spurs and sabres meet us at
every turn; and in the centre of all, under a huge spreading tree
planted years before any Russian had set foot in Turkestan, sits a
towering form whose vast proportions and bold swarthy face seem to dwarf
every other figure in the group. Twelve years ago, General Kolpakovski
was a private soldier in the Russian army: to-day he is the commander of
thirty thousand men and absolute master of a territory as large as the
States of New York and Pennsylvania together.

"Fine fellow, isn't he?" says my conductor, looking admiringly at the
stalwart form of his chief. "Did you ever hear of his ride across the
steppes from here to Kouldja? He started with twelve Tartars, and you
know what horsemen _they_ are. Well, three of them broke down the first
day, five more the second, and all the rest on the third; and the
general got in by himself. Ever since then the Tartars have called him
'The Chief with the Iron Skin;' and the soldiers go about singing,

Kolpakovski molodetz--
Fsadnik Tatarski--glupetz!

("Kolpakovski's a fine fellow: the Tartar horseman is a fool.")

"Well done!"

"Ay, and he did a better thing still two years ago. He was crossing the
mountains with a Cossack squadron in the heat of summer. Presently up
comes one fellow: 'Your Excellency, my horse is lame.'--'Go back,
then.'--Another man, seeing that, thought he'd get off the same way; so
_he_ calls out, 'My horse is lame, Your Excellency.'--'Get off and lead
him, then,' says Kolpakovski; and the unfortunate fellow had to tramp up
hill all day, and tow his horse after him into the bargain, with the
thermometer ninety-five in the shade."

But just at this moment my name is called, and I go up to the general's
chair, to receive a cordial handshake, a few words of frank, manly
kindness, and the passport which is to carry me northward across the
steppes as far as the border of Siberia.

D.K.

LITERATURE OF THE DAY.

Memoir of William Francis Bartlett. By Francis Winthrop Palfrey. Boston:
Houghton, Osgood & Co.

The Story of my Life. By the late Colonel Meadows Taylor. Edited by his
Daughter. With a Preface by Henry Reeve. London: William Blackwood &
Sons.

We put these two books together, not on account of any similarity in the
scenes and events, the characters and careers, depicted in them, but
because each in its way brings under a strong light the qualities on
which nations rely in seasons of peril and eme