THE START FROM MOSCOW. 65 



on the right hand side of the road any more than 

 Count Trotoff, on the left ? 



Whether you put up at a hotel traktir, or with a 

 moujik on the Russian roads, all feed is supplied by 

 weight or measurement. A primitive form of beam 

 scales, with brass dots to accommodate the mathemati- 

 cal incapacity of the unlettered moujik, instead of fig- 

 ures, is produced to weigh your pood or half-pood of 

 hay or cut grass, and measures are filled with oats and 

 leveled off. Hay and oats are almost always to be 

 procured. 



The accommodation for man is not particularly in- 

 viting. The village traktir is a little better than a 

 Chinese wayside inn, but not much. Doughy Mack 

 bread, eggs, and tea are the refreshments, and in sum- 

 mer your rights to what you purchase are disputed by 

 myriads of persistent flies. The Russian fly worries 

 you all night as well as all day. The brief summer of 

 his activity commences late and ends early, and he evi- 

 dently believes his short life should always be a merry 

 one. 



The windows of the room to which you are shown 

 are probably nailed up and were never intended lo be 

 opened. It is no joke to be thrust into an evil-smelli/ig 

 room, ten feet square, with a myriad of hungry flies, and 

 the air of which has been boxed up since winter. The 

 Russians thrive on this sort of thing, however, and one 

 soon ceases to regard an over-crowded prison as a pun- 

 ishment to the lower-class Russian. 



For travelers of sufficient importance, from a finan- 

 cial point of view, however, the landlord readily vacates 

 his private room and arranges a comfortable shake- 



