off or take another man, neither proceeding being favorably regarded. If
any one will rid me of Redbeard I will sell him for his passage-money to
America. I am also open to offers for Blackbeard, as he has announced
his intention of lying in wait for me at the door every day, as a cat
sits before a mouse's hole." Vanka (the generic name for all
_izvostchiki_) gets about four dollars or four dollars and a half a
month from his employer, when he does not own his equipage. In return he
is obliged to hand in about a dollar and a quarter a day on ordinary
occasions, a dollar and a half on the days preceding great festivals,
and two dollars and a half on festival days. If he does not contrive to
extract the necessary amount from his fares, his employer extracts it
from his wages, in the shape of a fine. The men told me this. As there
are no fixed rates in the great cities, a bargain must be struck every
time, which begins by the man demanding twice or thrice the proper
price, and ends in your paying it if you are not familiar with accepted
standards and distances, and in selling yourself at open-air auction to
the lowest bidder, acting as your own auctioneer, in case you are
conversant with matters in general.

Foreigners can also study the bargaining process at its best--or worst
--in the purchase of furs. The Neva freezes over, as a rule, about the
middle of November, and snow comes to stay, after occasional light
flurries in September and October, a little later. Sometimes, however,
the river closes as early as the end of September, or as late as within
a few days of Christmas. Or the rain, which begins in October, continues
at intervals into the month of January. The price of food goes up,
frozen provisions for the poorer classes spoil, and more suffering and
illness ensue than when the normal Arctic winter prevails. In spite of
the cold, one is far more comfortable than in warmer climes. The "stone"
houses are built with double walls, three or four feet apart, of brick
or rubble covered with mastic. The space between the walls is filled in,
and, in the newer buildings, apertures with ventilators near the
ceilings take the place of movable panes in the double windows. The
space between the windows is filled with a deep layer of sand, in which
are set small tubes of salt to keep the glass clear, and a layer of
snowy cotton wadding on top makes a warm and appropriate finish. The
lower classes like to decorate their wadding