102 NORTHERN RUSSIA. 



The supplies of fruit are neither cheap nor tempting. 

 Most of it comes from the south. 



The stoppages on the railway are frequent and long. 

 But a walk an.d saunter refresh the system, and I saw 

 several really nice-looking young ladies, who were in the 

 same carriage with us, employ these seasons of repose to 

 smoke their cigarettes, which they did with such grace 

 as unfortunately to tempt both strangers and foreigners to 

 follow their bad example. 



I found myself early in the forenoon in the busy 

 parlour of Mr. Billo, well known to all travellers to Mos- 

 eow as a most civil landlord. 



" To the Kremlin ! ' was the first and anxious desire 

 of our party. So to the Kremlin we went. 



How shall I describe it ? for it is unquestionably one 

 of the most remarkable, odd, out-of-the-way, like-nothing- 

 else spots I have ever visited, and indeed the thing to be 

 Been in Moscow, if not in Russia. 



The first sign of the Kremlin, as we walked along the 

 street towards it, was a high whitewashed wall, with 

 Tartar-like embrasures, and separated from the town by 

 an open boulevard. Beyond this nothing was visible; 

 until, on passing through a gateway, behind which was a 

 very small chapel, which seemed from its lamps, its 

 pictures, and crowded worshippers to be some " holy 

 place," we entered on what seemed a busy town. This 

 was the " Kitai Gorod " or Chinese city. 



Proceeding along the narrow crowded street, we de- 

 bouched into a vast oblong space, half a mile or so in 



