Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1885-12-12
LIFE IN sT. PETERSBURG.


From the Atlantic Monthly.
The really mysterious element Of life in ST.
Petersburg is one that transcends western ex-
periences. Below the outward forms OF things
you enter an atmosphere in which thought
seems limited by new laws. Out of novel
habits, strange customs, hereditary legacies
OF the intellect in which you have had
share, the fancy makes stair for Its
ascent into another planet. The differences
you ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS are unlikenesses NOT
between Aryan and Aryan, but between Ef-
rope and Asia ON the one hand, between q new
and old civilization on the other. Readily
would the native help you in your bewilder-
NAL to you is the normal to him. You call
upon him to look. and he sees nothing. Your
speeters are his thin air. the novelties you itaf-
else his daily commonplace. SO that In
time your surprise becomes less demonstrative,
III not less acute. In time your diary Is content
to hold the mirror up to nature. The munich
pal council for example, "has just fixed the
price of bread for the next twelve months.
The Gotos punished tor improper tendencies
right to publish adveftsements.' 'SThe authori-
ties about to raise money by imposing a tax on
ali foreigners resident in st. Peters
half of poor families in the capital "a
well-known police official purchases the wife of
a subordinate for ten thousand roubles-" News
paper proprietor eXiled to q northern province
Tor having published a cartoon representing, in
a series OF nine views, the torments of a dog at
into senne the Whole Without head head line but
believed in official circles to be an allusion to
the Tsars enforced retirement to Cat.
the morrow is the name day of the empress,
and that they must celebrate on the occasion
that is to say. hang out banners and burn lamps
Or pay "a heavy penalty And thus 1t runs
on this record of events, mere story of familiar
experience to the native Russian, but to the
foreigner a tale of doings in world all other
IL may be well here to remind the reader that
the habit of living in lodgings is general In st.
Petersburg. SO far as Russian life is a bivouac,
the term lodgings is APPLY used; etymologi-
caIly, il corresponds with the English "house,"
or 'home," and is therefore without the sense
usually associated with 1t in the west. In
the capital q man who lives in his own
house occupies little more than q cor.
ner Of IT, or sleeps In a palace , some OF
and but few of them need all the apartments
which constitute ST. Petersburg fiat This
is in itself suggestive OF the scale upon which
houses are built in the great Russian cities.
But IL is all too inadequate as preparation for
the statement that st. Petersburg lodging
house frequently contains many as
thousand rooms, with population OF from
two to three thousand persons. The finest apart
ments are on the ground floor; the poorest
are reached by ascent OF from ten to twelve
stories. A suite of six rooms suffices for the
wealthiest dodgers who have no palace of their
own. Two or three supply all the needs of the
vell-tO-dO tradeSman and his family the ma
jority of professional men who are bachelors,
nearly all teachers and students, and u large
CLASS Oh OFFICIALS Hnu themselves amply accom-
mOdated by single apartment. The cost Of
lodgings depends, of course, upon such elements
as situation, number and furnishing of rooms,
height of fiat and service. As rule, 1T
may be said that, taking into consideration the
general purchasing power of the money eX-
pended-a precaution consistently neglected
in international comparisons of this kind
house rent is somewhat higher in st. Peters
burg than it is in Paris or London. l offer
these details simply in order that the reader
may be the better prepared for q singular
custom TO which here invite his attention.
Rent charges in Russia invariably eX-
acted sin advance, even when lodger sur
rounds himself with luggage valuable enough
TO yield the amount OF a whole years arrears.
Upon personal property of this kind there can
be legally no lien. The same Russian law which
hampers foreigner and native alike with the
police surveillance of passport regulations,
seizing every opportunity to throw obstacles in
the way of free movement, gives to a lodger
the fullest right to carry off his luggage in
the teeth of an irate landlord ciamoring for
the settlement of his unpaid bill. Any for
chile detention of property in such cases is
treated by the courts as quasi criminal OfienSe.
How easy il is, under these circumstances, to
attach to a whole class an undeServed stigma of
sordid caution or of suspicious distrust OF their
fellow beings, will be at once seen. The law
Itself is an interesting survival; its origin, q
defense OF personal rights in the country where
the modern ukas so frequently ignores them,
must lie as deeply in historical causes as the
RI in rs<,1 salt