d _mujik_ is drafted into the army, and in a few weeks attains a
precision of movement more like an automaton than a human being. He
becomes a trader, and the Jews themselves can not match him in cunning and
artifice.

The _mujik_ is a thoroughly good-tempered fellow. Address him kindly, and
his face unbends at once, and you will find that he takes a sincere
delight in doing you a kindness. In no capital of Europe are the
temptations to crimes against the person so numerous as in St. Petersburg,
with its broad lonely streets, unlighted at night, and scantily patrolled;
but in no capital are such crimes of so rare occurrence.

But the _mujik_ has two faults. He is a thorough rogue, and a great
drunkard. He will cheat and guzzle from sheer love for the practices; and
without the least apparent feeling that there is any thing out of the way
in so doing. But in his cups he is the same good-natured fellow. The
Irishman or Scotchman when drunk is quarrelsome and pugnacious; the German
or the Englishman, stupid and brutal; the Spaniard or Italian, revengeful
and treacherous. The first stages of drunkenness in the _mujik_ are
manifested by loquacity. The drunker he is the more gay and genial does he
grow; till at last he is ready to throw himself upon the neck of his worst
enemy and exchange embraces with him. When the last stage has been
reached, and he starts for his home, he does not reel, but marches
straight on, till some accidental obstruction trips him up into the mire,
where he lies unnoticed and unmolested till a policeman takes charge of
him. This misadventure is turned to public advantage, for by an old custom
every person, male or female, of what grade soever, taken up drunk in the
street by the police, is obliged the next day to sweep the streets for a
certain number of hours. In our early rambles we often came across a
woeful group thus improving the ways of others, in punishment for having
taken too little heed of their own.

_In vino veritas_ may perhaps be true of the juice of the grape; but it is
not so of the bad brandy which is the favorite drink of the _mujik_. He is
never too drunk to be a rogue, but yet you do not look upon his roguery as
you do upon that of any other people. He never professes to be honest; and
does not see any reason why he should be so. He seems so utterly
unconscious of any thing reprehensible in roguery, that you unconsciously
give him the benefit of his ignorance. If he victimizes