The New York herald., 1870-07-29

would you believe 1t? those officers declared
their soldiers were superior with the bayo-
net to the English, and had shown that
of sebastopol! And can any readerstelI how
many nations in this world claim that same supe-
riority as peculiarly their own? The Southern
soldiers captured at shiloh claimed in our teeth
that one "Secesh" was equal to four Yankees
with the bayonet. But we think the yankees
proved themselves quite as capable of handling
.he bayonet as their "Secesh brothers at Gettys,
burg. The French boast before Waterloo was
that their soldiers were the champions of the bay-
onet, but on the fatal summit Of Mount st. Jean
alas for French renown with the bayonet The
SWISS have claimed the same superiority: the
Spaniards even have claimed it; the Turks do
claim it, and know by personal observation of
the Spaniards at the siege Of Valencia and the
the Turks in Crete that the forte of both nations
Is behind trees, rocks and mattresses. Old Amer-
cans remember the time the English claimed itl
But at Bunker Hill what happened? Old Amer-
cans can tell.
But the Russians have not yet arrived at that
philosophic stage that the HERALD correspondent
has. so as to be able to assert deliberately that
with the bayonet no nation has the pre-eminence;
that success by the bayonet s entirely governed
by circumstances.
RUSSIAN OFFICERS IN DIALOGUE.
But the Russian officers are gentlemen az told
you before and instead of taking me for an jgno-
ranlus, politely listened, smiled set the HERALD
man down for close reasoner; but were not con
vlnced, nevertheless. The Russian officers almost
all speak French. the very highest of them speak
English and German. You know that on board of
steamer, unless you have something to do or
somebody to talk to, time hangs heavy on one
hands to oil except travelling correspondent.
The best thing the officers thought they could do
was to try and pump the American They asked
me what thought of the capabilities of the Rus
SANS to speak foreign languages? replied that
had been struck by the number of people in
Russia who knew French, English and German.
. But do you not think said they that the
RuGSuuS thov
speak, are more capable of learning foreign Ian
guages than any other"
"Oh no, not bit of it. The reason why more
Russians speak foreign languages Is obvious to me-
They have no cause yet to boast Of their
advancement in literature, like the Germans the
French, the English, or the Americans. You
have had poets, such as Derjavin, Dunitrciff
and Pushkin; you have had powerful essayists,
such as Novi KOff and karamsin, and historians
like Lomonassot, Karamsin, Solovief and you
have had several comedians and actors Of no mean
merit. But, pardon me, those writer's have not
written everything that is necessary for q cuti-
waited man to know; hence, when you witness
Faust you begin to study German in order to
know more of that great author of it, You have
no such poet as Shakespeare, as he IL produced but
once In 500 years, hence you study English to
know him. so also you must study French to know
Voltaire, Racine, Corneille, Rousseau and Victor
Hugo, just as we study Greek to know Homer in
ms his native language, as we study Latin to know
Virgil and Horace.
Are the Americans great linguists ~
Ihose whose business 1t IS to be linguists are
great in that way. We have DR.. Bliss mission
ary at BeyrOut, and DR.. Thompson, DR.. Lansing
all missionaries, who understood the Arabic lam
guage as well as know English or you Russian.
There are individual cases OF eminent Americans
studying foreign languages for the mere pleasure
derived from 1t; for instance, Mr.. Morris, the
American Minister at Constantinople, who can
speak twelve languages"
RELIGIOUS PRACTICES
BY the time we had finished our animated dis
cussions about such great subjects our steamer
arrived at Orper, her destination and the urthest
point up the Rion to which the steamers ascend.
Had known something Of Russian customs in the
Caucasus certainly should have left Orpcri within
an hour after my arrival for Kutas by diligence,
for there Is a diligence communication between
the two towns. But as was entirely ignorant of
how certain things were managed at Orper | was
left behind hOuseess and friendess in q most
aguish place, and to assist your imagination let
me tell you that 1t is the Siberia of the Caucasus
for those who emasculate themselves. Hither all
the military Skoptsi are banshed not to hard la
Dor, but to form colony by themselves, separate
and apart from other people These white
eunuchs have the same pecuiarties az their dark
faced species at Constantinople and Cairo they
are extremely tall, slim, thin voiced and are
6eardless. But between the causes which made
these white men OF Orper and the harem agas
eunichs, there is vast difference. The white men
operate of their own free will, while the harem
eunnchs have the operation performed on them
by their captors.
When asked a Russian gentleman (not cfrcte)
what idea was 1t that induced these men to inhct
such punishment upon their persons, he replied
in cool, methodical manner, as if he had dis
cussed the question many times before and had
arrived at satisfactory understanding of it. He
said it was most philosophical idea; that the reli-
gion OF the eunuchs was most logical, and l. after
nearing his reasons, came to be of the same opin-
ion, and believe it just rational as lay Jesuit of
the Asturias, who once told ME that the bread and
wine partaken of at the communion table after
beng consecrated by the priest became the in
carnate body and real blood of Christ.
The origin of this sect sprang from the same
causes which induced Luther and the myriad Of
sects after him to differ from the Catholics of the
Roman Church The founder of it, Dania inter
preted Scrptural verse literally, and according
to this verse few men dare dispute their claim to
having acted with true religious faith. Christ, ia
his Sermon on the Mount said that whosoever
looked upon woman with an aduterous eye had
already committed adultery in his heart, and en-
Joined on men If any members Of their bodies
offended to pluck the said sinful members out, for
1t was better that one member should perish
rather than the whole body should be in danger
OF hell IRE The Skopts have understood these
verses literally and have acted upon them to the
abscision even Of those members which propa-
gate the human species.
The patriarch Neon, in the time Of Alexius
Mlkhailovitch, took it upon himself to correct the
errors that had crept In through careessness of
copyists into the holy books, and to have them
reprinted and distributed to the masses. The
missals and prayer books used i'm the Greek
Church were, in his opinion, open to improve
ment, as well as the pictures of saints and holy
images, which were, in fact, but senseless daubs,
manufactured in the early days of the empire.
This attempt Of Nicon created good deal of con
fusion among the most ignorant and fanatcal,
who imagined him about to subvert the writings
of holy men whom they had been taught to con-
slider as immaculate heretofore and he began to
be regarded by those as all anti Christ Those
who refused to acquiesce in the innovations in.
troduced by Neon formed themselves into sect
which came to be known as Staro-briatsi, or
men of conservative ideas, and by the orthodox
people they were called RascoIniki or seceders.
The Staro-bratsi stood by the old forms, the old
missals and images, and preferred to,believe In
their holy books as their forefathers had done be-
fore them Out of this new sect sprang variety
of sects two of which were particularly distin-
gushed for the literal construction they placed
upon Scripture. These men were the Skoptsi.
and the Bjellya Golub, or white Pigcons''
The former cut out their generating members; tho