. The spacious and brilliantly lighted apartment, draped with
flags and decorated with evergreens; the polished dancing-floor;
the crash and blare of the music furnished by a military band; the
beautiful women in rich evening toilettes; and the throng of handsome
young officers in showy and diversified uniforms, simply overwhelmed
us with feelings of mingled excitement and embarrassment. I felt,
myself, like a uniformed Eskimo at a Charity Ball, and should have
been glad to skulk in a corner behind the band! All I wanted was an
opportunity to watch, unobserved, the brilliant picture of colour and
motion, and to feel the thrill of the music as the band swept, with
wonderful dash, swing, and precision, through the measures of a
spirited Polish mazurka. General Kukel, however, had other views
for us, and not only took us about the hall, introducing us to more
beautiful women than we had seen, we thought, in the whole course of
our previous existence, but said to every lady, as he presented us:
"Mr. Kennan and Mr. Price, you know, speak Russian perfectly." Price,
with discretion beyond his years, promptly disclaimed the imputed
accomplishment; but I was rash enough to admit that I did have some
knowledge of the language in question, and was forthwith drawn into a
stream of rapid Russian talk by a young woman with sympathetic face
and sparkling eyes, who encouraged me to describe dog-sledge travel
in north-eastern Asia and the vicissitudes of tent life with the
Wandering Koraks. On this conversational ground I felt perfectly at
home; and I was succeeding, as I thought, admirably, when the girl
suddenly blushed, looked a trifle shocked, and then bit her lip in
a manifest effort to restrain a smile of amusement not warranted by
anything in the life that I was trying to describe. She was soon
afterward carried away by a young Cossack officer who asked her to
dance, and I was promptly engaged in conversation by another lady, who
also wanted "to hear an American talk Russian." My self-confidence had
been a little shaken by the blush and the amused smile of my previous
auditor, but I rallied my intellectual forces, took a firm grip of my
Russian vocabulary, and, as Price would say, "sailed in." But I soon
struck another snag. This young woman, too, began to show symptoms
of shock, which, in her case, took the form of amazement. I was
absolutely sure that there was nothing in the subject-matter of my
remarks to bring a blush to the