rding a very original if not quite harmonious performance.

As regards the Petrofski Park, the truth is it is a famous resort for
reckless pleasure-seekers, and largely made up of the demi-monde,
where scenes anything but decorous are presented to the eyes of
strangers during the afternoons and the long summer twilight. But
those who wish to see and study "life," fast life, have only to visit
the Chateaux des Fleurs, or Marina-Rostcha, which are also in the
environs of the town. As in Vienna, Berlin, and Paris, the police,
who cannot suppress these resorts, strive to control them so far that
they shall not outrage openly the conventionalities of society. Human
nature is much the same all over the world, though its coarsest
features are more obtruded upon observation in some lands than in
others. In extensive travel and experience, the author has learned
that it is not always in semi-barbarous countries that grossness and
indecency will be found most to prevail. It must be admitted that
there are temples of vice in Moscow which for ingenuity of
temptation, and lavish and gilded display, are not equalled elsewhere
in Europe.

Under the shadow of the spacious and lofty tower which forms a
reservoir for the distribution of water for the domestic use of the
citizens, there is held in the open square each Sabbath day what is
called "The Market," but which might better be designated a weekly
fair, a sort of Nijni-Novgorod upon a small scale. Here Jew and
Gentile, Asiatic and European, exchange their goods or sell to the
citizens. There are confectioners, jewellers, clothiers, hard-ware
merchants, dried-fruit venders, fancy-dry-good dealers, tea-booths,
tin and earthenware tables,--in short, every domestic article that
can be named is here offered for sale. The crowd is great, the Babel
of voices deafening, the hustling incessant, occasional quarrels
being inevitable. Now one meets a group of courteous, well-dressed
people, now an itinerant in rags, now a bevy of boisterous girls and
boys, now a long-haired and bearded priest; some are sober, many are
drunk. Alas! Sunday is here a day of drunkenness. Speaking plainly
upon this subject, there are more intoxicated persons to be seen in
the streets of Moscow on the Sabbath than the author has ever
encountered upon any day of the week in any other capital. At this
Sunday-fair articles are offered at popular prices, presumed to be
much lower than is charged by regular merchants wh