res are still brought up in the houses of the Russian nobility,
as if to preserve a specimen of those Tartars who were conquered by
the Sclavonians. In the palace of Narischkin there were two or three
of these half-savage Calmucks running about. They are agreeable
enough in their infancy, but at the age of twenty they lose all the
charms of youth: obstinate, though slaves, they amuse their masters
by their resistance, like a squirrel fighting with the wires of his
cage. It was painful to look at this specimen of the human race
debased; I thought I saw, in the midst of all the pomp of luxury, an
image of what man may become, when he derives no dignity either from
religion or the laws, and this spectacle was calculated to humble
the pride which the enjoyments of splendor may inspire.

Long carriages for promenade, drawn by the most beautiful horses,
conducted us, after dinner, into the park. It was now the end of
August, but the sun was pale, the grass of an almost artificial
green, because it was only kept up by unremitting attention. The
flowers themselves appeared to be an aristocratic enjoyment, so much
expense was required to have them. No warbling of birds was heard in
the woods, they did not trust themselves to this summer of a moment;
neither were any cattle observable in the meadows: one could not
dare to give them plants which had required such pains to cultivate.
The water scarcely flowed, and only by the help of machines which
brought it into the gardens, where the whole of this nature had the
air of being a festival decoration, which would disappear when the
guests retired. Our caliches stopped in front of a building in the
garden, which represented a Tartar camp; there, all the musicians
united began a new concert: the noise of horns and cymbals quite
intoxicated the ideas. The better to complete this entire banishment
of thinking, we had an imitation, during summer, of their sledges,
the rapidity of which consoles the Russians for their winter; we
rolled upon boards, from the top of a mountain in wood with the
quickness of lightning. This amusement charmed the ladies as much as
the gentlemen, and allowed them to participate a little in those
pleasures of war, which consist in the emotion of danger, and in the
animated promptitude of all the movements. Thus passed the time; for
every day saw a renewal of what appeared to me to be a fete. With
some slight differences, the greater part of the great houses of