84 THROUGH RUSSIA ON A MUSTANG. 



He is recognized by all classes as primarily a lover of 

 vodka and the music of the accordion. The toy 

 moujik in the shops of Moscow and St. Petersburg 

 always represents a drunken man with a bottle or an 

 accordion. In groups, his wife is trying to pick him 

 up from the ground. 



On Tuesday night we put up at the house of a 

 thrifty moujik in the mir of Volosovo. His was an 

 ideal peasant family household, and Volosovo came 

 near being an ideal mir. The ideal mir is one of the 

 happiest arrangements imaginable for the people of the 

 mental attainments and social disposition of the Rus- 

 sian moujik. Unfortunately, the real state of affairs 

 comes far short, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, 

 of the ideal, even as we found it in Volosovo. 



The household I speak of consisted of an ancient 

 moujik, more than eighty years old, — who remembered 

 Napoleon's retreat from Moscow, — and three robust 

 sons with their families. The house sheltered about 

 eighteen persons. All three of the sons could read 

 and write. I had noticed, when riding through Volo- 

 sovo, that the houses were neater and better, and that 

 the whole appearance of the place seemed more pros- 

 perous than other villages we had passed through. 

 We inquired the reason. " It is because there is no 

 vodka shop in the mir," was the answer. 



We entered into conversation on the subject of the 

 moujiks and their condition. Our hosts vied with each 

 other in giving information. Were the moujiks better 

 off since the emancipation than before ? 



" Some of them are, and others are not," was the 

 reply. " Everything depends on the man himself. 



