A HUNTING STABLE. 59 



" I'll run the risk with your pilotage, colonel. And 

 while they are getting them ready, suppose we go and 

 take a look at the count's stables. You half-promised, 

 Matuschevitz, that you'd have a Cossack thorough- 

 bred or two out here for covert hacks this season. 

 Have you forgotten that ?" 



"Neither the promise nor the horses, Beaufort. I 

 have not said any thing about them yet, because I 

 wanted to get a little flesh upon, and a little condition 

 into them, before letting you fellows criticise them, 

 after a journey of so many versts and a voyage of so 

 many leagues. But I will have the saddle put upon 

 ' Moscow,' and you shall see one nag from the farthest 

 east, and a pair from the far west together. Fairfax 

 tells me, by the way, that two of the fastest trotters 

 in his country are called ' Moscow ' — Lord and Lady, 

 I believe. Is it not so, colonel V 



'' Something of the sort, count," said Fairfax. 

 "But you must not pride yourself on that, for if they 

 are called Moscow, it is not after your sacred city, I 

 assure you." 



" I never supposed it was," answered Matuschevitz, 

 with a droll smile and a slight leer. " I took it for 

 granted it was after some small western village con- 

 sisting of a blacksmith's shop, a court house and a 

 tavern, with one bank, built of pine lumber on the plan 

 of the Acropolis, and a Baptist church exactly like 

 the Pantheon. I know you have got a St. Peters- 

 burgh about ten miles from Rome, and as many more 

 from Athens, so why not a Moscow, too?" 



"Why not, indeed," said Fairfax ; "and for aught I 

 know, there may be not one Moscow in the United 

 States, but one in every county of every state in the 

 Union — still our Moscows cannot claim your Russian 

 title even at second or third hand, being so styled as 

 I am informed, by corruption, from the Indian name 

 ' Yamaska,' of a Canadian river, on the banks of which 



