CHAPTER IV 



SHANDROVKA 



Russian Politeness Drinking a Fly Steppe Horses The Lasso Haltering 

 Horses Breaking in a Wild One Kicked over Rough Riding Kalmouks 

 An Imperial Cigarette Case Bargaining Double Poneys Mr. Hothersall 

 Half-bred Hackneys An Engagement A lost Friend. 



WHEN we got into the train and left Doubrovka 

 behind, I found that General Derfelden was less 

 depressed than before ; possibly because he had seen me 

 do some breaking for Colonel Ismailof and had approved 

 of it. But here again was the objection that the horses at 

 Doubrovka were quiet stud - breds and not wild steppe 

 animals. I was glad to learn from the General that the 

 Russians are the politest people in the world ; but as he had 

 seen few countries besides his own, I was at a loss to know 

 how he could have formed a conclusion that embraced all 

 the nations of both hemispheres. He trotted out for my 

 edification the Russian stock yarn, that if a Russian lights a 

 match for his cigarette in company with another man who 

 has an unlighted cigarette, he will first offer the lig'ht to his 



o o o 



companion and then set fire to his own paper and baccy. A 

 Frenchman in similar circumstances, so he said, will light his 

 own cigarette and then hand the match to the other individual ; 

 but an Englishman will light his own cigarette in the first 

 instance, and will then chuck the lucifer away, without offering 

 it for further employment. I laughed ; not because the story 

 struck home, but because I remembered that on many such 



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