ty on its shores, and flowing on with
stately dignity, as if it would not be hurried from its calm
consciousness of its own strength and significance for those nine
provinces through which it passes on its way to the Caspian. I felt its
spell at once, and, as I crossed the great bridge over which the
Trans-Siberian line is carried--an exquisite piece of engineering a mile
and a quarter in length--I knew that I should always feel a curious
sense of personality in connection with that glorious river. I think
Merriman, in one of his novels, speaks of associating a sense of
consciousness with the Volga; and that is just what I have felt each
time of crossing over its bounteous-looking, calm, and steady flow. It
seems to live and know.

The third and last "difficulty" which I will speak of in this opening
chapter, and which is no difficulty at all, is the passport. Every one
in Russia must possess one; and, if travelling and intending to spend
one or two nights in a place, it must be sent to the proper official and
be duly stamped. It must be _vised_ by the Russian ambassador, or
minister, at the place from which one starts before entering Russia;
and, which is even more important, it must be _vised_ by the right
official at some important town or place of government, and stamped with
the necessary permission, before one is able to _leave_ Russia.

It is natural to feel at the frontier, when entering the country, "I
hope it is all right," as the passport is handed to the customs officer,
and, with just a little approach to anxious uncertainty, after all one
has heard and read; but it is almost impossible to avoid real anxiety
that it will be found correct and in order as it is presented at the
frontier when _leaving_, as the difficulties of being kept back there,
so far away from the great cities, would be far greater than those of
being refused _admission_ from some technicality that could probably be
put right by a telegram to and from England.

"But surely the passport must prevent you from feeling that sense of
freedom that you have spoken of more than once--surely _that_ must give
a sense of repression and suspicion and being watched and having an eye
kept on your doings," my reader will be thinking, and perhaps many other
people have the same feeling. It is, however, exactly the opposite with
me, for my passport in Russia and Siberia is a great stand-by, and gives
me a great sense of being always able to establish my