The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1856-12-27 00:00:00

THE PAPAL STATES.

A letter from Bologna, of the 13th inst., states
that an attempt to assassinate Major Zambelli, of
the Carabiners, had been made at Imola. He was
walking with a brother officer when he was fired
at, and the ball struck his cloak. The two officers
pursued the assassin, but he escaped.
The individuals accused of the murder of Count
Lovatelli had arrived at Bologna, and were to be
tried by an Austrian court martial.

NAVAL AND MILITARY INTELLIGENCE.

Her Majesty's steam vessel Oberon, 3, Lieut
Jackson commanding, arrived at Spithead on
Wednesday evening from the Mediterranean.
She made a long passage, having left Malta on
Nov. 26, Gibraltar, Dec. 15, and Cape Finisterre
on the 21st. She experienced heavy weather from
Gibraltar to Cape Finisterre, where she put in for
shelter from a hard gale on the 16th, and sailed on
the 21st. Her voyage from Malta to the Rock
was extremely boisterous. After leaving Cape
Finisterre she had fine weather, She brought
home seven naval invalids from Malta, eight naval
supernumeraries, 17 discharged men from various
ships on the Mediterranean station, and one pri-
vate of the 46th regiment. She will now be paid
off and refitted.

Her Majesty..., screw blockship Pembroke, 60,
commissioned for coastguard service, was tal:en
out of Portsmouth harbour to Spithead on Wed
nesday, and out to the Nab Light to try her
engines, after which she returned to moorings off
Gosport.

Her Majesty's screw steam corvette Satellite,
21, Captain Prevost, sailed from Plymouth on
Tuesday for the Pacific. She conveys Dean Howard
to the island of Madeira, and takes to the Straits
of Magellan a quantity of flour for the missionary
station there.

The crew of the screw steamship Cornwallis, 60,
nt Devonport, got up lower yards and topmasts on
Wednesday. _ _

The African mail steamship Niger, Commander
Corbett, sailed from Plymouth on Wednesday for
Sierra Leone and the West Coast of Afria.

NOTES OF A TOUR FROM MOSCOW TO
THE CRIMEA AND oDESSA.

The Russians complain that the books of travels
which have been written concerning the vast
empire they inhabit abound with misrepresenta•
tions and falsehoods, and are deeply imbued with
prejudice, ignorance,
.and conceit. In order to
prevent sticn charges being preferred against the
notes made by me during an excursion of nearly
three months' duration in the southern part of
Russia, I beg at once to s'ate that I do not pretend
more than to record what I saw, and that whatever
is advanced on hearsay was reported to me by
persons of respectability and character, on whom
the responsibility of these statements must depend;
that I do not venture to offer an philosophic re-
flections on the habits, institutions, or social cons
dition of the people, or propound any theories con-
cerning the governmeni and administration of the
country, but that simply writing what I believe to
be true on the evidence of my own eyesight or
hearing; I leave to others the task of drawing such
conclusions and deductions as they please. The
friends whom I have left behind me in Russia,
must be well aware that I sot out from Mosoo.
without any disposition to regard their countrymen
and institutions with an unfavourable eye, and
they must not be offended if my impressions are
recorded as they were formed, and are expressed
with sincerity and candour. These impressions
may be erroneous, but, at all events, they are
honest, and I must own that, had I gone no
further than Moscow, I should have had a very dif-
ferent notion of the condition of Russian society
from that which I now entertain after a short tour
" off the rail." The grand spectacles of the coro-
nation, the glare of the ballroom, the glitter of
monster reviews, and all the civilized pomp of
Moscow—its French and German shops, its gay
equipages, and orderly streets, dazzled and per-
plexed the judgment. The Russian post-house,
the serf villages, the roads, the soldier on the
march, the post-cart, the country town, the hotel
—these presented another and a very different
aspect of Russian life and manners.
One of the objects I had in view in making the
journey was to judge, as far as the time and means
of observation at my disposal would enable me, of
the condition of the country and of the effects of
the late war upon the mass of the population ;
another was to follow the route of the main body
of the Russian reinforcements as they approached
the Crimea; and a third was to get home as speedily
as possible by a new route,which also afforded oppor
tunities of becoming acquainted,superficially indeed,
but still to some extent accurately, with the physical
aspects and social state of a vast tract which few
strangers have occasion to traverse, and still fewer
think it worth while to describe. In addition to
these motives for undertaking, as it proved, a long
ann not very agreeable journey, an inducement
presented itself, the force of which moved me
powerfully, and which I am sure would exercise
equal influence with any one who had lived so
long with a British army as I had, and who had
passed so many months of mingled joy and
sorrows in the society of friends whose voices
are silent for ever. I wished to revisit our
cemeteries and the scattered monuments and
resting-places of our noble dead, to see with
my own eyes that the Russians had kept their
promise, and to ascertain the present state of
Sebastopol. The prospect of beholding the
plateau on which I have lived for nearly two years
with very little interruption, and which was the
scene of so many events, to be remembered for ever
by all who in the smallest degree participated in
them ; of going over the old ground once more, of
mounting from Balaklava to the front, tracing the
lines of the trenches now fast crumbling away, and
peering about the city of the dead and its sunken
navies, exercised over me a fascination which, if
not strange, is certainly indescribable; and the
chance of doing this might, in all probability, never
come again.
And so I decided that I should proceed home
by the Crimea and Odessa, for we had reason to
believe very confidently that we could find steamers
plying between the ports of the former province and
the latter city, from which three or four routes to
England lay open to the choice of the visitor. The
" we" is a pleasant t eality, and net a newspaper
phrase, for I was fortunate enough to find that my
two companions during the coronation month at
Moscow were willing and anxious to accompany me
and to make the same journey—the one inspired by
a desire to revisit the Crimea, theother actuated by
the natural wish of a young Englishman to behold
the ground which the brilliant valour and the suffer-
ings of his countrymen hive consecrated to the end
of all time. As it would not be possible to procure
permission from the police authorities of Moscow
for such an expedition, undertaken as it was for
pleasure, and not business connected with service
of the State, I applied to our Minister, Lord \\rode-
house, to move the officers of Government to assist
me, and his Lordship, with his usual kindness and
courtesy, at once complied with my request, and
begged M. Tolstoy, adjoint of the Minister of
Foreign Affairs, to give me permission to proceed
into the Crimea. M. Tolstoy, to whom I was per-
sonally known, promised to do what was asked of
him, and in a few days after the first application
forwarded to the Hon Julian Fane, First Secretary
of our Embassy, an "office" which he addressed to
the Governor of the Crimea in our behalf, and of
which we were bearers It was a formidable
looking missive, directed to the " General Major
Jokoffsky, Civil Governor of the Crimea," and was
about a foot square, with a tremendous seal full of
distorted eagles and Cyrillic letters, which is pos-
sibly familiar as being the seal of the Russian
Foreign Office to a good many of our statesmen.
Armed with this we proceeded to the passport
office, a large barracky looking building full of
clerks, all as busy in describing the eyes,
noses, and chins of their fellowmen as Audu-
bon ever was over a rara avis, or Guy'sr on
a new bone. In a few days our passports
would be ready for Simpheropol, the civil head
clerk told us, and he kept his word. The passports
which had been given at the St. Petersburg
Chancellerte of the Minister Dolgorouki were taken
from us, and in their place we received documents
quite illegible to the general, in which "Alexander
Nikolaevitch, Gosondar and Emperator of All the
Russias, in the form of a ukase," ordered all his
subjects to take care of a gentleman with a stout
figure, middling nose, eyes, mouth, &e., and to let
him go, and aid him in going to Simpheropol. For
each of these the charge was about ,the same as
that for our own Foreign office passport—or a
little less. So far we were all right, but the next
thing to be done was to find out some means of
locomotion. There was a diligence going south to
Kharkofl, but all the places were engaged in this
for many days, and, judging from the company we
saw starting in it, and the outward appearance of
the vehicle itself, we were rather pleased than
otherwise at finding that it would be impossible
to get places. It was necessary, therefore, to buy
a carriage of some kind, and all our Russian
friends said, " By all means purchase a tar-
antasse don't get a spring carriage, for if
anything happens to it on the road you will never
get it repaired, whereas any country smith can
mend a tarantasse " And so to buy a tarantosse we
sallied forth, and visited the quarter of long bearded
• coach manufacturers, whom wo discovered to be
quite as advanced in their ideas as to the cost of
their work, and as to hard bargains, as if they had
lived in Long acre all their lives. A tarantasse to
look at is a decent, commodious, quiet sort of family
coach, secured on three long perches, so that the
body, which is placed amidships, so to speak, is
balanced between the fore and hind wheels at some
distance from them, owing to the length of these
perches. I say to look at, but to travel in ! Ah,
when the time comes that horror will be revealed.
They are of all shapes, however—like gigs, cabriolets,
sociables, broughams, watchboxes, soup tureens, all
alike springless, and in that absence of springs, pod
sessing the occult virtues which recommend them
to Russian travellers. The Moscow Long-
acre is a long line of wooden coach sheds of
ono story in height, about half a mile from the
Kremlin, fronting a branch of the Moskau river.
It is unusually infested with saints and pigeons. Of
the former there is always one in each shed, and
it is no wonder that he is generally black and
wrinkled from assisting at so much cheating and

rogitery as is being constantly practised before hie
very eyes by his votaries, We were asked invari-
ably about a third more than the proper price
except in one instance, where the long-bearded
proprietor demanded for a tarantasse about as much
as one would give for a good secondhand carriage in
London. The agonies of bargaining were insup-
portable to us, but what must have they been to
our kind friend who translated French into Russian,
and Russian into French, for one long hour? And
all to no purpose. The longobarbi thought we
must give in, and we were determined not to
be done, and the contest ended several days
afterwards in our purchasing a tarantasse
with room for three inside, two outside and a
i driver, in a remote part of the city, to which we
had penetrated in seardh of less extortionate coach
.manufacturers, for about £5O, including alterations
and repairs. The next thing was to get an inter-
, preter and servant, and in this matter another
excellent friend, M. de Mottchanoff, assisted us by
obtaining from the Postmaster-general a post-
office courieri who was popularly believed to
speak German and to be versed in other lan-
guages. Our good Walter however, on presenting
himself to us, was found to be rather weak in
Teutonic, and to be quite ignorant of any other
language but his vernacular. The sight of his
uniform however (a smart green frock with black
facings and braid on the shoulders) was calculated to
produce a great effect on the postmasters, and so
we looked on him as a great acquisition, and set
him to work at once to get horses. Butthis was no
easy matter. The Emperor had gone to Tula the
day before, and was expected back the day after
that on which we intended to start; and, to make
a long story short, it was six o'clock on the evening
of the second day after we intended to start before
four very miserable, lame, limp, little ponies were
sent to our hotel to be fastened to the huge taran-
tasse, which we were gravely assured they would
whirl away at the rate of 10 or 12 versts an hour. A
verst, be it understood, is about the same measure
of distance as the French kilometre—and may be
practically considered as two-thirds of an English -
mile. Leaving the courier, the valet de place (one
Antonio Bellini, an honest Italian who had come
to Moscow as a wild beast proprietor, and had
been rendered bankrupt by the obstinate way
in which his lions and tigers persisted in dying)—
and the English courier to pack up our luggage,
we sallied out to the Hotel de Labardie to
dinner, and gave orders to the driver to call for
us as soon as the operation was completed. It
should be• promised that we laid in a stock of
provisions for the road, as our friendshad counselled
us to do—tea, the great Russian vade mecum, which
is certainly more refreshing and delicious in Russia
than anywhere else—white bread, sugar, sherry,
ham, sausages, cheese, sardines, potted game, all
foreign except the bread, and in that Moscow can
challenge the bakers of any city—not excepting
Vienna—in the world. And here, before leaving
Moscow most probably for ever, let me, in antici-
pation of the more general remarks I shall here-
after have occasion to make, and of the description
of the great establishments connected with charity
and philanthropy in which that strange city
abounds, give some data as to the prices, such as
we fouriti them, at least, during the coronation.
The impossibility of travelling uninterruptedly,
the annoyances of the passport system in its
most rigid form, and the exaggerated statements
respecting the difficulties of obtaining accom-
modation, which were industriously circulated,
prevented any great influx of foreigners to those
fetes. It was imagined that the circulation of those
stories would justify the shopkeepers and lodging-
house proprietors in the exorbitant charges they
have made on those who fell within their grasp
A. rouble, or 3s 21d, scarcely goes as far as a
shilling in the dearest parts of London. For
example, the hire of an ordinary brougham, with a
pair of sorry horses, for the month is from 65/ to
701, and the driver expects to be paid besides.
The common drosky-drivers ask a rouble and
a half an hour, and a rouble for the shortest
drive. The price of a bedroom and sitting-room
for the month has been about 55/, and the most
grubby and dingy boarding-houses charged
.10 roubles, or about 1/ 15s a day, for bed, dinner,
and breakfast, without wine or beer. For washing
shirts 12 roubles a dozen was asked at the outset,
and the price was with difficulty reduced to about
Is each. The price of a pair of white kid gloves
is 5s 6d or Os. There was a fish soup, very
excellent indeed, and of peculiar flavour and rich-
ness, served up at the Russian restaurant at which
we dined the other day which costs 25 roubles, or
about four guineas for three persons, and the
same description of soup is sometimes made so
extravagantly that it costs 51 or 6/ sterling a head !
The common price of champagne is 15s a bottle,
and the quantity the Russian officers consume is
very great. In fact, the luxuries of life, which are
here regarded almost as necessaries, are of enor-
mous cost. The whole price of food was raised
very little, so that these excesses must be regarded
as extortions for the most part, and as the involun-
tary contributions which all strangers and travellers
are required to pay to the maintenance of trade
and commerce when they go to see sights beyond
their own country. But what is this roar of
distant thunder ? Oh, the " ekipadge" (the
Russians are obliged to borrow many words
from foreign languages to express those things
with which civilisation has made them ac-
quainted)—the " ekipadge" is at the door ! My
two friends and myself got inside ; Walter and our
English courier got into a huge dicky, or rumble, in
front ; poor Bellini made us a warm speech in
Italian ; the driver cracked his whip, and we were
immed'ately eent with our heads into each other's
stomachs with a lunge so violent and so sharp
that we really should have been justified in
thinking the carriage had blown up. But it was
nothing ; our tarantasse was merely under way,
and this was the first roll over the stones.
Before we could utter an exclamation we were
pitched violently hack with our heads rap against
the hard cushions, while the noise, the
creaking, the rattling of glass, the screaming of
tortured timber, rose high above our cries of dis-
tress. Any one who has ever been buffeting a ,
gale head to wind in a short sea, and in a short
elderly steamer, will ba able to form some notion of
the motion of our tarantasse over the ill-paved i
streets of Moscow and across the huge blocks of
stone of the chaussee. The lights in the shops
danced like wildfire before our eyes ; and as the
camphine lamps which illuminate the street shone
in through the ports of our driving land-ship, the
features of each seemed to the other hideously
distorted, now pulled out to an unnatural
length, and in an instant flattened, and then
extended to twice their breadth. No one had
the moral courage to say it. Each, was waiting
for the other to pronounce the fatal word, but it is
my belief that if any of the party has said, " I
really can't stand this ; we must stop !" the expedi-
tion would have been at an end, to the great joy at
that time of the whole societe. It was at 6.30 p.m.,
in the dark of a cold wet and blowing night, that
the tarantasse weighed and stood for Tula, driving
through the streets of Moscow like a two-decker
rushing through the downs for her moorings in a
winter breeze. For nearly half an hour the noise,
the clatter, the pitching was most annoying and
sickening, for so long were we in working through
the enormous city, which revealed itself to us for
the last time shining with rain, and at last died out
in a dim glow which lighted up the heavens far and
wide. Then we got off the pavement, and the
motion was easier ; the perch began to play a little,
and we settled down more readily into our places.
Out of the windows we could see nothing ; all
was dark. The rocking and shaking had set us
all into a hazy unpleasant sleep, which was broken
by a sudden cessation of sound or motion. We
bad pulled up at Berliova, our first stage, 17 versts
from Moscow. It was 8.15 p.m. The chausse
had been so far very good, and the pace re-
spectable. The posthouse, a staring white build-
ing with a double headed eagle emblazoned over
the door, and a large post with much unintelligible
information engraved tkereonrespecting places and
distances in black letter of the most ancient type
at the side of the entrance, invited us to enter, and
in distant apartments we heard Walter battling'
with the Spirit of Evil, or the postmaster, as
we crossed the threshold. The post for four
horses had been paid to Tula,—a distance of

180 versts. It was not very great-21 roubles
silver, and 5 roubles and 46 copecks for turnpikes,
for there are said• to be turnpikes in Russia,
on to Orel: Pass'ng through a long and cheerless
room, -in which a high smelling and dingy-looking
piny of natives were waiting, we entered a
smaller room, warmed by a stove and provided
with two chairs, and a most uncompromising
leather covered sofa and a card table, by way of
furniture, and in this we remained worshipping
the goddess Tchai till the horses were put to, and
we rushed forth into the darkness once more. For
the somovar, or hot water urn, the charge was
about 10d. To the yainschtk, or driver, the fee
was thirty copecks, or a shilling, for which trifling
consideration he performed a humiliating series of
genuflexions. As the horses were announced
Walter came forth, looking flushed and red in the
face and guilty in the eyes. We knew he had
been telling an awful number of lies on our
account; but we forgave him in the most generous
manner, as they had not been told to us, and so
we set forth upon our journey from Berliova.