TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
effoit to accomplish the undertaking, are con- 
tinually betraying the hidden reality. Their 
pages, like embroidered vestments upon the 
priests of Moscow, disclose, with every gust that 
separates them, the rags and wretchedness they 
were intended to conceal'. Nor is it only in 
those periods of Russian history when hostility 
threw oft the veil, and enabled other nations to 
observe the real disposition of the people towards 
every country but their own, that their character 
has been thus manifested. It is alike displayed 
m peace or war ; in circumstances of seeming 
civilization, or of acknowledged barbarism ; in 
the reign of Peter, or of Catherine; under the 
tyranny of Paul, or the mild government of 
Alexander. These are facts, indeed, which a 
traveller may withhold : lie may say, with Fonte- 
nelle, “ If 1 had my hand full of truths, I would not 
suffer one of them to escape ; or, like Voltaire, 
he may wait “ until he has leisure to methodize 
(0 You can hardly imagine any thing more showy than the appear- 
ance of the priests of these churches on their festival days. But if the 
od should chance to blow aside the sacred vestment, you would 
pro ably feel a degree of disgust not easily described, at seeing shoes 
dockings, and breeches, and shirt, of the coarsest materials, gene- 
ra y ragged, and always dirty, appearing from under robes of the most 
Per and costly embroidery.” Letters from Scandinavia, vol.l.p.Tl. 
I7gg t r 
