_ACROSS EUROPE._
Departure for Petersburg.--Official receptions.--Minister of the
Interior.--Metropolitan of Moscow.--Introductions.--Books
forwarded.--Departure for Moscow.--Nijni Novgorod.--Site
of the fair.--Joined by interpreter.--Kasan.--Bulgarian
antiquities.--Neighbouring heathen.--Idolatrous objects
and practices.--Departure from Kasan.--The Volga and the
Kama.--Arrival at Perm.
On Wednesday morning, 30th April, 1879, I left London, and reached
Petersburg on the following Saturday evening, to find at my hotel a
pleasant welcome in the shape of an invitation to breakfast with Lord
Dufferin on the Monday morning. This was due to letters with which
I had been favoured from high quarters in England, and one result
of which, thanks to the kindness of the British Ambassador, was an
introductory letter to M. Makoff, the Minister of the Interior, which I
presented to his Excellency on Tuesday. Whilst waiting in the ante-room
with other suitors, there was time for cogitation as to what the
answer might be. My Petersburg friends gave me small hope of success;
on the contrary, one of them, high in authority, who had helped me
before, had gone so far as to say, “Why, it is not likely that, with
so many political prisoners therein, they will allow him to go through
the prisons of Siberia now.” I drew encouragement, however, from the
fact that a ministerial letter had been given me the previous year,
which I thought would be registered in the archives, and, trusting
there was on it nothing against me, I hoped that this would be in my
favour. At length, when I was ushered into the Minister’s presence, he
scarcely looked at the Ambassador’s letter, but referred to my having
had the document the previous year, and said at once that there was no
objection to my having another; upon which, flushed with success, I
bowed and retired.
This emboldened me to go to another dignitary, and, having a friend to
interpret, I went straight from the Minister to the new Metropolitan
of Moscow, to present a letter from the Archbishop of Canterbury,
addressed “To the Metropolitans of the Church of Russia, or others whom
it may concern.” His Eminence appeared in a brown silk moiré-antique
robe, glittering with jewelled decorations, and wearing as is usual
the white crape hat of a metropolitan, with a diamond cross in front.
He stood on little ceremony, and, almost before I had made my bow, he
shook my hand, gave me a fraternal kiss on either cheek, and motioned
me to a seat beside him. He then entered with zest into my scheme for
distributing the Scriptures, said that the Russians had not the means
to perform all they would, and commended the English for what they were
doing. He asked a few questions relative to Church matters in England,
regretted that we had no language in common in which we could converse,
and then cordially wished me God speed.
I had thus made an excellent beginning. The next thing to be done
was to get additional introductions, and this I tried to do so as
to find my way amongst various classes of people. A letter from Mr.
Glaisher, the aeronaut, and formerly of the Greenwich Observatory,
opened the way for me to scientific people, more especially those
taking meteorological observations in European and Asiatic Russia; an
introduction from a German pastor brought me into contact with the
educational world through Mr. Maack, the late General-Inspector of
Schools for Eastern Siberia; a third and a fourth introduction procured
letters to the Finns and the German pastors throughout Siberia; and a
fifth to the telegraph officers, most of whom speak English, French, or
German. Messrs. Egerton Hubbard took me under their wing, and kindly
arranged to forward money and letters; and I had various mercantile
introductions, together with several of a social character, to persons
of different standing, from the Governors-General of Siberia downwards.
All told, my introductions, as far as Kiakhta, numbered 133. It is,
however, a traveller’s axiom that, “Of good introductions, store is no
sore,” and many of mine proved to be worth their weight in gold.
My Petersburg friends were delighted at the Minister’s reply, and, as
the sun was shining, they determined to make their hay. They urged
me to take still more books--5,000 additional pamphlets of one kind,
especially suited for schools; and this notwithstanding that upwards
of 25,000 of a miscellaneous character had already been forwarded by
slow transit to the Urals. My willingness, however, was limited only
by my capabilities of carriage, and, accordingly, as many more books
were taken as, together with my personal baggage and those gone before,
would fill three Russian post waggons; and this I thought would be
about as many as, under the circumstances, it was possible for me to
take.
After a busy stay of nine days in the Russian capital, I left for
Moscow on the afternoon of Monday, the 12th of May, and arrived the
following morning. The only business that detained me there was to
inquire of some ladies, who devote themselves to work among the
prisoners, how many and what books they were distributing among the
exiles, so that I might not do their work over again. I found, however,
that their labours were directed more especially to the temporal
good of the prisoners--looking after their wives, placing out their
children, finding them clothes, and such like useful works, rather than
seeking directly their spiritual good, though this had to some extent
been attempted by lending and occasionally giving them books to read in
the prison. Accordingly, I left Moscow by rail on Wednesday evening, to
arrive after thirteen hours at Nijni Novgorod, on the Volga.
May is not a good time to see this famous place. The river overflows
its banks in spring to a depth of several feet, and covers the site
of the wonderful fair, in anticipation of which the lower storeys of
the warehouses and buildings are cleared; and to cleanse them before
July is one of the first things to be done by the owners, who with
their goods arrive yearly from all parts of the world. I was rowed in
a boat through the streets (which are called after the names of the
merchandise sold therein) to see the Chinese quarter, with pagoda-like
buildings; the Persian quarter, the two cathedrals, the theatre, the
Governor’s house, etc., all of which are used only during the fair,
and were now empty. The nearest approach to a fair that I saw was a
gathering near the entrance to the Kremlin, where were men standing
with their stock-in-trade in their hands or slung over their
shoulders--one with a pair of boots, another with a shirt, and a third
with a pair of trousers or other garments, and for which each was ready
to bargain and chaffer. Hitherto I had travelled alone. I now stayed at
Nijni Novgorod to be joined by a young man who was to be my companion
and interpreter, and then, leaving by steamer on Friday at mid-day, we
reached Kasan early on Saturday morning, there to spend Sunday, the
18th of May.
[Illustration: THE NICHOLAS GATE, MOSCOW.]
The covered heads and veiled faces of the women, together with the
tawny porters carrying their huge burdens, speedily reminded us that we
had reached an ancient Tatar city. The only tourists’ lion we visited
was Mr. Lichatcheff’s collection of Bulgarian antiquities. He very
kindly and politely showed us through the rooms of his house, which
were crammed with curiosities. Among them were rude implements of the
stone age, ancient oriental lamps, and ancient crosses, one of which,
dating from the eleventh or twelfth century, was without the foot-piece
now found on the Russian cross, which foot-piece, our informant
considered, was not used on Russian crosses in the earliest times.
There were also some stone Byzantine crosses. The Bulgarian antiquities
had been found on the banks of the Volga, showing the location of that
people before their migration further south.
Another point of interest in Kasan must not be passed over. I had
supposed that heathen rites and practices were now in Europe a thing of
the past. We heard, however, of five nationalities scattered through
Russia, but found more, especially in the Kasan government, who, though
nominally Christian, still resort to idolatrous superstitions. They
are called Tcheremisi, Mordvar, Vodeki, Tchuvashi, and Tatars; and the
Russian Government is adopting means for their enlightenment by taking
peasant boys from among them, and training them for schoolmasters and
priests. A seminary devoted to this purpose, situated near the Tatar
quarter of the town, was shown to us by the principal, Professor
Ilminski.[1]
In or near the Bishop’s house in the Kremlin we were introduced to
Mr. Zoloneetski, who trains young men to be mission priests to the
nationalities whence they have been brought. In 1878 he had twenty-one
students, some of them from the seminary just mentioned. He gives them
lectures on aboriginal languages, customs, and superstitions, and
shows them how to bring the natives to Christianity. This he does in
part by exposing various idolatrous objects, of which he has a curious
collection. Among them was a Tchuvash idol, consisting of a block of
wood, to which pieces of cloth were brought as offerings. This had
been used less than ten years before. Another piece of superstition
came from the Tcheremisi,[2] and was less than twelve months old.
There was also to be seen a rudely-cut box containing coins. Some of
them were ancient, but were supposed to have been offered recently by
Tatars, nominally Christian. It would seem that a Tatar sometimes makes
a vow to the spirit of the forest to dedicate a horse, cow, or some
other animal; but not having a victim, or not having it to spare at the
time, he leaves money as a pledge of good faith, and then, when able to
fulfil his vow, reclaims his coin.
Some of these objects had been obtained through friends and some
by fraud, but there was a curious story connected with the boxes.
A missionary priest (a friend of our informant), knowing of their
existence, went to a family in his parish, and asked if he might take
away their idolatrous things. They answered at first in the negative;
but, after he had left the house, a woman came out to draw water,
and told him she thought it would be much better if he would _steal_
the things, for then they would have less money to bring and fewer
prayers to say. The priest, therefore, returned at night, when the
family pretended to be soundly asleep (so that the spirit might not be
offended with what took place whilst they were unconscious), mounted
the loft, took the things, and subsequently gave them to our informant.
We quitted Kasan on Monday morning in one of Lubimoff’s steamers, and,
after proceeding two or three hours down the Volga, left that river
to finish its career of 2,200 miles, whilst we turned into one of its
affluents, the Kama, which is no mean river in itself, having a course
of 1,400 miles. The junction of the two streams presents a fine expanse
of water, but the banks are too flat to be pretty. Steamboat travelling
in Russia is not expensive, the first-class fare from Nijni Novgorod to
Perm, a four days’ journey, being only 36_s._
After a voyage of three days and a half from Kasan we reached Perm,
where the people were in great excitement consequent on the burning of
two “quartals,” or large blocks of buildings. The roofs and houses of
the town were described as being covered, during the previous night,
with women, watching lest sparks should fall on their property, whilst
their husbands helped to extinguish the fire; and so great was the fear
of a general conflagration, that some sent their wives and families
into the neighbouring villages. Others we saw encamped by the bank of
the river, whilst on a grass plot near a church were others tired out
and fast asleep beside the chattels they had rescued. Not long before,
Orenburg and Irbit had been burnt, and were supposed by some to have
been wilfully set on fire, and so excited were the inhabitants of
Perm, and so ready to snap up persons at all suspected, that we were
cautioned, as being strangers, to walk in the middle of the road. We
then visited the hospital, saw the Governor, and left some books for
the Perm institutions; but I was reserving my strength for Siberia, and
the same evening the train was to carry us to the top of the Urals.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The Government provides support for 150 scholars, half of whom
are Russians, and the remaining half are from the five nationalities
already mentioned. They have no difficulty in procuring the requisite
number of scholars. Such as can say their small Russian catechism
intelligently are received, and kept for three years as pupil-teachers,
at the expiration of which time they serve the Government for six years
by way of return for their education, and receive salaries of from
twelve to thirty pounds a year. A New Testament, we found (but not the
Bible), is provided for each youth in the higher classes.
[2] Their worship was thus described: The priest takes in one hand a
piece of burning wood, and in the other a branch (such as we saw, and
on which the leaves were still green, though dry), and then walks in
a circle, the area of which is thus, for the time being, consecrated
for worship. Then he fastens round a tree a withe, and sticks therein
a branch with the bark peeled something like a whip, which is supposed
to represent a fir-tree; on this is hung a piece of lead, previously
melted, poured into cold water, and molten so as to form roughly
the figure of a head, which is called an _eeta_. Towards this they
afterwards say their prayers. The priest kills the victim, which may be
a horse, a cow, a chicken, a duck, etc., and sprinkles the blood on the
tree and the withe. (The blood was yet visible on the one we saw.) Then
they proceed to peel or chip pieces of wood, making them fly off in the
direction of the tree; and according as the chips fall, with the bark
or the white side upwards, so they divine an answer to their prayer.
The branch we saw was brought away by a friend of our informant just
after the offering.