ng them. The well-known Count Sheremetieff, however, who
owns some of the richest merchants and shopkeepers in Saint Petersburg,
will not consent to emancipate any one of them, although some have
offered him large sums for their freedom. He is content with a small
annual payment as tribute. When he dies, however, if his successor is
avaricious, their condition may be very much changed.

"The Greek is the Established Church of Russia. The priests are as a
class illiterate, and but little removed above the mujicks in their
habits of life. A priest is expected to marry, but can only marry one
wife. When she dies, he enters the monastic order. His sons enter the
clerical seminaries, and his daughters marry priests, while another
takes his vicarage. When a priest dies, or becomes a widower, and
leaves a grown-up daughter, the living is generally given to some
candidate for holy orders who pleases the young lady, and who is willing
to marry her. Thus the clergy have become almost a separate class, the
office descending from father to son. The value of livings is very
small, seldom surpassing 15 pounds per annum. The priests are in
general held in very little respect by all classes, even by the
peasants, who, however, kiss their hands when they meet them, and often
have a feeling of regard for them. There are numerous dissenters, who
are frequently treated with the most bitter persecution by the orthodox
Church.

"The _Pameshtchiks_ or landed proprietors may be divided into two
classes,--those who have vast estates, and, honoured by titles, live
chiefly at courts, while they commit their affairs to the charge of
stewards; and those who reside on their property and look after it
themselves. The former are generally polished in their manners,
well-informed, and luxurious in their habits, and are courtiers,
diplomatists, or naval or military commanders. Though they occasionally
visit their estates, when they keep up considerable pomp and ceremony,
they reside chiefly in the capital.

"The landlord who lives entirely on his property is of a very different
character, and thoroughly unlike an old English gentleman of the same
social rank. Supremely indolent and unintellectual, he thinks of
nothing but how he can most easily kill time. When he awakes in the
morning, his attendant slave brings him his pipe, and he smokes till his
first meal of tea and rusks is prepared; his bailiff then comes and
makes his daily rep