her and
climate, whom I saw on a bleak common in Poland, lying on the road,
helpless, shivering, and hardly having wherewithal to cover his
nakedness? I pitied the poor soul: though I felt the severity of the air
myself, I threw my mantle over him, and immediately I heard a voice from
the heavens, blessing me for that piece of charity, saying--

"You will be rewarded, my son, for this in time."

I went on: night and darkness overtook me. No village was to be seen.
The country was covered with snow, and I was unacquainted with the road.

Tired, I alighted, and fastened my horse to something like a pointed
stump of a tree, which appeared above the snow; for the sake of safety I
placed my pistols under my arm, and laid down on the snow, where I slept
so soundly that I did not open my eyes till full daylight. It is not
easy to conceive my astonishment to find myself in the midst of a
village, lying in a churchyard; nor was my horse to be seen, but I heard
him soon after neigh somewhere above me. On looking upwards I beheld him
hanging by his bridle to the weather-cock of the steeple. Matters were
now very plain to me: the village had been covered with snow overnight;
a sudden change of weather had taken place; I had sunk down to the
churchyard whilst asleep, gently, and in the same proportion as the snow
had melted away; and what in the dark I had taken to be a stump of a
little tree appearing above the snow, to which I had tied my horse,
proved to have been the cross or weather-cock of the steeple!

Without long consideration I took one of my pistols, shot the bridle
in two, brought the horse, and proceeded on my journey. [Here the Baron
seems to have forgot his feelings; he should certainly have ordered his
horse a feed of corn, after fasting so long.]

He carried me well--advancing into the interior parts of Russia. I found
travelling on horseback rather unfashionable in winter, therefore I
submitted, as I always do, to the custom of the country, took a single
horse sledge, and drove briskly towards St. Petersburg. I do not exactly
recollect whether it was in Eastland or Jugemanland, but I remember that
in the midst of a dreary forest I spied a terrible wolf making after me,
with all the speed of ravenous winter hunger. He soon overtook me. There
was no possibility of escape. Mechanically I laid myself down flat in
the sledge, and let my horse run for our safety. What I wished, but
hardly hoped or expected, happened