prefect has died.

Court carriages with lackeys in crimson and gold, ambassadors' sledges
with cock-plumed chasseurs and cockaded coachmen, the latter wearing
their chevrons on their backs; rude wooden sledges, whose sides are made
of knotted ropes, filled with superfluous snow; grand ducal _troikas_
with clinking harnesses studded with metal plaques and flying tassels,
the outer horses coquetting, as usual, beside the staid trot of the
shaft-horse,--all mingle in the endless procession which flows on up
the Nevsky Prospekt through the Bolshaya Morskaya,--Great Sea
Street,--and out upon the Neva quays, and back again, to see and be
seen, until long after the sun has set on the short days, at six minutes
to three. A plain sledge approaches. The officer who occupies it is
dressed like an ordinary general, and there are thousands of generals!
As he drives quietly along, police and sentries give him the salute of
the ordinary general; so do those who recognize him by his face or his
Kazak orderly. It is the Emperor out for his afternoon exercise. If we
meet him near the gate of the Anitchkoff Palace, we may find him sitting
placidly beside us, while our sledge and other sledges in the line are
stopped for a moment to allow him to enter.

Here is another sledge, also differing in no respect from the equipages
of other people, save that the lackey on the low knife-board behind
wears a peculiar livery of dark green, pale blue, and gold (or with
white in place of the green at Easter-tide). The lady whose large dark
eyes are visible between her sable cap and the superb black fox shawl of
her crimson velvet cloak is the Empress. The lady beside her is one of
her ladies-in-waiting. Attendants, guards, are absolutely lacking, as in
the case of the Emperor.

Here, indeed, is the place to enjoy winter. The dry, feathery snow
descends, but no one heeds it. We turn up our coat collars and drive on.
Umbrellas are unknown abominations. The permanent marquises, of light
iron-work, which are attached to most of the entrances, are serviceable
only to those who use closed carriages, and in the rainy autumn.

Just opposite the centre of this thronged promenade, well set back from
the street, stands the Cathedral of the Kazan Virgin. Outside, on the
quay of the tortuous Katherine Canal, made a navigable water-way under
the second Katherine, but lacking, through its narrowness, the
picturesque features of the Fontanka, flocks of pigeons are