The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1889-11-07
RUSSIAN PECUlIARITiES.
The Paid Public Jokers-Guides Who Get
Drunk-Choosing Wives.

DIR. Barrett saw great deal of the
Russian people.
Some funny things he observed
| among them:
Did You ever see paid joker?n he
said. We'll, if you never did YOU
would be interested to watch one.
There in those Russian cities they pay
so much an hour TO listen to the Joker
have alway thought that this class of
people deserve some remuneration, but
| never saw such thing till l reached
St. Petersburg.
How do they work it?"
well, the joker provides himself
with two or three hundred tickets, and
mounting a sort of rostrum he announ-
ces that he is going 70 regale his audi
ence with choice tidbits of mirth-pro-
yoking lore. He begins selling tickets
at about 1-2 cents each, and when he
has sold enough to warrant his begin
ming, he turns himself loose, and the
audience remains spell-bound by his
humorous stories for an hour or two.
Il listened to them several times, and
although | could not understand one
word the joker said, l was sure from
the way the audience greeted their
stories with roars of laughter, that the
jokcrs and the jokes were above the
average
Another curious thing about the
Russians was the guides. Faithful and
honest to rare degree, they will 90
with you all day and half the night,
never murmuring nor complaining Of
the least fatigue. Several times I felt
like paving the guide more than he
charged, simply because | felt that he
had earned and deserved extra COM
pensation.
But they get drunk.
'Not lighting drunk, but a sort of
goOd-natured drunk. They drink a
stuff with queer name, that makes
them mellow drunk and in a few hours
they sober up and do not seem to suffer
from the effects OF it all During these
bibulous intervals they meet each other
with the most effusive greetings. Men
embrace and kiss each other, and be-
come unusually merry.
Among the lower classes women
are not priced for their beauty. 1t is
for their strength. a lady of our party
asked a Russian guide if his wife was
pretty.
No he answered. she is very
strong and very good, but she is not
pretty. She is very ugly We all
laughed, but must confess that | ad-
mired him for his candor. Parents
choose the wives for their sons. and
they have an eye to the useful as well
as the agreeable. If the woman is
healthy and strong she is quite an ad-
ditiOn to the working force of the fami-
ly of which she becomes member.
The bishops choose the wives for
the priests and they generally select
the girls of the older priests who are
burdened with the largest families,
which is very practical way of look
ing at the question.
Nothing on earth equals in magni-
ticence the barbaric splendor of those
old czars. | visited the museum, where
they showed me with great pride the
products of the Russian mines. Here
was the largest nugget of gold in the
world; the largest lump of silver, the
largest specimen of malachite and the
largest lipis lazuli. with hundred and
one other things from the Siberia
mines.
Il saw the saddles and caparisons of
some of these old warriors. One. | re-
member, had a large saddle blanket, as
you might call it, made of cloth of
gold. Al Il distance it looked perfectly
white. and it was large enough to cover
the great portion Of the body of the
war horse. 4 closer inspection showed
that 1t was covered all over with dia-
monds Of the purest water. The larger
ones were sewn on in the form of stars
and other figures, but the entire sur
face was covered with these gems.
The blanket was worth thousands
and thousands of dollars
'Then. i'll one of GATHERINGS palaces,
| saw columns of pure amber, with the
walls of entire rooms covered with the
same costly stuff.
"And yet, in other countries of
Europe, amber has become so scarce
that it is almost impossible to secure a
pure article, and imitation amber is
used for jeweiry. ."-Attaaa Coisstit,s-
ton.