
 horses. " Jump down and ask some one else to 
 show you the street where your friend lives." 
 
 But Boris was gazing up at the church and did 
 not hear what the man said. " I did not know 
 that there was such a wonderful building in the 
 world! " he exclaimed. 
 
 The driver laughed. " That is just the way 
 everyone looks at it," he replied. " And it may 
 be, truly, the most wonderful church in the world, 
 for there are four or five hundred churches in 
 Moscow, and not one to compare with this." 
 
BORIS'S LUCKY DAY 77 
 
 The great church is indeed a remarkable build- 
 ing. It is very large, and is absolutely top-heavy 
 with spires and domes and minarets, no two of 
 them alike in color, shape or size. Some are blue, 
 others yellow, green, and silver; and each one is 
 tipped with a golden ball and a glittering golden 
 cross, so that when the sun shines upon them it 
 is like a great rocket bursting against the blue sky. 
 
 " The church was built over four hundred years 
 ago," explained the izvostchik, who was accus- 
 tomed to driving strangers over the city, and had 
 picked up many bits of information for them. 
 " It escaped the great fires, but Napoleon ordered 
 his troops to destroy it before they left the city. 
 Fortunately they did it little harm and when 
 the people returned to Moscow they quickly 
 rebuilt it so that it was as good as new. 
 
 " But jump down, little brother, and find your 
 friend before it grows dark. There are some ped- 
 dlers over there. Among them all you may be 
 able to find out something about Mikayla Mikail- 
 off." 
 
 Boris crossed the Red Square to the Kremlin 
 wall. He had read often of the famous fortress, 
 but his thoughts were so busy with his friend 
 Mikayla that he forgot for the moment that 
 inside the white wall was the ancient city, the 
 Moscow of history, with its splendid palaces, its 
 
78 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 arsenal, and its cathedrals where for centuries 
 the Czars of Russia have been baptized, married 
 and crowned. 
 
 The great wall which encloses the ancient 
 Kremlin has eighteen towers and five gateways, 
 the most important being the Gate of the Re- 
 deemer which opens out of the Red Square. 
 
 Over this gate is a sacred icon, representing the 
 Saviour, which was placed there by the Czar 
 Alexis in 1626. A lamp burns constantly before 
 the icon, which is said to have performed many 
 famous miracles; and no man, even the great 
 Czar himself, may pass through the gate with 
 covered head. 
 
 Boris had heard of this gate, and had often 
 dreamed of passing through it into the famous 
 city beyond; but now he kept his eyes on the 
 peddlers at the tents and booths beside the river. 
 
 Messenger boys brushed past him, heavily- 
 loaded wagons rumbled over the rough cobble- 
 stones in the street, and troikas whirled across the 
 square, the three horses shaking dangling red 
 tassels from their gilded harnesses. But he hur- 
 ried along until, just as he reached the Gate of the 
 Redeemer, something happened which took his 
 mind quickly enough from his own affairs. 
 
 A man, a stranger in Moscow like Boris himself, 
 turned to enter the gate. There were many men 
 
Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
 
 The Great White Wall of the Kremlin 
 
 'It has eighteen towers and five gateways, one of them being the Gate of the 
 
 Redeemer." Page 78 
 
BORIS'S LUCKY DAY 79 
 
 walking through the great stone archway at the 
 same time; but all of the others, whether coming 
 or going, removed their hats as they passed be- 
 neath the sacred icon. The stranger did not seem 
 to know of the custom, or did not intend to follow 
 it, for he kept his head covered and passed in 
 without even looking up. 
 
 At that moment a gust of wind swept through 
 the gateway, another came rushing up from the 
 river to meet it, and between them they whirled 
 off the stranger's hat and rolled it down the dusty 
 street to Boris's feet. 
 
 The lad picked it up and looked about him for 
 the owner. Many others also stopped to look at 
 the hat, and to exclaim over the miracle. " You 
 see," they said to each other, " the icon can do 
 wonderful things! " and they crossed themselves 
 piously, staring angrily at the foreigner who would 
 have passed the sacred picture without removing 
 his hat. 
 
 They even scowled at Boris, who bowed respect- 
 fully when he returned the missing hat; but the 
 stranger smiled at him and pulled a coin from his 
 pocket. 
 
 " A friendly service earns a reward,." he said, 
 and placed the coin in the boy's hand. Then, he 
 disappeared through the gate and left Boris 
 gazing after him in amazement. 
 
80 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " It was a small service and needed no reward," 
 he said, half aloud, and looked up into the face of 
 a burly moujik, who had stared angrily enough 
 at the foreigner, but was now smiling at Boris 
 with a face full of kindliness. 
 
 " This is your lucky day," he said genially. 
 " It is not often worth a rouble to pick up a 
 stranger's hat. But our icon is always working 
 miracles, and it has brought you good luck when 
 perhaps you needed it." 
 
 " I did, indeed," replied Boris, glancing at the 
 coin; " but it was a friend and not money that I 
 wanted just now. I came from Kostroma on the 
 train, and I did not call it a lucky day when I 
 found no one to meet me at the station." 
 
 " Are you a stranger in Moscow? " questioned 
 the moujik. 
 
 " That I am," Boris answered; u but I have a 
 friend here, Mikayla Mikailoff, who promised to 
 meet me. There was no sign of him at the station, 
 nor anywhere else along the road, and now I must 
 try to find him before it is night." 
 
 As he finished speaking, a big black coach, 
 drawn by six black horses harnessed three abreast, 
 rolled through the gate, followed by six priests 
 wearing beautiful embroidered robes. All the 
 people took off their hats and crossed themselves 
 as it passed, and Boris followed their example. 
 
boeis's lucky day 8i 
 
 " It is the icon of Our Most Holy Lady," the 
 moujik explained. "It is being taken to the 
 bedside of some one who is sick. See how for- 
 tunate you are to-day. All things point to a 
 happy future for you. 
 
 " I, myself, know Mikayla Mikailoff and can 
 take you to his room," he continued, after the 
 carriage had passed out of sight. " He lives on 
 my own street. It lies beyond the river. Come, 
 and I will show you the way." 
 
 Without waiting for Boris, to answer, he turned 
 into one of the crowded thoroughfares and hurried 
 across the bridge to the opposite bank of the 
 Moskwa River, where lies the more modern 
 section of the city; and the lad followed him, 
 eager to find his friend before nightfall. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 THE FIRST SNOWFALL 
 
 The moujik led the way to a little street that 
 ran back from the bank of the river, and there, 
 on a cot in a tiny room at the top of a tall, narrow 
 house, lay Mikayla Mikailoff, sick with a fever. 
 
 " Welcome, little brother! Welcome to Mos- 
 cow! " he cried excitedly. His eyes were bright, 
 his cheeks were much too hot for comfort, and he 
 talked on without waiting for Boris to answer. 
 
 He began to tell a long story about building a 
 fire and putting too much wood in the stove, and 
 how it blazed and crackled and threw out a great 
 heat. " But Moscow has many rooms to be kept 
 warm, and the barges that come up the river are 
 piled high with wood. There will always be 
 enough," he said. 
 
 Boris tried to quiet him. " You must He still 
 and get well, so that you can go with me to the 
 Kremlin," he said gently. " Don't forget that 
 you promised to take me to the top of Ivan's 
 bell-tower and show me all the sights of the city." 
 
 " Yes, yes," replied Mikayla, his eyes gleaming, 
 his words tumbling over each other. " We will 
 
THE FIRST SNOWFALL 83 
 
 go up and down the streets together, and you 
 shall see all the towers and palaces and churches, 
 all the hundreds of churches, and all the walls 
 around the different parts of the city, — " but 
 then his thoughts began to wander and he mumbled 
 something about the River Volga and the great 
 fair at Nijni. 
 
 Boris saw that talking was not good for the sick 
 man. " Hush," he said; " you must be quiet 
 now! " and he moved about the room, lighting the 
 candle, heating some water in the samovar, 
 making Mikayla a cup of tea, bathing his face 
 and making him comfortable for the night. 
 
 " Now you must sleep," he said, and sat down 
 beside the bed. In two minutes he was fast 
 asleep himself, tired out by all the excitement of 
 the day. 
 
 In a little while Mikayla fell asleep, too; and 
 while he slept the fever left him, so that when he 
 awoke, before daybreak, he was much better,, 
 although he was still very weak. 
 
 " You should be a doctor, Boris," he said with 
 a laugh. " See how you have cured me in a night." 
 
 Boris laughed, too, and called Mikayla his first 
 patient. "It would make my father happy to 
 see me curing a sick man so easily," he said. " He 
 is always urging me to be a doctor; but I cannot 
 make up my mind for it yet," and he lighted the 
 
84 BOBIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 candle and put some fresh water in the samovar 
 for another cup of tea. 
 
 " It was the sight of you here in Moscow that 
 cured me," Mikayla told him. " I am strong 
 enough this minute to climb to the top of the 
 bell-tower with you." 
 
 " We will be in no hurry to do that," said Boris. 
 " Lie still and talk to me about your great city. 
 What did you mean when you said that there are 
 walls around the different parts of the city? I 
 thought that the Kremlin wall was the only one 
 in Moscow." 
 
 " No," answered Mikayla; " the Kremlin was 
 built first and fortified with a great stone wall, and 
 then another section of the city grew up outside 
 the wall and that also had to be protected, for 
 there were savage Tartars in the country who 
 were always ready to destroy the Russian cities. 
 
 " For hundreds of years each new section that 
 was built had to be fortified; but now the city is 
 spread out over a large territory and there are 
 no outer walls because we have no need of them. 
 
 " The Kremlin contains wonderful cathedrals 
 and palaces which you shall see some day, but 
 no trading is ever carried on within its walls. It 
 is just outside one of the great gates that I have 
 the little stand where I have made my fortune," 
 he added, and he put his hand under his pillow 
 
THE FIRST SNOWFALL 85 
 
 where there was a bag well filled with coins. " I 
 have only a booth now, but some day I shall have 
 a shop and you shall tend it with me." 
 
 Then Boris told the story of his adventure at 
 the Gate of the Redeemer, and Mikayla asked 
 about the starosta and his wife, and the other 
 villagers whom he had met while he was working 
 in the hay-field. 
 
 Before they knew it, the morning light was 
 creeping into the room through the window that 
 looked out over the winding Moskwa River. Boris 
 blew out the candle and went to push back the 
 curtain. " See, Mikayla," he cried, " the snow 
 has come while we were sleeping." 
 
 Mikayla sat up on his cot to look out at the 
 soft feathery flakes. " It is the same weather that 
 drove Napoleon out of Moscow nearly a hundred 
 years ago, and killed his thinly-clad soldiers on 
 their journey back to France," he said. 
 
 " King Winter was as great an enemy as the 
 Russian army," he added, shaking his head; 
 " and that Napoleon knew nothing about our 
 cold weather." 
 
 Mikayla was right. The French Napoleon 
 had never seen such sudden storms, such bitter 
 winds and piercing cold. He did not know that 
 in Russia an October morning may be warm and 
 sunny, with balmy winds blowing up from the 
 
86 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 south; and then, suddenly, without any warning, 
 the cold winds will creep down from the north, 
 driving gray clouds that are rilled with snow. 
 
 First a flake falls lightly here and melts upon the 
 sparkling water; then another clings to the stone 
 pier of the bridge, and soon the air is filled with 
 the fluttering snow stars. They fall upon the 
 walls, the roofs, the spires; and all the gleaming 
 golden domes that sparkled in the summer sun 
 become white-hooded monks. 
 
 The snow wraps itself around the iron rails of 
 the fences, the iron links of the chains. The win- 
 dows hold it tightly against their wooden frames, 
 and the wires above the streets hang heavy with 
 its weight. Trees, shrubs and vines gather it 
 with every leaf and tendril, and hold white masses 
 in their arms. 
 
 Boris stood at the window for a long time, 
 watching the snowflakes which were so softly 
 and silently covering the city roofs, and he fell 
 to thinking of the tiny izbas at home which would 
 soon be almost buried in the drifts. But at last 
 Mikayla recalled his thoughts with a sigh. 
 
 " I always go to the convent and beg the roses 
 when the first snow comes," he said, when Boris 
 turned away from the window. " They would 
 be frozen before night, and the porter is an old 
 friend who is glad to give them to me." 
 
THE FIRST SNOWFALL 87 
 
 " Let me go for you," cried Boris, slipping on 
 his sheepskin coat, and in a moment he was out 
 in the street, making his way through the snow 
 toward the convent gate as Mikayla had directed 
 him. 
 
 He had thought, the day before, that Moscow 
 was a wonderful city, with all its glittering, shining 
 domes; but now, in the fast-falling snow, it 
 seemed transformed. Where, yesterday, all had 
 been color, dust and noise, now everything was 
 white and pure and beautiful. 
 
 Boris passed costly mansions and poor, tumble- 
 down hovels, side by side; but dirty streets and 
 rickety houses were fast disappearing under the 
 white garments of the snow. 
 
 The air was thick with the soft fluffy flakes, 
 and when he reached the convent gate the porter 
 had already cut the flowers and was shaking the 
 snow from their petals. When he heard that his 
 friend was sick with a fever, he selected three roses 
 and wrapped them carefully in paper. 
 
 " Take them to Mikayla," he said to Boris; 
 " the sight of them will make him well." And 
 so they must have done, for in a few days the 
 peddler was able to take his stand once more out- 
 side the Kremlin wall, where, with Boris to help 
 him, he sold more of his brasses than ever before. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 BELLS OF MOSCOW 
 
 It was a clear, cold day in late December. If 
 it had been anywhere else but in Russia, it would 
 have been a January day; but away back in the 
 sixteenth century, when Pope Gregory XIII 
 changed the calendar, Russia refused to accept 
 the change, and is now thirteen days behind the 
 rest of the world. 
 
 So when the New Year comes in the other 
 countries, the children of Russia are just beginning 
 to wonder what their Christmas gifts will be; 
 and when they are celebrating the first day of the 
 year, the other children are going to school, and 
 their holidays are almost forgotten. . 
 
 But now Christmas had come and gone, even 
 in Russia, and everyone was getting ready to 
 welcome the glad New Year. The streets were 
 filled with people, sleighs were dashing across the 
 squares and whisking around the corners, and 
 there was a merry holiday spirit in the air. 
 
 Mikayla had been busy at his booth all day, 
 and Boris had helped him — running on errands, 
 urging customers to look at the beautiful brasses, 
 
Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
 
 Bells of Moscow 
 
 " At the foot of the tall bell-tower stands the enormous bell, Czar Kolokol." 
 
 Page 89 
 
BELLS OF MOSCOW 89 
 
 and even selling them himself when his friend was 
 busy. 
 
 " Come," said Mikayla at last, " let us take 
 our turn at walking up and down the streets to 
 see the sights." 
 
 " When we were in Nijni you promised me that 
 some day we should climb the great bell-tower 
 together and look down upon the domes and 
 spires of Moscow," Boris reminded him. 
 
 " It shall be done within the hour," replied 
 Mikayla, and he hurriedly packed his brasses in 
 a great chest at the back of his booth, locking 
 it and slipping the key into his pocket. 
 
 Then he led the way across the Red Square, 
 through the Gate of the Redeemer, where both 
 man and boy removed their caps and crossed 
 themselves, and then on past famous palaces 
 and cathedrals until they stood at the foot of 
 the great bell-tower, beside the enormous bell, 
 Czar Kolokol. 
 
 This bell, which is the largest in the world, is 
 so old that no one knows all its story. More than 
 a hundred years ago it was recast and was being 
 raised to a position in the cathedral beside the 
 tower, when it fell to the ground and a large piece 
 was broken from its side. It has since been placed 
 on a low platform, but it has never been repaired 
 and it is doubtful if it was ever rung. 
 
90 BOKIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " I have lived in Moscow almost three months 
 and this is the first time I have been inside the 
 Kremlin walls," said Boris, after they had ex- 
 amined the king of bells and were climbing the 
 stone stairs to the top of the tower. 
 
 " That is because we have been so busy selling 
 our wares that we have had no time for sight- 
 seeing," replied Mikayla. 
 
 " It was not so in Nijni," laughed Boris. " There 
 I had too much time for sight-seeing." 
 
 But Mikayla was puffing and panting up the 
 steep steps, and could spare no breath to speak 
 until they stood at the top of the tower, looking 
 out over the wonderful view. 
 
 Below them lay the great city. The glittering 
 snow on all the roofs, domes and towers was 
 tinged with a rosy glow, and the frozen Moskwa 
 River wound in and out like a silver girdle, holding 
 cathedral, palace and humble home in Mother 
 Moscow's arms. 
 
 The two friends stood side by side gazing out 
 over the ancient city. Hundreds of pigeons that 
 lived high up among the bells were just settling 
 down for the night, and their soft cooing, with 
 the gentle swirring of their wings, were the only 
 sounds that broke the silence. 
 
 The pigeons are sacred birds in Russia, and no 
 one would think of killing or injuring them. They 
 
BEIXS OF MOSCOW 91 
 
 are so tame that they fly down to eat from any 
 hand that holds out grain for them, and now, 
 when Boris touched one gently on the head, she 
 turned to look at him without even a flutter of 
 her wings. 
 
 " Listen! " exclaimed Mikayla, " the bells are 
 ringing for the hour of sunset. We shall hear 
 them well up here." 
 
 From all over the city came the pealing notes, 
 filling the air with their music. 
 
 " Moscow seems to be the city of bells," said 
 Boris. " They are ringing all the time, but they 
 sound best up here, away from the noises of 
 the streets." 
 
 "There are thirty-six bells in this one tower," 
 Mikayla told him. " Two of them are made of 
 solid silver, and another is the largest bell in the 
 world that can be rung." 
 
 " Russia seems to have a great many of the 
 largest things in the world," Boris said thought- 
 fully. " I was reading only yesterday that it has 
 the largest wheat-fields, the largest oil-wells, and 
 the largest coal-fields in Europe. Its rivers and 
 lakes are also very large, and it has the longest 
 railway in the world." 
 
 " That is because it is such a large country," 
 Mikayla explained. " Russia covers one-sixth 
 of all the land surface of the earth, and our Czar 
 
92 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 rules over one hundred and sixty millions of 
 people. Eighty millions of them are peasants 
 who depend upon the rye for their bread, and the 
 buckwheat for their porridge. We need great 
 fields and forests to give us food and shelter." 
 
 " Yes," agreed Boris, thinking of the fields at 
 home; " my father often says that if the land 
 were taken away from them, the peasants would 
 soon die." 
 
 Just then a sudden thought came to him and he 
 turned quickly to his friend. " Did your father 
 work in the fields, or was he a brass peddler, like 
 you? " he asked. It was the first time he had ever 
 questioned Mikayla about his father. 
 
 For answer, Mikayla pointed to a large building 
 beside the river, outside the Kremlin walls. " That 
 is the Foundling Hospital," he said. " They take 
 in as many as ten thousand babies there every 
 year. I was left there more than forty years ago, 
 when I was only six days old. 
 
 " It was on St. Michael's Day, so they gave me 
 the name of Mikayla Mikailoff. I never knew 
 anything about my father or my mother. When 
 I was ten years old I was sent to a farm in Tula 
 near the good Count Tolstoi's estate. I worked 
 in the fields in summer, and in winter I went to 
 school, and I also learned to hammer brass. The 
 people were good to me and taught me to be care- 
 
BELLS OF MOSCOW 93 
 
 ful and saving, so that now I have one hundred 
 roubles in the bank." 
 
 Boris held his breath and looked at Mikayla 
 in amazement. " I did not dream that you were 
 such a-rich man," he cried. To his mind Mikayla 
 was a prince with his hundred roubles. He won- 
 dered if he should ever have so much money in all 
 his life, and he shook his head sadly as he thought 
 how many hours it took to earn a rouble in the 
 factory at home. 
 
 " Even if I should learn to be a doctor," he 
 said, " I could never save so much money." 
 
 " You were not born a serf, and a free man can 
 do what he sets out to do," Mikayla told him. 
 
 " My father was born a serf," Boris answered, 
 " and although he is now free, he is still very 
 poor." 
 
 " It was Boris Godunoff, the Czar who built this 
 tower, who established serfdom," said Mikayla. 
 " The peasants had always been free to work on 
 one estate or another, as they chose; but about 
 1590 he made a law that they should remain with 
 the land as a part of the estate of the landowner, 
 and could be sold with it. It was a cruel law and 
 brought much sorrow and suffering upon the poor 
 peasants." 
 
 " I have heard my father say that the happiest 
 day he ever knew was that February day in 1861 
 
94 BORIS JN RUSSIA 
 
 when Czar Alexander II freed the serfs," Boris 
 interrupted. " Count Pavloff's father was a 
 good man and a kind master, but it is better to 
 be free even if one is poor." 
 
 " Alexander II freed twenty-two million serfs," 
 said Mikayla, " and then the government bought 
 land from the landowners and allowed the peasants 
 to use it; but few of them have been able to buy 
 it, and they are still paying heavy taxes every 
 year. 
 
 " But freeing the serfs and giving them each a 
 little land was not enough to do for them. They 
 should have a chance to learn better ways of 
 living than they know now. They should be 
 trained in ways of government and taught that 
 it is better to rule with honesty than with dis- 
 honesty. 
 
 " There are many cruel laws in our country, 
 and some of them can be evaded if one has the 
 money to bribe the officers. That is all wrong. 
 Men who work for the government should be 
 honest men, and the peasants should be allowed 
 to help choose good men to govern them. 
 
 " Our great Czar is deceived by his officers, and 
 the officers, in their turn, are often deceived. 
 Everything is wrong now, but by studying and 
 working among the poor people, you might be 
 able to help make things nearer right. 
 
BELLS OF MOSCOW 95 
 
 " But come," he added, " we must be going 
 back to our lodging. There is the moon rising 
 over the city. Take one more look at Holy 
 Mother Moscow." 
 
 Boris looked down over the white walls and 
 the towers flooded with moonlight, and said 
 under his breath, " Krasni, krasni! It is indeed 
 beautiful. Now that I have seen it, I cannot help 
 wishing to see St. Petersburg and our Little 
 Father, the Czar." 
 
 " And so you shall," Mikayla told him, leading 
 the way slowly down the winding stairs. " We 
 will go next week and take a little stand near the 
 Nevski Prospekt. There are many rich people in 
 our great capital and they buy with a lavish 
 hand." 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 PETER THE GREAT 
 
 Six days later Boris and Mikayla stood on the 
 platform at the railroad station, waiting for the 
 train which would take them to St. Petersburg. 
 
 They had bought their tickets for the third- 
 class car; their brasses had been packed in a big 
 box and sent ahead, and all they had to carry was 
 a small bundle of clothing and a bag of food to 
 last during the journey, which is about four 
 hundred miles and takes eighteen hours. 
 
 Their passports, telling their full name, age, 
 religion, and business, where they were going 
 and what they were going to do, were tucked 
 safely away in their pockets, and they were all 
 ready for their journey. 
 
 These passports are very important. No one 
 can travel from one town to another, anywhere in 
 all Russia, without first obtaining a passport, 
 which he must carry with him and be ready to 
 show at any moment. If he should be caught 
 without it, he might be arrested and fined or 
 imprisoned. 
 
 A child cannot go from the country to the city 
 
PETES THE GREAT 97 
 
 schools; a laborer cannot leave his village to work 
 in the factory of another town; a peddler, a mer- 
 chant, a pilgrim or a tourist cannot travel over 
 the highways, rivers or railroads without a passport 
 in his pocket; and wherever he goes, the police 
 will surely ask to see it. 
 
 " Now we are off to see the world," said Boris, 
 as he took his seat in the car, and crossed himself 
 to be sure that no accident would happen while 
 he was in the train. 
 
 " Keep your eyes open to see the people," 
 Mikayla advised him. " They are always the 
 most interesting part of the world." 
 
 But there was no need to tell Boris to keep his 
 eyes open. He was no longer the shy country 
 lad who had set off for Nijni in the summer. The 
 active city life, with its many changing scenes, 
 had sharpened his wits and brightened his eyes, 
 and he looked about him with eager interest. 
 
 The moment they left the outskirts of the city 
 they were in the open country, and Boris was 
 gazing out over broad, snow-covered fields which 
 reminded him of home. 
 
 It was like all the rest of the country in Rus- 
 sia, — long reaches of cheerless, deserted plains, 
 dotted here and there with forests of fir and birch. 
 Every few miles there were great stacks of peat 
 and enormous woodpiles beside the track. 
 
98 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 The train whizzed along past little villages 
 where the low izbas were almost buried in snow- 
 drifts; and at each station soldiers in full uniform, 
 with clanking swords and spurs, walked up and 
 down the long wooden platform. 
 
 "How fast we go! " exclaimed Boris, as they 
 flew across an icy swamp that looked like a great 
 frozen lake. 
 
 " That is because it is such a straight road," 
 replied Mikayla. " There is hardly a twist or a 
 turn in the whole distance between Moscow and 
 Petersburg." 
 
 " How is that? " questioned Boris, who was 
 counting the flying telegraph poles. 
 
 " When the government began to make plans 
 for building the road between the two cities, there 
 was much discussion as to where it should run," 
 Mikayla explained. " At last the question was 
 laid before the Czar, Nicholas I, and he settled 
 it in a minute. ' Build it so,' he said, and taking 
 up a ruler he drew a perfectly straight line across 
 the map." 
 
 " Our Czars are all wonderful men," said Boris, 
 who, like most of the Russian peasants, wor- 
 shipped the Czar but hated his officers. 
 
 " And the most wonderful of them all was 
 Peter, — the giant, the wonder-worker," replied 
 Mikayla. " There was Vladimir, who brought 
 
PETER THE GREAT 99 
 
 Christianity from Greece into Russia in the 
 tenth century; Ivan the Great, who united the 
 different tribes into one nation; and Ivan the 
 Terrible, who first took the title of Czar. But it 
 was Peter who saw what a great nation Russia 
 might become, and gave it a start in the right 
 direction." 
 
 " When I went to school we read many stories 
 about Peter the Great," Boris interrupted. 
 
 " Do you remember the little island in the 
 Moskwa River where Peter built a fortress and 
 drilled his troops when he was only a boy? " 
 questioned Mikayla. 
 
 " That I do," replied Boris quickly. " And I 
 remember the place where he found the old English 
 boat in a storeroom, and insisted on taking it out 
 and trying to sail it. You told me that you have 
 seen that very boat in St. Petersburg, and that it 
 is called the ' Grandfather of the Russian Navy. ' " 
 
 "All that I told you is true," said Mikayla; 
 " and there is more to tell than I have time for, 
 even in this long ride to Petersburg. Whole 
 books, and many of them, have been written 
 about Czar Peter. He was one of the greatest men 
 that ever lived, and people never tire of telling 
 about his deeds." 
 
 " What did he do? " questioned Boris, thinking 
 to start his friend on a long story. 
 
IOO BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 "Ah, what did he not do! " rejoined Mikayla. 
 " He was interested in boats and soldiers from the 
 time he was born, and he was so determined to 
 have a great army and navy that he would let 
 nothing stand in his way. 
 
 " He began his reign when he was only seventeen 
 years old, and it did not take him long to decide 
 that, while Russia was a vast inland country, 
 what it needed was water communication with 
 other countries. His only seaport was Archangel, 
 near the Arctic Ocean, which is ice-bound more 
 than half the year. 
 
 " ' It is not land I need, but water! ' he cried; 
 and he determined to drive out the Swedes who 
 held the Baltic provinces around the Gulf of Fin- 
 land, and the Turks who stood between him and 
 the Black Sea. When he had conquered the 
 Turks he had a seaport but no navy. 
 
 " ' First we will have some ships,' he said; but 
 he could find no one in Russia who could teach 
 him to build sailing vessels, and learn he must; 
 so off he went to Holland with more than two 
 hundred of his officers. 
 
 " In the shipyard at Amsterdam he worked for 
 four months like any laborer and was paid for his 
 work with the rest. One day an English nobleman 
 went to the docks to have a look at him. The 
 overseer, to show which of the men was the Czar 
 
PETER THE GREAT 101 
 
 of Russia, called out, ' Carpenter Peter, why don't 
 you help your comrades? ' Then our Little 
 Father put his shoulder to the log and helped to 
 carry it to its place." 
 
 Boris sat still, listening eagerly to every word. 
 He had heard the story many times, but it was 
 always interesting. 
 
 " After learning all that he could in Holland,'' 
 Mikayla continued, " Peter went to England; 
 and there he learned, more about ship-building. 
 
 " His own people were rude, with the barbarous 
 manners of the savage Tartars, who over-ran 
 Russia in the Middle Ages. Czar Peter watched 
 carefully all the customs of the foreign courts, 
 and after he reached home he introduced these 
 customs into his own court. 
 
 " There was nothing he did not notice while he 
 was abroad. He visited markets, factories, hos- 
 pitals and museums. He asked questions about 
 all the little things that happened in the Dutch 
 and English homes, and whatever he saw that was 
 good he remembered and took home to his people. 
 
 " ' Now we will have a new capital, and open a 
 window toward Europe,' he said, after he had 
 returned to Russia, and driven the Swedes out of 
 the country. 
 
 " Moscow had been the capital for hundreds of 
 years; but Peter selected for the site of his new 
 
102 BORIS EST RUSSIA 
 
 city the low marshy land at the mouth of the Neva 
 River, where it empties into the Gulf of Finland. 
 
 " People said he could never build a city in 
 such a desolate swamp; but Peter liked hard 
 tasks, and he set to work at once, building his 
 city after the model of the foreign capitals he had 
 visited. 
 
 " Thousands of workmen were sent to drain 
 the swamps, drive piles into the marsh-land, and 
 lay stone foundations for the buildings. When 
 they were sick and died from cold and exposure, 
 others were sent to take their place. 
 
 " Every boat coming nto the river, every cart 
 driven into the city, had to pay a toll of stones, 
 and the work went on rapidly under Peter's 
 direction. In about nine years the new city was 
 ready for its inhabitants, and then the Czar ordered 
 people to come and live in it. Palaces and cathe- 
 drals were built, and the new capital was named 
 Petersburg in honor of the Czar who founded it." 
 
 " How did you learn all these things? " asked 
 Boris. 
 
 " I have read many books about Peter the 
 Great," replied the peddler, " and I remembered 
 what I read because I, too, would like to do great 
 things for my country. But I have had to spend 
 my nights making brasses and my days selling 
 them, until now I am too old to do anything else. 
 
PETER THE GREAT 103 
 
 "But you are young, and if you will study and 
 work I will help you. You are just beginning your 
 life and can do with it what you will." 
 
 Boris looked out of the window across the 
 desolate, snow-covered plains. " That is what 
 my father tells me," he said slowly. " He wants 
 me to be a doctor, but I would rather travel and 
 see the world." 
 
 " It is better to see the people in it, and help 
 them if you can," Mikayla told him; and then 
 for a long time there was silence between them, 
 while the train rushed onward toward the famous 
 city of Peter the Great. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 BLESSING THE NEVA 
 
 The police are everywhere in Russia. If it 
 were not so, Boris and Mikayla might not so 
 easily have found a place to sleep when they 
 reached St. Petersburg that night. 
 
 The station was crowded with people, and the 
 moment the two friends stepped from the train 
 they found themselves in a mob of howling izvost- 
 chiks who were looking for passengers from the 
 first-class cars. 
 
 Mikayla pushed his way through the crowd, 
 and Boris followed him to the rear of the station, 
 where they found a policeman in uniform with a 
 double-headed eagle on his badge. This double- 
 headed eagle is the coat of arms of the Russian 
 Empire, and represents the union of the church 
 and state. 
 
 When Mikayla spoke to the officer he im- 
 mediately demanded their passports, which he 
 examined with the greatest care. Then he told 
 them where they could find a comfortable lodging, 
 pulled a little book from his pocket and wrote 
 
BLESSING THE NEVA 105 
 
 down their names and where they were going, 
 and watched to see that they followed his directions. 
 
 " The police watch every man, woman and 
 child that enters Petersburg," Mikayla told Boris 
 as they hurried along the broad, paved streets. 
 " If they suspected us of pla nnin g any mischief, 
 we should quickly be arrested and thrown into 
 prison." 
 
 " But in spite of all their care our good Czar 
 Alexander II, and many of the grand dukes and 
 other nobles have been assassinated," replied 
 Boris. 
 
 " Hush! " commanded Mikayla. " You must 
 not even whisper such a thought in the streets; " 
 and he glanced around hastily to see if by chance 
 any one had been following them. 
 
 In a little while they had found the lodging- 
 house which the policeman had suggested, and 
 were soon settled in a room which was small and 
 not too clean, but was comfortably heated with 
 a tiled stove. Boris curled himself up on top of 
 the stove like a big dog, just as he had always 
 done at home in cold weather, and was soon fast 
 asleep; but Mikayla preferred to lie on the narrow 
 bed-shelf against the wall, and cover himself with 
 his sheepskin coat. 
 
 The next morning the two friends were up with 
 the sun, which in January does not rise until nearly 
 
106 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 nine o'clock in St. Petersburg; and they were 
 soon out in the street, looking for a stand where 
 they could get a cup of hot tea. 
 
 " The government owns these little booths," 
 Mikayla explained, as they drank their tea. 
 " There is always fresh water boiling in the sam- 
 ovars, and we can have tea for the asking. It 
 helps many a poor man with his work to have a 
 cup of good tea, and the water is pure, so that 
 there is no danger from drinking it, as there is in 
 some of the eating-houses." 
 
 Then he led the way toward the Nevski Pros- 
 pekt, pointing out some of the famous buildings 
 which they passed. The Nevski Prospekt is 
 the finest street in St. Petersburg, and is so named 
 because at the end of the street there is a fine 
 view of the Neva River. It is nearly three miles 
 long, and is lined on both sides with shops, palaces 
 and cathedrals. 
 
 On a winter afternoon it is crowded with gay, 
 fashionable throngs of people. Sleighs and sledges 
 dash along, drawn by spirited horses; officers 
 and soldiers in uniform ride up and down on pran- 
 cing steeds; and court ladies, wrapped in costly 
 furs, visit the jewellers' shops to buy magnificent 
 gems, or enter the cathedrals for a brief prayer 
 before an icon. 
 
 Everyone who can possibly afford it owns or 
 
BLESSING THE NEVA 107 
 
 hires a carriage for this afternoon promenade; 
 but in the morning the street is almost deserted, 
 and Boris and Mikayla walked along slowly, 
 stopping often to look in the shop windows. 
 
 The air was clear but it was bitter cold. The 
 hard, glistening snow creaked under the smooth 
 runners of the passing sleighs, and the white walls 
 reflected the dazzling light of the sun and snow 
 until Boris closed his eyes from the glare. 
 
 "It is a wonder that the people are not all 
 blind," he said. " It is worse here than in the 
 glittering fields at home." 
 
 " The sun does not always shine like this in 
 Petersburg," replied Mikayla. " There are many 
 damp foggy days when everything is dark and 
 gloomy and the street lamps are lighted all day 
 long. I, for one, am glad to see the sun shining 
 on the Czar's children." 
 
 Just as they reached the Cathedral of Kazan 
 a procession of priests came down the steps carry- 
 ing banners, crosses and sacred icons. A crowd 
 quickly collected in the street, waited reverently 
 until the procession passed, and then followed at 
 a respectful distance. 
 
 " Where are they going? " Mikayla asked one 
 of the men, and when he learned that it was the 
 day for blessing the waters of the Neva, he hurried 
 Boris along with the others. 
 
108 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " See how lucky we are! " he said. " It is a 
 wonderful ceremony. All the priests from the 
 largest cathedrals will be there, and we may even 
 catch a glimpse of the great Czar himself." 
 
 But there was an enormous crowd in the street, 
 and also in the Square of the Admiralty, opposite 
 the spot in the river where the ceremony was to 
 take place. Mounted policemen kept the people 
 back and made room for the procession, which 
 moved slowly across the square and out upon the 
 frozen river to the canopy-covered opening in the 
 ice. 
 
 Boris and Mikayla found they could get no 
 nearer than the corner of the Winter Palace, 
 which fronts upon the Neva. 
 
 " Now who says we are lucky? " exclaimed Boris; 
 but Mikayla held up his hand. 
 
 " Hush! " he said, " we can hear the service 
 even if we cannot see it." 
 
 The blessing of the waters is only one of the 
 many ceremonies which are performed each year 
 by the priests of the Russian church. The rivers 
 all over the country are blessed in the winter 
 when they are covered with ice, and again in the 
 spring when the ice is gone, so that when they 
 overflow their banks their waters may enrich 
 the soil and bring prosperity to the people. 
 
 The cattle are blessed before they are driven 
 

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BLESSING THE NEVA 109 
 
 into the meadows, the fields are blessed before 
 they are plowed, and as the year goes on, the priest 
 is called upon to bless each ripening crop until 
 the harvest is over. 
 
 So now the River Neva was to be blessed, and 
 a silence fell over the whole company as the voices 
 of the priests rose and fell in a weird, chanting 
 melody. A gleaming golden cross was raised high 
 in the air, and all the people bowed and crossed 
 themselves. Then, with the chanting of the 
 priests and the deep clanging of the cathedral 
 bells, the cross was dipped into the water once, 
 twice, three times. It was raised again, all drip- 
 ping wet, so that the people might see it with the 
 water already freezing on its golden arms. The 
 priests' voices, deep and sonorous, were heard 
 pronouncing the final blessing, and the ceremony 
 was over. 
 
 " Come," said Mikayla, as the police began 
 driving back the crowds to make room for the 
 procession of priests; " we will walk along the 
 quay and you shall see something that you have 
 always wanted to see." 
 
 " What is it? " questioned Boris; but Mikayla 
 would not tell him, and began pointing out the 
 places of interest which they passed. 
 
 "This is the Winter Palace," he said; "but 
 our present Czar prefers the country and fives in 
 
IIO BORIS EST RUSSIA 
 
 a beautiful palace at Tsarskoe Selo, about fifteen 
 miles away. 
 
 " Here is the Admiralty building, and over there 
 is St. Isaac's Cathedral — " 
 
 But Boris had taken off his cap and was swinging 
 it over his head, shouting, " At last I see it! At 
 last I see it! " 
 
 Russians are seldom demonstrative, and several 
 men and women turned to look in amazement at 
 this boy who seemed so much excited. 
 
 " What is it that you see? " asked Mikayla, 
 pretending not to understand what Boris meant, 
 and looking in every direction but the right one. 
 
 " It is the monument to Peter the Great! " 
 cried Boris. " I saw a tiny picture of it once on 
 a postage stamp; " and he hurried across the 
 square to get a nearer view of the magnificent 
 statue, erected by the Empress Catharine II in 
 memory of the founder of the city. 
 
 It is an imposing monument. The splendid 
 bronze horse and his fearless rider stand poised 
 on a Huge rock of Finland granite overlooking the 
 Neva River. This rock once lay in a marshy 
 forest several miles beyond the city, and was set 
 here beside the Neva at a great cost of time and 
 money. 
 
 But the Russians can do anything they set 
 out to do, and expense was no hindrance to Cath- 
 
BLESSING THE NEVA in 
 
 arine II. She. had the marsh drained, the forest 
 cleared, and a road built to the Gulf of Finland. 
 Even then it took five hundred men five weeks 
 to get the great rock landed near the spot where 
 it now stands. 
 
 " Czar Peter was a great ruler," said Boris, 
 looking with admiration at the man on horseback. 
 
 " And Russia has become a great country," 
 said Mikayla proudly. " This monument stands 
 for them both, — a great land, and its greatest 
 Czar." 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 EASTER IN ST. PETERSBURG 
 
 For almost two months Boris and Mikayla 
 stood side by side at a little stand near the Nevski 
 Prospekt, selling their brasses and carved wooden 
 toys. They found ready customers, too, among 
 the people of the great city, and sold so many of 
 their best pieces that they often had to work late 
 into the night, replenishing their stock. 
 
 During Butter Week, which is the week of the 
 great feast before the beginning of Lent, they 
 worked harder than ever, for Mikayla had a 
 booth at the fair which is always held every year 
 on the parade ground beside the Neva. 
 
 There are many feast-days and many fasts in 
 the Russian church; so many feasts that there are 
 only about two hundred working days in the 
 whole year; so many fasts that it seems as if the 
 poor peasants must often be hungry. 
 
 There is the long fast of Lent, a fast in June 
 and another in December, besides a fast-day on 
 Wednesday and Friday of every week. But 
 there are the feast-days, too; the festival of the 
 
EASTER IN ST. PETERSBURG 113 
 
 harvest, Christmas with its green trees, New 
 Year's Day with its bonfires, and Butter Week, 
 the merriest of them all, with its sleigh rides and 
 its blinnies — '■ little cakes which are fried in butter 
 and eaten by the dozen during the week before 
 Lent. 
 
 Boris had plenty of blinnies on this Butter 
 Week in St. Petersburg, for he bought them, all 
 hot and smoking, at the little booths in the fair; 
 but they did not taste half so good as those his 
 mother always made, and it made him so homesick 
 to eat them that he longed to hurry home without 
 waiting for the ice to break up in the river. 
 
 He wrote a long letter, to his mother, to tell 
 her how well he was getting on, with Mikayla to 
 help him; and later he wrote to his father, too, 
 but he did not say anything about going home to 
 study. 
 
 He began to think about it, however, when he 
 was walking back to his room at night; and one 
 Sunday, after they had walked across the icy river 
 to take a look at the great Peter and Paul Fortress; 
 he even talked about it a little with Mikayla; 
 but still he could not make up his mind. 
 
 " I like to read," he said, " and I think I should 
 like to study at the University in Moscow; but 
 how do I know that I should like to be a doctor? " 
 
 " Some day you will know," Mikayla told him, 
 
1 14 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 " some day you will decide to give your life to 
 healing the sick and helping the poor peasants 
 in your village; " and he began to plan how they 
 would live together in Moscow, Boris bending over 
 the heavy books which he brought from the 
 University, Mikayla by his side designing won- 
 derful brasses which would bring them a fortune. 
 
 " Design one now, and I will read you this book 
 about Peter the Great which I found at a book- 
 stall yesterday," Boris replied, and began reading 
 aloud before Mikayla could say another word 
 about the future. 
 
 So the days and weeks of the long Lenten fast 
 came and went, with Boris and Mikayla still in 
 St. Petersburg, selling brasses at the little stand 
 all day, reading and working far into the night. 
 And now it was the night before Easter Sunday, 
 the greatest feast-day of the whole year in Russia, 
 and the two friends were on their way to the mid- 
 night service in St. Isaac's Cathedral. 
 
 Earlier in the evening they had been to one of 
 the public baths and had a good steaming and 
 scrubbing. Their hair was neatly combed, and 
 Mikayla was wearing a new cap; but Boris had 
 nothing newer than his sheepskin coat, which 
 by this time was beginning to look a little the worse 
 for wear. 
 
 The moon was shining in the clear sky, shedding 
 
EASTER IN ST. PETERSBURG II 5 
 
 its silver radiance over river and quay, church and 
 palace. The crowds were so great in the streets 
 that the two friends found it hard work to make 
 their way, but they pushed along until they 
 reached the steps of the great cathedral. Rich 
 merchants with their wives and daughters clad 
 in beautiful silks and furs, soldiers in long coats, 
 high boots and astrachan caps, peasants in sheep- 
 skin coats, thronged the steps, each one carrying 
 in his hand an unlighted candle. 
 
 When they finally entered the cathedral the 
 crowds were even greater. There were three 
 thousand — five thousand — men and women, 
 all patiently standing, all eagerly waiting for the 
 midnight bell to strike the hour when the Saviour 
 would rise again from the tomb. 
 
 Boris crossed himself in awe at the splendor, the 
 magnificence of the scene before him. The walls 
 were tiled with rare marbles and hung with in- 
 numerable pictures of the saints, the Virgin and 
 the Redeemer. Pearls, rubies, diamonds, and 
 precious stones of priceless value covered all but 
 the faces and hands of these sacred pictures, the 
 gems sparkling with the light from countless tiny 
 lamps which burned before the icons. 
 
 Great pillars of green malachite and lapis 
 lazuli rose from the floor to the arched dome 
 overhead, and a thousand candles in magnificent 
 
Il6 BORIS IN RUSSIA 
 
 golden candelabra shed their soft light into the 
 gloom of the vast church. 
 
 The altar of silver and gold was covered with 
 rich embroideries set with precious stones. Priests 
 bowed and crossed themselves, and took their 
 places on either side of the chancel; altar boys 
 moved silently to and fro. But still the wonderful 
 silver doors before the altar remained closed, and 
 a solemn silence brooded over the great congrega- 
 tion. 
 
 Suddenly, as if by magic, the bells began to 
 peal, everyone lighted his candle, the Holy Doors 
 were thrown open, and the archbishop appeared 
 before the people, stretching out his hands as if 
 in benediction, while he proclaimed in joyful 
 tones, " Christ is risen! He is risen from the 
 dead! " j 
 
 The priests took up the glad words, and the 
 voices of the choir repeated them over and over 
 again in a jubilant song of praise. No organ was 
 there, no musical instrument of any sort is per- 
 mitted in the Russian church; but the volume of 
 sound from the throats of three hundred men and 
 boys poured out the good tidings of great joy 
 until all hearts were thrilled by the mighty music. 
 
 The priests made their way among the crowds, 
 swinging golden censers filled, with burning in- 
 cense. The archbishop, clad in rich vestments 
 
EASTER IN ST. PETERSBURG 117 
 
 of purple and gold, intoned the litany, and the 
 music of the choir rose and swelled and throbbed 
 among the pillars and arches of the great cathedral. 
 
 Every face in the vast audience bore an ex- 
 pression of rapture. Friends and relatives clasped 
 hands and kissed one another, saying, " Christ 
 is risen! Truly, he is risen! " 
 
 Boris turned to kiss Mikayla. Tears were 
 streaming down his cheeks, and his face was 
 shining with happiness. " The day has come, 
 just as you said it would," he whispered joyfully. 
 " I shall give my life to my people." 
 
PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 
 AND DICTIONARY 
 
 An'tSn, a boy's name. 
 
 An t8n'6 vitch, " son of Anton." 
 
 A lSx an drov'na, " daughter of Alexander." 
 
 Arch an'gel (ark an'jel), a seaport near the Arctic Ocean. 
 
 Ba reen', lord, master ; a title of respect. 
 
 Ba rish' na, lady ; a title of respect. 
 
 blin'nl, a batter-cake fried in butter. 
 
 Bo'ria, a boy's name. 
 
 Czar or Tsar (zar), title of the Emperor of Russia. 
 
 dom'6 voi, a house-sprite, a dwarf. 
 
 dou'ga (doo), the wooden arch over the neck of a har- 
 nessed horse. 
 
 drosh'ky (dros'ki), a low, four-wheeled, open carriage. 
 
 GS'du ndff, Boris (ddo), Czar of Russia, 1598-1605. 
 
 Gru'shia (groo'sha), a girl's name. 
 
 I'con, a sacred picture representing Christ, the Virgin, a 
 saint or martyr. 
 
 Ivan' (e van'), John. 
 
 I van 6v'na (e), " daughter of John." 
 
 Iz'ba, cottage. 
 
 iz vSat'chik, driver of a droshky. 
 
 khor'6 v5d, a circling dance. 
 
 ko'peck, a small coin worth one-half cent. 
 
 K6s tr5 ma', a city and province in Russia. 
 
 kras'ni, beautiful. 
 
 Kremlin, the ancient, fortified city of Moscow. 
 119 
 
Ma tush'ka (tSosh), "little mother." 
 
 Mi kay'la, Michael. 
 
 MSsk'wa (va), the river on which Moscow is situated. 
 
 mou'jlk (mbo), country-fellow, peasant. 
 
 Ne'va, the river on which St. Petersburg is situated. 
 
 Nev'skI Pr6s pSkf (nef), the finest street in St. Peters- 
 burg. 
 
 Nij'nl WSv'gd r6d (Nezh), a city and province in cen- 
 tral Russia. 
 
 rou'ble (roo'b'l), a silver coin worth ioo kopecks, about 
 fifty-one cents. 
 
 sam'6 var, " self-boiler," a metal urn for making tea. 
 
 serf, one who was attached to the soil and sold with it ; 
 a kind of slave. 
 
 Si be'ri a, a vast region in northern and central Asia 
 which forms a part of the Russian Empire. 
 
 star Sa'ta, the head man of the village. 
 
 stgppe, vast plain. 
 
 tar'an tass, a carriage. 
 
 troi'ka, three horses abreast, or a vehicle drawn by three 
 horses abreast. 
 
 Troit'sl a, " Trinity," a famous monastery near Moscow. 
 
 Tsar'skft e Se15 (sa), a town near St. Petersburg where 
 there is a famous palace of the Czars. 
 
 u rl ad'nlk (06), an officer of the police. 
 
 verst, two-thirds of a mile. 
 
 VSl'ga, the largest river in Europe, 2,400 miles long. 
 
 Ya ro alav', a city and province in Russia. 
 
 120 
 
LITTLE-PEOPLE 
 
 **•*.•* 
 
VERYWHERE