TCHUDOVO AND THE PRISTAV. 25 



seven years old, with a pleasant face of almost mahog- 

 any darkness from the long exposure to the dry, wintry 

 winds of Siberia. He wore the Cossack lamb's- wool 

 hat, leather jacket and trousers, with a broad yellow 

 stripe down the latter, and heavy jack-boots. He was 

 armed with a British bull-dog revolver and a small 

 sword. 



His horse was a big-barreled, stocky gray pony, 

 about fourteen hands high, the exact counterpart of 

 horses one sees by the score in the broncho herds 

 of Wyoming and Colorado. He was well chosen 

 for his task. He was all barrel, hams, and shoul- 

 ders. His neck and head seemed scarcely to be 

 parts of the same horse. His pace was a fast, ambling 

 walk that carried him over the ground at five miles an 

 hour and left the big chargers of the Czarevitch's Cos- 

 sacks far to the rear. The escort had to trot occa. 

 sionally to catch up. The gallant little gray was as 

 sleek and well-conditioned as if he had just come out 

 of a clover pasture. 



Paishkoff raised his cap in reply to our salutation, and 

 when my companion said that I was from America, 

 lifted it again. " We belong almost to the same part 

 of the world," said he, smilingly, " only the sea is 

 between us. We have both traveled a long way, you 

 by ship and train, I on horseback." The Cossack 

 officer, though pleasant, was inclined to be rather taci- 

 turn, and we talked more with the newspaper men 

 than with him, calling upon him occasionally for con- 

 firmation. One of the reporters was Sergie Riskin, 

 from the Moscow Listok ; the other was the Novgorod 

 correspondent of the St. Petersburg Novosti. The 



