Journey to Moscow--Russian Railway--Passengers--Mr Evergreen and his
Hat-box--Refreshment Rooms--Scenes on the Road--Polite Spy--First View
of Moscow--Unromantic Mode of Entering it--Hotel Chollet--The Chinese
City--The Kremlin--The Great Bazaar--Cathedral of Saint Basil--The
Holy Gate--Great Bell of Moscow--Tower of Ivan Veleki--Wonderful View
from the Summit--The Tulip City.
"And now, my boys, we may pack up and be off for Moscow," exclaimed
Cousin Giles as they reached the Gostiniza Benson, after settling all
the preliminary passport business, without which no one, either of high
or low degree, subject or foreigner, can move from one city to another
in the empire of the Czar. There is no great difficulty in this
passport business, and no great annoyance; but still it is apt to ruffle
the temper of the most mild and patient men, to have to spend the whole
of one day, during their stay in each place, in performing a task which
might well be dispensed with, not to speak of having to disburse several
roubles on each occasion; it is not, therefore, surprising that
everybody who writes about Russia should grumble at the system, and
occupy many pages in abusing it.
The Moscow railroad station is at the end of the Nevsky Prospect. The
travellers reached it soon after ten o'clock. Only one train started in
the day, so that to miss it was to lose a day. The building is a fine
one. It is entirely under Government superintendence, and the
stationmaster, and ticket-clerks, and porters, and policemen, and guards
are all in military uniform; it makes a person very much inclined to
behave himself. A passenger must get to the station in good time, for
there are all sorts of preliminaries to be gone through. One cannot
jump out of a cab, rush to the ticket-office, sing out, "Porter, bring
along my luggage!" jump into a carriage, and away to Edinburgh or
Holyhead without a question being asked;--oh no! People do not go ahead
quite so fast in the kingdom of the Czar. Before a ticket can be got,
the passport must be shown at one office, where it is stamped; then one
goes over to another office, where it is examined and the ticket
granted,--all in the most deliberate way, rather trying to a person who
fancies that he is late. Then the luggage must be taken to another
place, and a ticket bought for it, and paid for according to the number
of articles; then it must be delivered over the counter at another
place; and lastly, the perplexed traveller is allowed to go on the
platform and select his seat. The carriages are very long, the
entrance, after the American model, being at each end, where there is a
platform, a passage running down the whole length of the carriage, so
that people can pass from one end of the train to the other. The
second-class have seats arranged in rows like those in a church, and are
not very comfortable for a long journey; but the first-class are more
luxurious: at each end there is a small ante-room, then a saloon with
ottomans round it, and the centre compartment is full of large,
luxurious arm-chairs, far enough apart to allow long-legged men to
stretch their legs to the full. The windows are large, and of plate
glass, which, as Harry observed, would be very convenient if there was
anything to look at out of them. Our friends had arranged themselves in
one of the centre compartments, and the lime of departure was at hand,
when Mr Evergreen made his appearance on the platform in a state of
great agitation, first turning to one moustached fierce-looking
official, then to another, appealing in vain to know, as it appeared,
what had become of parts of his luggage.
"Does any one know the Russian for hat-box?" he exclaimed.
"Hatboxichoff! Hatboxichoff!" he cried in piteous accents. "Dear me,
dear me--there are all my writing things in it, and my letters, and my
money, and my best hat, and my gloves; and I shall be sent to prison as
an impostor, and not be able to appear decent at the coronation, and
have no means of paying my bills, and be starved, and--"
At that moment he caught sight of Cousin Giles' face. His countenance
brightened up. "Oh, Mr Fairman, I am so glad to see you!--can you help
me?" he cried.
Cousin Giles asked to see his luggage ticket, and, finding that the same
number of packages which he possessed in all were marked on it, assured
him that there could be no doubt his hat-box was safe.
Thus assured in his mind, Mr Evergreen took his seat. The ticket is a
long strip of paper, with the names of the chief places on the road
marked on it, and the fares to each of them. The passengers having
taken their places, the military officials waved their hands, and the
long train began to move.
The view as they left the city was not interesting. Some large
red-brick houses appeared above the low huts in the outskirts, with a
large reed-bordered lagoon, and a wide extent of dead level covered with
low shrubs or rank dry grass. The distance to Moscow is about five
hundred versts, nearly four hundred miles, and for the whole of that
distance there is very little improvement towards picturesque beauty.
Now and then, to be sure, they came to woods of birch or fir, but the
trees were small and widely scattered; still the chief feature was a
dead flat covered with scrub.
Russia, however, is very far from being a barren and unfruitful country.
There are large tracts near its numerous rivers which yield an abundant
harvest of all descriptions of corn, and there are forests full of the
finest trees, whilst fruits of many descriptions also are produced.
This particular road, however, gives a stranger a very unfavourable
impression of the country; still there were many things to interest our
friends. About a mile, it seemed, from each other were little oblong
wooden cottages, with a square enclosure in the rear and a platform in
front, all so exactly alike that Harry said they looked as if they had
been taken out of some Dutch brobdignag toy-box and placed along the
road. In front of each hut, as the train passed along, appeared a
guard, presenting arms with an iron-headed pike; and so exactly did one
look like the other that Harry said he was certain there must be some
spring underground which made them all pop up as the train passed along.
There must be at least five hundred along the line--every hut, man,
cap, pike, and greatcoat formed after the same model; there were guards,
also, at all the signal stations. Whenever, also, the train stopped, a
fierce-looking guard, in the uniform of the French gendarmes,--
bright-blue coats, helmets, and silver ornaments,--stood immoveable as
sentries before each of the carriages, to prevent people from doing
anything they ought not to do: altogether there seemed to be a very
wholesome discipline established along the line. At all the
stopping-places there were a number of Swiss-looking cottages,
apparently newly erected; while the bridges and palings, and flights of
steps and banisters, and refreshment booths, and vast long sheds in
which heaps of logs were piled up, all looked as if they had been made
in Switzerland, and were exactly like the models which come in neat
white wooden boxes to England from that country of mountains and snow.
They were very neat, and pretty, and picturesque, but certainly did not
look as if they belonged to the place.
At every station there are refreshments of some sort. Our friends
observed fruits, raspberries, strawberries, and peaches, though of an
untempting appearance and very dear; and also cakes of various forms,
bread, beer, and of course quass.
At all the larger stations there are large, long, handsome refreshment
rooms, equal in appearance to those at the large stations in England,--
there is one for each class. At one of these they stopped for
three-quarters of an hour, when a good dinner was served at about
half-past four. They did not note the name of the place, but Harry
suggested that it must have been _Chudova_, which was one of the
principal places on the road.
_Chew_!
"Oh, oh, Harry!" exclaimed Fred as he heard his brother's atrocious pun.
The tea is excellent at these places; a tumblerful costs ten kopecks,
but a regular tea costs thirty, about fifteen-pence; indeed, the charges
are much the same as in England. Probably at home, more substantial and
better fare is to be got at the same price.
As soon as the train stops, out get all the passengers, and a very
motley assemblage they form as they pace up and down on the platform.
Uniforms of all sorts predominate, from the modern-coated, richly-laced
officer of the Emperor's guard, to the sombre-dressed rank and file of
the line. There were Circassians and Georgians, and Cossacks of the Don
and Volga, and other remote districts, in blue and silver coats, fur
caps with red tops, and wide trousers, and yellow boots, and gauntlets
on their hands, and jewelled daggers, and chain armour, and carved
scimitars, with black, flashing eyes, and thickly curling glossy beards
and moustaches, their language as well as their appearance telling of
far-off southern regions, which have succumbed before the arms or the
diplomacy of Russia. Then there were Armenians and Persians, men of
peace, intent only on making money, with high-pointed fur caps, long
gowns, full, dark trousers, and waists belted not to carry swords, but
inkhorns; and Tartars with turbans, and rich shawls, and
gold-embroidered slippers; and priests with low-crowned, broad-brimmed
hats, beneath which straggled huge quantities of long light hair, and
long green coats, and crosses rather ostentatiously shown at their
breasts. There were traders, too, from the northern cities of the
Empire, dressed in long dressing-gown-looking coats, more properly
described as dirty than clean, and high boots, and low-crowned hats, and
beards of considerable length and thickness; while the humbler classes,
the mujicks, evidently delighted in pink shirts with their tails worn
outside their trousers, and fastened round their waist with a sash or
belt. These wore caps, and high boots, and long coats, like the rest;
indeed, the inhabitants of Russia may be said to be a long-coated,
boot-wearing population. There were women passengers, but there was
nothing very peculiar in their appearance. The upper classes wore
bonnets, and the lower had handkerchiefs tied over their heads, or caps,
with thick-padded cloaks. They all had brought huge leather pillows,
and cloaks, and shawls, to make themselves comfortable in the carriages.
No sooner did the train stop than all the men lighted their cigars and
pipes, and began to puff away most assiduously. Our friends were much
amused at seeing a servant bring his master, an old gentleman, his pipe
at every station. It was the servant's business not only to light it
but to draw it up, and the cunning rogue took good care to get as many
whiffs out of it as possible before he removed it from his own mouth.
"That's what I call smoking made easy," said Harry. "I've heard of a
man being another's mouthpiece, and this old gentleman seems to make use
of his serf for the same purpose."
Some of the priests wore fur caps and dark gowns, and others had on
broad-brimmed hats and green gowns, with dark overcoats; some had
several crosses on their breasts, frizzy or straggling hair being common
to all. One of them, who was in a first-class carriage, pulled out a
comb and began combing his beard and hair with great assiduity--an
operation more pleasant, doubtless, to himself than to his neighbours.
There was a fine Abasian officer--Abasia is a province bordering on the
Caucasus, conquered by the Russians. He wore a black fur cap with a
red-and-white top to it,--night-cap fashion,--a white coat with
cartridge cases in the breast and trimmed and lined with fur, a
silver-lace belt round his waist, white gloves with fur backs, and green
trousers with a silver stripe down the legs; yellow boots, a curved
scimitar behind, and a richly-jewelled dagger in his belt in front
completed his costume. He was a very fine-looking fellow, and was most
evidently aware of the fact. He was on good terms with every one, and
laughed and chatted with all the officers of rank. Such were some of
the companions our friends had on their journey.
Mr Evergreen said that he considered it his duty to taste the tea at
each stopping-place, to ascertain whether it was really superior to any
to be found out of China. At some places he took only a tumblerful, but
at others the samovar, with the little teapot on the top of it, and a
small china cup were placed before him, with a tumbler also. Those who
have not drunk tea out of a tumbler may be assured that it is by far the
best way of taking it to quench thirst. The Americans put a lump of ice
into it, which keeps bobbing up against the nose while the hot tea is
being quaffed--also a very agreeable fashion. The result of all this
tea-drinking was, that poor Evergreen could not manage to close his eyes
when night came on, and the rest of his party went to sleep. After some
hours had passed, he was accosted by an officer in uniform.
"Ah, sir, I see that sleep has fled your eyelids," said the officer in
very good English.
"Oh, yes; but I can do very well without it," replied Evergreen,
delighted to have some one to talk to; "there is always so much to think
about and interest one in a strange country."
"Your first visit here, I presume?" said the stranger.
"Never out of England before," replied Evergreen.
"What do you think of affairs in general in this country?" asked the
stranger.
"Very large country--very fine country--inhabitants very polite. Big
city Saint Petersburg. People may not say exactly what they think, I
hear; but that's nothing to me, you know," observed our friend.
"Oh, that's quite a mistake, my dear sir," replied the stranger; "people
may say exactly what they think, I assure you: no one interferes with
them. Now, for instance, in the friendly way in which we are talking,
one man might unbosom himself to another of his most secret thoughts,
and no harm could come to him."
"Very pleasant state of society; exactly what I like," said Evergreen,
who thereupon, taking the hint, launched forth on several little bits of
his own family history, with which he was fond of entertaining any
casual acquaintance.
The strange officer appeared to be listening attentively, and finally
offered to call upon Evergreen and to show him the lions of Moscow.
Cousin Giles awoke while the conversation was going on, and was
exceedingly amused at what he overheard, especially with the warm way in
which Evergreen accepted the stranger's offer. After the latter had
made numerous inquiries about Cousin Giles, and Fred, and Harry, he got
up and went into another carriage.
"Wonderfully polite man that was who came and talked to me last night,"
observed Evergreen in the morning, after the passengers had rubbed their
eyes and stretched themselves. "I wonder who he can be. A man of some
consequence, I should think."
Among the passengers were some merchants from the north, who had never
before been at Moscow. They had for some time been putting their heads
out of the windows, and as they caught sight of a few gilt domes and
gaily-coloured roofs, and some convents scattered about, which was all
that was visible of the holy city, they began crossing themselves and
bowing most vigorously. This ceremony lasted till the train rushed into
the station. The luggage was handed out as each person presented his
ticket, and Mr Evergreen found, to his delight, that his hat-box was
safe. A vast number of ishvoshtsticks presented their tickets, and
offered their droskies for hire, and, two being selected, away the whole
party rattled through broadish streets, paved with pebbles, up and down
hill, among gardens, and green-roofed houses, and pink, and yellow, and
grey, and blue walls, till they reached their hotel.
They had been recommended to go to that of Monsieur Chollet, in the
Grand Lubianka, and they had no reason to regret their choice. Nowhere
could a more civil, active, attentive landlord be found. Every language
seemed to flow with the greatest ease from his tongue. He would be
talking to three or four customers in German, and English, and Italian,
addressing his wife in French, and scolding his servants in their native
Russian, answering fifty questions, giving advice, and receiving
accounts, all in one breath. He did all sorts of things better than any
one else. He went to market, came back and cooked the dinner, mixed the
salad, and in another instant appeared dressed as if for a ball, and
took his place at the head of the table. His dinners were very good,
somewhat in the German fashion; and his rooms were very comfortable, and
excessively clean for Russia.
As soon as our friends had dressed and breakfasted, they sallied forth
to gain a general view of the city. Evergreen said he thought he ought
to wait for his new acquaintance, who had promised to call; but an
English merchant, who happened to overhear him, assured him that he must
not be delicate on the subject, as the person in question was simply one
of the guards of the train, and that he was employed by the police to
pick up any information he could about passengers.
"Had he thought you a suspicious character, you would certainly have
been honoured by a visit from him," he added.
"Dear me, if I had said anything treasonable, I should have been whirled
off to a dungeon to a certainty," exclaimed poor Evergreen, shuddering
at the thought of the danger he had escaped.
Moscow is one of the most romantic cities in Europe--indeed, there is no
other to be compared with it; but our friends had entered it in so
ordinary, every-day a manner that at first they could hardly persuade
themselves that they had reached a considerable way towards the centre
of Russia, and were really and truly in that far-famed city.
"Now, my boys, we will steer a course for the Kremlin," cried Cousin
Giles, having taken the bearings of their hotel as they walked along the
street called the Grand Lubianka.
Their course was nearly a straight one. In a little time, crossing an
open space, they found themselves before a line of fortified walls, and
a gateway, such as they might have expected to see in a picture of China
or Tartary, with strange-looking eastern turrets, and domes, and roofs
rising within them.
"This must be the Chinese city we have heard of," said Cousin Giles.
So it was. It is a city within a city. It has three sides, the walls
of the Kremlin making the fourth. They passed through the gateway and
found themselves in a narrow street, the buildings on either side of
them having a still more Chinese appearance. On the left was a little
church, with numerous parti-coloured domes, and minarets, and towers,
and outside staircases leading nowhere, and railings, and balconies, and
little excrescences of roofs, altogether forming an edifice much more
like a Chinese than a Christian temple. Close to it, on the left, they
saw a long open space, just inside the walls, crowded with people of the
lowest order, with booths on either side. This was what may be called
the rag fair of Moscow. The booths or shops contain all the articles
either for dress or household purposes used by the mujicks. The sellers
and purchasers were all talking and laughing, and haggling and
chattering away as if the affairs of the nation depended on what they
were about, and yet probably a few kopecks would have paid for any one
of the articles bought or sold. At the end of the street the travellers
came to the entrance of the great bazaar of Moscow, and as they looked
down its numerous long alleys, glazed over at the top, they saw lines of
little shops,--jewellers, and silversmiths, and makers of images, and
hatters, and shoemakers, and tinmen, and trunk-makers, and other workers
in leather, and head-dress makers, and blacksmiths, and toy sellers,--
indeed, it would be difficult to enumerate all the various trades and
handicrafts there represented, each trade being in a row by itself.
Each shop was little more than a recess, with a counter in front of it,
before which the shopmen stood, praising in loud voices their wares, and
inviting passers-by to stop and inspect them. No time, however, was
spent at the bazaar, for across a wide open space appeared a high
pinnacled wall, with a line of curious green-pointed roofed towers, with
golden crescents surmounted by crosses on their summits, and two
gateways up a steep slope. Over the walls appeared a confused mass of
golden and blue-and-silver domes, and spires, and towers, and green
roofs, and crescents, and crosses, and gold and silver chains,
glittering in the sun, altogether forming a scene such as is pictured in
the _Arabian Nights Entertainments_ or other Oriental romances, but such
as one scarcely expects to find within eight days' easy journey of
sober-minded, old, matter-of-fact England.
"That must be the Kremlin," exclaimed Fred. "Well, it is a curious
place!"
"There can be no doubt about it," observed Cousin Giles. "And that gate
to the left, under the high tower, with the lamp and the picture over
it, must be the Holy Gate. Let us go through it. It leads us at once,
I see by the map, to the terrace overlooking the river." As they went
down the place towards the river, they found themselves before a fine
bronze group on a high pedestal.
"Oh, those must be the statues of the two patriots, Posharskoi, the
general who drove away the Tartars, and Minin, the merchant who devoted
his fortune to the support of the army with which the victory was won.
We will read about them by and by," said Cousin Giles.
As they stood there, on their right side were the walls of the Kremlin,
on their left the front of the bazaar, while some way beyond appeared a
most extraordinary-looking church, the Cathedral of Saint Basil. It has
nine domes or cupolas,--one large one in the centre, and eight round it,
each one painted of a different colour, with various ornaments; some are
in stripes, some in checks, some red, some blue, some green, while the
structure on which these domes stand consists of all sorts of ins and
outs; windows, and stairs, and pillars, and arches--all, too, of
different colours, green, and yellow, and red predominating. Harry
looked at it for a minute, and then burst into a fit of laughter.
"Well, that is the funniest building I ever saw," he exclaimed. "It
looks as if it was built up of sentry-boxes, and Hansom's cabs, and
dovecots, and windmills, and pig-sties, and all sorts of other things.
It was built, I see, by Ivan the Cruel, and it is said that he was so
pleased with its strangeness that he put out the eyes of the unfortunate
architect, to prevent his ever building another like it."
"Pleasant gentleman he must have been," observed Evergreen. "A new way
he took to reward merit."
"Rather an old way," said Cousin Giles. "I do not think that any
sovereign would venture on such a proceeding now-a-days."
Putting off their visit to the bizarre little cathedral, they turned to
the right through the Sacred Gate. Mr Evergreen did not observe that
every one passing under it took off his hat, and very nearly got a prod
from the sentry's bayonet for his neglect of that ceremony. The story
goes, that the picture over the gateway was unscorched by fire, and that
the lamp continued burning all the time the French were in occupation of
the city, untrimmed and unattended. A newly-recruited regiment of
soldiers, without arms, were marching through, and it was curious to
observe each man in succession doff his cap and cross himself as he
passed the spot. High and low, rich and poor, all do the same. The
only persons who neglected the duty were some wild-looking, dark-eyed
lads, whose marked features and olive complexions at once proclaimed
them to be Zingari or gipsies, of whom a great number are found in
Russia. Moscow is said, like Rome, to stand on seven hills, of which
that occupied by the Kremlin is the highest. It is not, however, as
much as a hundred feet above the Moscowa, which flows in a horseshoe
form directly to the south of it. It is enclosed by four walls of
irregular length--that at the west end being so short that the space it
occupies is almost triangular. Round the walls are about eighteen
towers, which vary in shape and height, though they all have
high-pointed roofs covered with green tiles. Outside the walls are
gardens with grass, and trees, and gravel walks. In the interior, on
the south side, is a magnificent esplanade and terrace overlooking the
river, and the strange jumble of coloured buildings which compose the
city. The rest of the ground is occupied with a collection of churches
of all shapes and sizes and colours, and towers, and convents, and
palaces. One palace, however, surpasses them all in beauty and size,
though its shining white walls and richly-carved facade and general
bran-new appearance look sadly out of place among all the venerable,
grotesque, many-coloured, odd-shaped, Byzantine edifices which are
dotted about in its neighbourhood. It looks like some huge intruder
into the place, which all the old inhabitants are collecting to put
forth again; or like an emu in a poultry-yard, at which all the
parti-coloured cocks and hens and ducks are crowing, and cackling, and
quacking, in a vain endeavour to frighten him out. It required more
than one visit to the spot before our friends could learn the geography
of the place, and distinguish the numerous churches of all sizes, and
heights, and shapes, and varieties of outside and inside adornment. The
chief, called the Cathedral, has its walls painted with subjects taken
from Scripture, which to the purer taste of Protestants appear shocking
and blasphemous. However, our travellers did not then attend to the
details of the strange occupants of the Kremlin. Their object was to
obtain a comprehensive view of the city from the summit of that gaunt
old monster, the Tower of Ivan Veleki. They first, however, examined
the huge bell which stands on a pedestal at its foot. This bell was
once suspended on the top of a tower, which was burnt, and the bell in
its fall had a little piece broken out of it. When they got up to it,
they found that this little piece was far too heavy for any ten men to
lift, and that the gap it left was big enough for a man to walk through.
The door of the old tower was open, and they mounted a well-conditioned
flight of circular steps towards the summit. Having climbed to the top
of the first flight, they passed through a door into another tower,
where there hung a peal of huge bells,--one more vast than the rest,
which, on being struck, gave forth a wondrously musical sound.
"I should not like to be near that fellow while he was ringing," cried
Harry; "he would make noise enough to deafen a rhinoceros."
They did not stop to hear those famous bells, but climbed on till they
stood high above all the surrounding edifices. As they gazed forth from
the narrow stone balcony which ran round the dome, they beheld rising on
every side a sea of spires, domes, cupolas, minarets, towers, and roofs
of every conceivable colour, shape, and size, not altogether unlike a
vast garden filled with brobdignagian tulips, but with more hues than
any tulip bed ever possessed; and, in addition to the many-coloured
tints of the rainbow, there appeared numberless balls of burnished gold
and silver, glittering brightly in the sun.
Cousin Giles first ascertained their position by his compass. Turning
to the north, they observed in that direction fewer churches, but
numerous villas and lines of wood, with the arid steppe beyond them. To
the south-west arose the Sparrow Hills, those celebrated heights whence
Napoleon and his then victorious army first caught sight of that magic
city which they deemed was soon to be the reward of all their toils, but
yet which, ere many days had passed, was to prove the cause of their
destruction. In the same direction the Moscowa was seen flowing down
towards the city, to circle round a portion of it under the walls of the
Kremlin, and then to run off again at an acute angle to the east. To
the south, on a plain near the banks of the river, rose high above other
buildings the red towers and walls of the Donskoy Convent, several other
convents, carefully painted of different colours, being scattered about.
"The birds which have their nests there can have no fear of mistaking
their proper abodes on their return from their morning flight," observed
Harry, who generally formed quaint notions on what he saw.
Directly below them were the numerous and strange gold, and black, and
blue, and green domes of the churches of the Kremlin,--its dark-green
pointed towers, its wide gravelled esplanade, the roofs of its vast
palaces and public buildings, its belt of turreted walls and gardens
with their green lawns and shade-giving trees; but stranger still was
the city itself, with its thousands of coloured cupolas, turrets, domes,
spires, roofs, and walls. To define this strangeness more clearly,
there were domes of bright-blue, with golden stars and golden chains
hanging from the golden crosses which surmounted them. There were some
domes of size so vast that they looked like huge mountains of gold; some
were of dark blue, and others of green and gold; some were black, and
others shone like burnished steel; some were perfectly white, others
grey, and others of the lightest blue, scarcely to be distinguished from
the tint of the azure expanse amid which they reared their heads, except
by the golden ball and cross and glittering chains above their summits.
Again, some of the domes were of red and green stripes, and some of
bright yellow, and pale yellow, and red; and some towers were surmounted
by gigantic crowns, open and outspreading, as well as globe-like. The
roofs and walls also exhibited a strange difference in their tints,
though green, and red, and black, and grey, and brown predominated among
the first; while the latter were white, and buff, and green, and blue,
and deep red, and pink. Truly it was a strange scene, such as they had
never before beheld, and could scarcely hope to behold elsewhere.
They returned to the top of the tower again in the evening, just as the
setting sun was throwing his glory giving rays across this
richly-jewelled expanse, which shone forth in a perfect blaze of light,
coloured by every hue of which the rainbow can boast.
It is difficult to imagine the vast number of domes and cupolas which
meet the eye in this strange city. There are said to be a thousand
churches, though probably there are not so many. Few of these churches
have less than five domes, and some have ten. Each tower also has a
dome on its top, surmounted by a golden cross and chains. A large
proportion of these domes are covered with gold, and some with sheets of
silver; the others are either black and white, or of the various hues
already described. Moscow may, indeed, most properly be called the
Golden City. The only rule which the church architect here appears to
observe is, to endeavour to make every new church as dissimilar as
possible to every other existing in the city, in colour, shape, and
size; yet they all evidently belong to the same style.
Altogether the venerable Kremlin and the buildings it contains, with the
mass of coloured edifices which surround it, form one of the strangest
architectural jumbles in the universe.