Passaic City record., 1892-08-13
LIFE IN ST. PETERSBURG.
STRANGE SIGHTS AND SCENES IN
THE CZAR'S CAPITAL.
The City On a Swamp-Its Magnifi-
+ cent Buildings and Streets-The
Droschkies and Their Drivers.

DrOSc0kteS anu Inetr drivers.
WISH could give you a stereop-
ticon view of st. Petersburg, writes
Frank B. Carpenter in the Courier
Journal. 1t is one of tie queerest,
one of the fastest, one of the gayest, and
by all odds the most unique capital in
the world. Lying as it does on the
great Gulf of Finland, river as wide as
the Mississippi at st. Louis runs through
it, and great canals cut it up 50 that it
looks like second Venice. 1t is a city
of wide streets, of big three, four and
five.story fats; of vast palaces, many of
which cover acres; of multitude OF
gorgeous churches, of great schools, of
art galleries, of factories and the thou
sand and one other features which make
up the capital of the greatest empire on
the globe. You have heard the story OF
its building. stood yesterday in the
slog hut that Peter the Great built on
the swamp here when he decided that he
would make this point his capital. All
this was a forest, marsh and a wilder
ness. The Russia of that day, as the
Russia of this, was in the interior, but
Peter decided he wanted to have his cap
Iital where he could look out upon
Europe, and he called St. Petersburg his
window, and, like Aladdin, he made it
rise upon the mud in almost night. He
made every noble in the empire build a
house there. Every boat on the Baltic
and the Russian rivers had to draw a
load of stone to the city, and 10000
men worked year in and year out till
the great capital rose. Fully
generation after New York was
founded the wolves howled in the wilder
ness on the site of St. Petersburg; now
city of stone and brick twenty-five
miles in circumference floats here, as it
were, almost upon the waters; and 1OO,-
900, 900 heads bow down to this as the
seat of their ruler. Piles by the millions
have been driven down to make founda-
tions. The great river Neva is walled
for mules with granite docks and all the
streets are paved. Our public buildings
at Washington are large, but those OF
Russia cover far greater areas. The only
things that compare with them are the
mammoth structures of the Chicago Ex-
position, and as to the churches here,
one of them, St. Isaac's Cathedral, has
cost nearly $50, 900, 900, or as much as
will be the total outlay of the Exposition.
There are other churches nearly as ex-
pensive, and the whole city has been
built without regard to cost. It is
almost a Sabbath days journey to go
Through one of these palaces. The win
ter palace, on the banks of the Neva,
would spoil the area of ten-acre field,
and its corridors, if stretched out, would
reach miles. There is tradition that
some of the unused rooms were turned
into barn yard by the servants in years
past, and that when the palace once
burned COW was hauled out with the
furniture. It is the same with private
houses. The people live in flats, and
these flats make up in area what they
lack in height. It takes nearly square
for the ordinary house, and the Hotel de
Europe, where am stopping, has halls
which seem to be mile long, ana I lose
myself again and again going to my
room. The business blocks are big, and
there is great bazaar here, where hun
dreds of merchants have stores facing
vaulted arcade, which covers vast area,
and which is thronged from morning till
midnight with thousands OF shoppers.
The finest street of ST. Petersburg is
the Nevski prospect, which runs from
the river at the Navy Department or
Admiralty buildings back through the
city. The street is over three miles long
in straight line, and it is walled with
magnificent stores. 1t is paved with
cobble-stones, flags and wooden blocks.
The pavements or sidewalks are of flag
stones. The center of the street, where
the double deckers of street cars go, are
of cobble-stones. and on either side of
this there is wide strip of wood for
driving. The wooden pavement is made
of octagonal blocks of pine about six
inches thick and five inches in diameter
set fat on base of planks, which rests
on great logs sunken into the street.
These blocks are cemented together with
pitch, and they make a driveway equal
almost to dirt road. The same charac-
ter of pavement exists in all the chief
streets of the city, and the sights of these
thoroughfares are such as you will see
nowhere else in the world.
have been in all of the great Capitals
of the world from Paris to Pekin, and
have nowhere seen such horses and such
driving as in st. Petersburg. Every other
man owns fast team, and all drive as
though the devil was after them. A
great many of the horses are of the Or.