French and German you may travel anywhere in Russia. So far as the great
cities and chief lines of communication are concerned, this may be true,
but beyond that it is a delusion. The Russian has not, any more than
the West-European, received from Nature the gift of tongues. Educated
Russians often speak one or two foreign languages fluently, but the
peasants know no language but their own, and it is with the peasantry
that one comes in contact. And to converse freely with the peasant
requires a considerable familiarity with the language--far more than is
required for simply reading a book. Though there are few provincialisms,
and all classes of the people use the same words--except the words of
foreign origin, which are used only by the upper classes--the peasant
always speaks in a more laconic and more idiomatic way than the educated
man.

In the winter months travelling is in some respects pleasanter than in
summer, for snow and frost are great macadamisers. If the snow falls
evenly, there is for some time the most delightful road that can be
imagined. No jolts, no shaking, but a smooth, gliding motion, like
that of a boat in calm water, and the horses gallop along as if totally
unconscious of the sledge behind them. Unfortunately, this happy state
of things does not last all through the winter. The road soon gets cut
up, and deep transverse furrows (ukhaby) are formed. How these furrows
come into existence I have never been able clearly to comprehend, though
I have often heard the phenomenon explained by men who imagined they
understood it. Whatever the cause and mode of formation may be, certain
it is that little hills and valleys do get formed, and the sledge, as it
crosses over them, bobs up and down like a boat in a chopping sea, with
this important difference, that the boat falls into a yielding liquid,
whereas the sledge falls upon a solid substance, unyielding and
unelastic. The shaking and jolting which result may readily be imagined.