y did not form a
comfortable couch, and I never envied their conductor.

On the day fixed for our departure we sent our papers to the station
in the forenoon, and were told we could be supplied at sunset or a
little later. This was not to our liking, as we desired to reach the
first station before nightfall. A friend suggested an appeal to the
Master of the post, and together we proceeded to that functionary's
office. An amiable, quiet man he was, and listened to our complaint
with perfect composure. After hearing it he summoned the smotretal
with his book of records, and an animated discussion followed. I
expected to see somebody grow indignant, but the whole affair abounded
in good nature.

The conversation was conducted with the decorum of a school dialogue
on exhibition day. In half an hour by the clock I was told I could
have a troika at once, in consideration of my special passport. "Wait
a little," whispered my friend in French, "and we will have the other
troika for Schmidt."

So I waited, kicking my heels about the room, studying the posters on
the walls, eyeing a bad portrait of the emperor, and a worse one of
the empress, and now and then drawing near the scene of action. The
clerks looked at me in furtive glances. At every pronunciation of my
name, coupled with the word "Amerikansky," there was a general stare
all around. I am confident those attaches of the post office at
Krasnoyarsk had a perfect knowledge of my features.

In exactly another half hour our point and the horses were gained.
When we entered the office it was positively declared there were no
horses to be had, and it was a little odd that two troikas and six
horses, could be produced out of nothing, and each of them at the end
of a long talk. I asked an explanation of the mystery, but was told it
was a Russian peculiarity that no American could understand.

The horses came very promptly, one troika to Schmidt's lodgings and
the other to mine. The servants packed my baggage into the little
telyaga that was to carry me to the first station. Joining Schmidt
with the other team, we rattled out of town on an excellent road, and
left the red hills of Krasnoyarsk. The last object I saw denoting the
location of the town was a church or chapel on a high cliff
overlooking the Yenesei valley. The road lay over an undulating
region, where there were few streams and very little timber. The snow
lay in little patches here and there on the swells least