DON COSSACKS. 
345 
already provided excellent quarters, in a spacious 
and clean apartment, with numerous windows, 
a balcony commanding a view of the Don, and 
every protection that an host of saints, virgins, 
and bishops, whose pictures covered the walls, 
could afford. Their General was at his country- 
seat, ten miles from the town 1 : an express 
was therefore sent to him, for his instructions 
concerning our future reception. In the mean 
time, sentinels were stationed at our carriage ; 
and an officer, with Cossack soldiers, paraded 
constantly before our door. During the whole 
time we remained in their country, the same 
honours were paid to us ; and although we 
frequently remonstrated against the confinement 
thus occasioned to the young officers, we never 
went out without finding the sentinels in waiting, 
and the officer at his post. The shaman came 
frequently to offer his services ; and the constant 
endeavour of the people seemed to be, who 
CHAP. 
XIII. 
(1) “ Most of the richer Cossacks have houses in Tcherkask, which 
they make their metropolis ; but pass the greater part of their time in 
their farms, on the northern bank of the river. Plain/, the /Human, 
said he kept there two hundred brood mares. He had, however, no 
land in tillage, though he possessed a vineyard a little to the east 
of Axy. Of the wine produced from these viueyards, they vaunted 
greatly. The best always struck me as mixed with Greek wine, or 
raisins. The ordinary wines are very poor, aud tasteless. Spirits are 
very cheap, and much drunk. Plain/ himself took a glass of brandy, 
with a spoonful of salt in it; as if brandy was hardly strong enough.” 
Helen's MS. Journal. 
