he greatest nicety,
and the grass borders are kept in the finest condition.

The cost of all this polishing and extreme attention is above 100,000
roubles yearly.

Very odd caprices are exhibited in the decoration of the grounds,
several fanciful towers, a Dutch and Swiss cottage, a Gothic building, a
marble bridge with Corinthian columns, bronze and other statues, and
numerous monuments raised by Alexander to his companions in arms,
intermingled with hermitages, artificial ruins, Roman tombs, grottoes
and waterfalls.

Like almost all other royal buildings in Russia, Tzarskoe owes its
origin to Peter the Great.

He erected the first house here, and planted the avenues of plane trees
with his own hand.

We had a great desire to drive about the grounds, and made several
attempts with the droshky drivers, but could not make ourselves
understood either with regard to the terms or the route we should take.

At length we succeeded in getting a carriage to Pavlofsky, another
imperial residence, by mentioning the name and offering a sum which we
found afterwards was much more than the distance justified. The palace
is not particularly distinguished, and the gardens are resorted to as a
sort of Vauxhall, with bands of music and other similar entertainments.

Among other public buildings at St. Petersburg should be mentioned the
Exchange.

A stately flight of steps leads to this great hall, which is lighted
from above; on both sides are spaces in the form of arcades. In one of
the first stands an altar with a lamp constantly burning for the benefit
of the pious Russian merchants, who always bow to the altar and
sometimes prostrate themselves to implore the favour of some favourite
saint to prosper their undertakings.

Here I may mention the several sorts of money circulating in this
country. One hundred kopecks make a rouble, about 3s. 4d. English money,
always used as the basis in commercial transactions; a few silver coins,
25, 30, 50, and a few 100 kopecks, but of the last these generally
appear in notes of 1, 3, 5, 10, and 20 roubles; some coppers, 1/4 to 3
kopecks.

The gold coins are the imperial, half imperial, and one between, but
these we did not see, being, we suppose, as Cobbett used to say,
unwilling to associate with dirty ragged companions.

They have a curious mode of reckoning by means of a frame with a number
of parallel wires, on which are strung ten black balls and ten white
balls, or sometimes a