hot bricks or water-bottles, as the Canadians do, for their feet, but
wear very thick fur boots, made of ample size, so as in no way to impede
the circulation of the blood. A tight boot is painful and dangerous,
and many a person in consequence has lost a foot, even his life. When
walking, India-rubber goloshes are worn, which are taken off when a
person enters a house. A very large thick fur cloak, in which a person
is completely enveloped, is worn when travelling. It is thrown down in
a corner as soon as a person enters a house, where it lies like a heap
of dirty clothes.

Spitting is as common among all classes as we heat that it is in
America. Carpets have only of late years been introduced into the
houses of the opulent, but people spit over them just as they did over
their brick floors. A refined sort of spittoon has been introduced,
with a high handle. By touching a spring the lid flies open, and drops
again when made use of. Uncle Giles says the inventor would have done
better to have invented some means of breaking his countrymen off a
dirty habit; perhaps, however, the hot air in the rooms, and the sharp
air outside, may have something to do with it.

The English here say that the habits of social life among the Russians
have very much improved since they mixed with them: I do not know what
view the Russians take of the case.

Thirty years ago, palaces and public offices were alike dirty in the
extreme; but the Emperor Alexander, after his visit to England,
introduced great improvements. Now the public offices at Saint
Petersburg, at all events, are kept fairly clean. I do not think,
however, that the housemaid has got so far south as Moscow; it is too
holy a place, in a Russian's idea, to make cleanliness necessary.

An English friend told us that once upon a time he went to pay a visit
to a great man, who lived in a great house. The entrance-hall was
unspeakably dirty; round it, against the walls, were a number of
ottomans, on which slept numerous shock-headed, sandal-footed,
long-coated, red-shirted serfs, with their master's fur cloaks rolled up
as pillows. The next hall was scarcely cleaner. The third was
gorgeously furnished, but no neat-handed housemaid, apparently, ever
entered to sweep the floors or brush away the cobwebs. An ante-room was
a shade better; while the great man's private chamber looked really
comfortable, as if he had imbibed a sufficient regard for cleanliness to
keep