as he was of the city. In this extremity
he called another driver to his aid, who spoke just the words of
English, "Gooda-morkig!" "Good-morning," said I. From this the
conversation lapsed at once into remote depths of Russian. In despair
I got out of the drosky and walked along the street, looking up at all
the signs--the driver after me with his drosky, apparently watching to
see that I did not make my escape. At length I espied a German name on
a bakery sign. How familiar it looked in that desert of unintelligible
Russian--like a favorite quotation in a page of metaphysics. I went in
and spoke German--_vie gaetz?_ You are aware, perhaps, that I excel in
that language. I asked the way to the United States Consulate. The
baker had probably forgotten his native tongue, if ever he knew it at
all, for I could get nothing out of him but a shake of the head and
_nicht furstay_. However, he had the goodness, seeing my perplexity,
to put on his hat and undertake to find the consul's, which, by dint
of inquiry, he at length ascertained to be about half a mile distant.
We walked all the way, this good old baker and I, he refusing to ride
because there was only room for one, and I not liking to do so and let
him walk. The drosky-man followed in the rear, driving along very
leisurely, and with great apparent comfort to himself. He leaned back
in his seat with much gusto, and seemed rather amused than otherwise
at our movements. At length we reached the consulate. It was about
three hundred yards from my original point of departure. Any other man
in existence than my istrovoschik would have sunk into the earth upon
seeing me make this astounding discovery. I knew it by certain
landmarks--a church and a garden. But he did not sink into the earth.
He merely sat on his drosky as cool as a cucumber. I felt so grateful
to the worthy baker, who was a fat old gentleman, and perspired freely
after his walk, that I gave him thirty kopecks. The drosky-man claimed
forty kopecks, just double his fare. I called in the services of an
interpreter, and protested against this imposition. The interpreter
and the drosky-man got into an animated dispute on the question, and
must have gone clear back to the fundamental principles of droskyism,
for they seemed likely never to come to an end. The weather was warm,
and both kept constantly wiping their faces, and turning the whole
subject over and over again, without the slightest probability of an
equit