TCHUDOVO AND THE PRISTAV. 27 



Paishkoff as he neared the end of his ride, and make a 

 lavish display of the Listok" s wealth and enthusiasm ? 



Sergie rattled on, pausing very reluctantly and only 

 for an instant now and then, to enable my companion 

 and interpreter to ask a question. His nervous ten- 

 sion, and his effort to talk faster than the movements 

 of his lips could frame his words and sentences, was 

 almost painful. Paishkoff, he informed us, was a re- 

 markable man in many ways. While he, his comrade 

 of the Novosti, and almost everybody else he had ever 

 met, drank vodka, the Cossack officer refused to drink 

 anything stronger than kwass, a kind of weak beer 

 made from rye bread. 



" At Novgorod," said Mr. Riskin, " there was a 

 grand service of prayer before a celebrated ikon in 

 honor of Paishkoff's safe arrival, and after the prayers 

 came a jollification, when the officers, the priests, and 

 all of us got drunk and happy — all but Paishkoff. 

 Paishkoff would drink nothing but kwass and tea; he's 

 a wonderful man. He eats what he likes, just like 

 other people. He wears undergarments of mineral 

 wool ; over that a linen shirt, which he gets washed 

 every two weeks. During the winter he wore a 

 cholera-belt to protect his stomach from the cold, and 

 over all a leathern suit. He rises at five in the morn- 

 ing, pops a lump of sugar in his mouth, and drinks tea 

 with lemon in it before starting. 



" A few days after starting he was caught in a bliz- 

 zard and got lost. He was nearly frozen to death, and 

 would never have pulled through but for his horse's 

 intelligence. He gave his horse the rein, and although 

 it was pitch dark and the air full of blinding snow, the 



