d who accompanied me. When we had driven about three-fourths of
the way we met a peasant-woman, who gesticulated violently, and shouted
something to us as we passed. I did not hear what she said, but my
friend turned to me and said in an alarming tone--we had been
speaking German--"Mein Gott! Ihre Nase ist abgefroren!" Now the word
"abgefroren," as the reader will understand, seemed to indicate that
my nose was frozen off, so I put up my hand in some alarm to discover
whether I had inadvertently lost the whole or part of the member
referred to. It was still in situ and entire, but as hard and insensible
as a bit of wood.

"You may still save it," said my companion, "if you get out at once and
rub it vigorously with snow."

I got out as directed, but was too faint to do anything vigorously. My
fur cloak flew open, the cold seemed to grasp me in the region of the
heart, and I fell insensible.

How long I remained unconscious I know not. When I awoke I found myself
in a strange room, surrounded by dragoon officers in uniform, and the
first words I heard were, "He is out of danger now, but he will have a
fever."

These words were spoken, as I afterwards discovered, by a very competent
surgeon; but the prophecy was not fulfilled. The promised fever never
came. The only bad consequences were that for some days my right hand
remained stiff, and for a week or two I had to conceal my nose from
public view.

If this little incident justifies me in drawing a general conclusion, I
should say that exposure to extreme cold is an almost painless form
of death; but that the process of being resuscitated is very painful
indeed--so painful, that the patient may be excused for momentarily
regretting that officious people prevented the temporary insensibility
from becoming "the sleep that knows no waking."

Between the alternate reigns of winter and summer there is always a
short interregnum, during which travelling in Russia by road is
almost impossible. Woe to the ill-fated mortal who has to make a long
road-journey immediately after the winter snow has melted; or, worse
still, at the beginning of winter, when the autumn mud has been
petrified by the frost, and not yet levelled by the snow!

At all seasons the monotony of a journey is pretty sure to be broken by
little unforeseen episodes of a more or less disagreeable kind. An axle
breaks, or a wheel comes off, or there is a difficulty in procuring
horses. As an illustration of