228 
FROM MOSCOW 
CHAP. 
X. 
Departure 
from Mos- 
cow. 
spies, and agents, of the contemptible tyrant 
who was then upon the Russian throne. Our 
situation, and that of every Englishman in the 
empire, was not better than the condition of 
prisoners on their parole. We had been al- 
lowed to move about, it is true, but always 
under the vigilant eye of a troublesome and 
capricious police. We were detained a long 
time, before we could learn when we might go, 
or by what route we should be allowed to 
pass. An escape by the Livonian frontier was 
utterly impracticable. At last, without any 
passport for leaving the country, but encou- 
raged by the advice and exertions of our 
excellent and friendly ambassador, who secretly 
conveyed to us letters from the Governor ot 
Petersburg to the Governor of Moscow, and to 
General Michelson, Commander-in-chief in the 
Crimea, we determined to set out for that Pen- 
insula, by a circuitous route, through the country 
of the Don Cossacks ; and, if possible, to visit 
the more distant regions of Kuban Tartary and 
of Circassia. Having, by means of these letters, 
procured the long-wished-for poderosnoy, and 
placed our carriage again upon its wheels, we 
left the city on the evening of the thirty-first of 
May, visiting our banker at his country-seat 
near Moscow, and proceeding that night only 
twenty-seven versts, to a place called Molodtzy, 
