SCENES ON THE ROAD. 1 27 



owing to the objections of every other member of the 

 party, he eventually took to scrubbing up against him 

 as we rode along. Our fortunes at night were various, 

 though always of a degree calculated to humble us to 

 the level of the rude, uncivilized life and unrefinements 

 of the moujik. Sometimes we stayed at traktirs, but 

 in the smaller villages, where the prospective consump- 

 tion of vodka and weak tea would not justify the es- 

 tablishment of a house of public accommodation, we 

 had to seek refuge with a moujik. 



Traktirs, as everything else in Russia that is patron- 

 ized by the commoner subjects of the Czar, are regarded 

 by the authorities chiefly as teats from which the 

 largest possible yield of taxes are to be milked. A 

 roadside traktir, according to a proprietor of one whom 

 we questioned, pays a tax of 500 rubles a year and up. 

 ward ; and a courtyard for the accommodation of teams, 

 250 rubles. 



No wonder these people are picayunish and over- 

 reaching in their small way, and disposed to make the 

 utmost of any casual stranger who comes along. The 

 moujiks presented a somewhat less monotonous level 

 of commercial depravity than the proprietors of the 

 traktirs ; but the general level of all was disagreeably 

 low. The tendency of all from whom we were com- 

 pelled to seek accommodation for man and beast, seemed 

 to be to get the utmost possible number of kopecks 

 out of us, and part from next to nothing in return. 

 Most of them would simply speculate on our neces- 

 sities, and take advantage of the fact that we had to 

 accept what they chose to supply us with or go with- 

 out. 



