Re gue Tows ov Viapivostock It was necessary to rise carly at barovsk—when a chill grey dawn was crawling from the Pacific and lifting the mists from Manchurian hills—in order to catch the train to Viadivostock.
This was the last section of the great Trans-Asian line and exactly thirty-two hours was taken to cover the 483 miles. Of course the railway station was three miles from the town and the roadway was just a network of tracks among a tangle of undergrowth, all decaying and colourless beneath the first breathing of winter. I had to grip tight the little droshki, or the violent bumps against tree stumps and the sudden lurches into holes would have pitched me out x dozen times. The 10 horses were sturdy energetic little brutes one running in the shaft and the other running at the side, like the hitching of an extra tram horse to help the car up a hill, the approved method of driving a pair in Siberia—and rattled along in good style.
The station itself was all bustle and noise. The entrance hall was packed with noisy Chinamen shouting gutturally and bumping about with loads, while meek, white-robed, quaint-featured Coreans squatted on their heels in corners. Russians, chiefly officials in their greys and blues, gilt epaulettes, white-peaked caps, and top hoots of pliable leather. took pos. session of the buffet with their bundles. Here was constant tea dun! and the dipping of long rolls into the tea and eating them ina soupy state. These rollo are sprinkled with little seeds that make the food look as though it wore fir-blown, Indeed. as every mirror and candle-stick and picture in Siberia is vpockled by. me dustrious flies, I have an idea that the seed is sprinkled on the cates to deceive the eater, who cannot tell by eyesight whether the spots are seeds or fly marks, Half-an-hour before the train started there was the clang of a bell. the. doors were thrown open, and a pell-mell rush to the platform and carriages took place. The scone was one that had a close comparison to that von see in India. Tustead. however. of British officers walking up and down with the confident stride of supriority while the Hindus and Mahomedans gave wav. acknowledging inferiority. there were Russian officers, clean and smart, promenading the platform while slithering, cowering Chinese and the cringing, frightened Coreans made room for them.
I strolled about watching the scone. There was little that ras arrogant in the demeanour of the Russians and the recognition of it by the Chinese and Coreans. The Russian has a strong streak of the East in his nature; but this is covered and hidden by ready adaption of Western civilisation. The Russian, as you see him in Petersburg or in Moscow in direct contact with other civilisations, often gives indications of his Tartar origin. These traits, though they remain, fail, however, to strike you when you seo the Russian in the far east of his Empire, the master of a hundred races. There ho is, the white, civilised Westerner, whose stride is that of a conqueror. The Mongolians, who once scourged the world, now bustle and make an avenue to let pass a young lieutenant with eight brass buttons on his coat, gold epaulettes on his shoulders, and a black scabbarded sword at his side.
In earlier letters I rather dwelt upon the free and easy, linest democratic life of the Siberians, largely due to the fact that the genuine Siberian was never a serf as the Russian was. He therefore shows hardly any servility in his disposition, and is free to talk about his Government as no man dare speak in Petersburg. I noticed this as soon as I crossed the Urals, and was impressed with the fact by the time I got to Irkutsk. But at Irkutsk there ended the great stretch of Siberia that had been inhabited by Russian set-tiers and political exiles. "Eastwards beyond Lake Baikal reared a mountainous territory, undeveloped, unfavourable to settlers, with scanty, decaying Buriat. tribes in the valleys and occasional gangs of convicts or adventurers working for gold and silver in the hills. All through the Trans-Baikal and Amur provinces, however, with the thinnest of population, consisting of immigrants from Russia, who had not come under the influence of the berian freedom, this democratic aspect was missing. Troops of Cossack soldiers on the banks of the Shilka and Amur rivers were the directors of policy and bayonets the arguments.
At Khabarovsk and down to Viadivostock I found myself in another stratum. Not one in ten of the Russians had cor> hero through Siberia. The rear maj. sity had travelled round from Odessa by sca, They wore Russians proper, and all the severe rigid official discipline was in evidence. Exerything was in accordance with regulation, For instance, I went out on the gangway between the railway coaches to admire the scenery. "That is against the rules, you must not stand there; it is strictly forbidden," said the conductor. Later on he came to my compartment where the back of one of the seats was raised to allow the lower seat to be broader to make a bed. " You must please let me alter that seat to its usual state for dortime," he said. " But I want it to Temain as it is," I replied, " because T may desire to lie down and sleep." "But. the regulations!" he urged. ' Never mind the regulations," I answered, "that is going to remain." He brought a superior who, however, only shrugged his shoulders and the foreigner have his way.
On the train was a first-rate restaurant cor. Atco. and was a buffet wher all sorts of snacks were on sale, and a white-Housed. white-capped chef presided. There were, however, no regulation hours for meals. You had what you liked when you liked. Ju the morning, when T had inv coffee. there was a telegraph official, yellow-braided. sitting next me drinking vodka. and_opnosite was an engineer, con-braided, noisily ladling soup into his month; and a little up the table was itary officer, cold and red-braided, drinking tea and eating cakes, The country we ran through in that two days' journey was first over a stretch of
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.