hear bad things of their neighbors than good, and the person who
furnishes startling tales is considered better company than the humdrum
truth-teller or the charitably disposed.

The truth is, that people too frequently go to Russia with the
deliberate expectation and intention of seeing queer things. That they
do frequently contrive to see queer things, I admit. Countess X. Z., who
in appearance and command of the language could not have been
distinguished from an Englishwoman, related to me a pertinent anecdote
when we were discussing this subject. She chanced to travel from St.
Petersburg to Moscow in a compartment of the railway carriage with two
Americans. The latter told her that they had been much shocked to meet a
peasant on the Nevsky Prospekt, holding in his hand a live chicken, from
which he was taking occasional bites, feathers and all. That they saw
nothing of the sort is positive; but what they did see which could have
been so ingeniously distorted was more than the combined powers of the
countess and myself were equal to guessing.

The general idea of foreign visitors seems to be that they shall find
the Russia of the seventeenth century. I am sure that the Russia of Ivan
the Terrible's time, a century earlier, would precisely meet their
views. They find the reality decidedly tame in comparison, and feel
bound to supply the missing spice. A trip to the heart of Africa would,
I am convinced, approach much nearer to the ideal of "adventure"
generally cherished. The traveler to Africa and to Russia is equally
bound to narrate marvels of his "experiences" and of the customs of the
natives.

But, in order to do justice to any foreign country, the traveler must
see people and customs not with the eyes of his body only, but with the