Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1899-08-17
SEVERE TEST.

Hospitality in Russia is heartier. more
generous and brighter than elsewhere. In
fact, it DIVORCES so much in degree as al
most to differ in kind. The rich and poor
practice it with the same zest, and it is
enjoined by unwritten secular laws and
customs which ave the force of religious
precepts. In those vast regions Of the
interior where there are no hotels the
wealthy landowners receive respectable
guests in their spare rooms and %isreputa-
bic tramps in their kitchens or outho1ses
hospitality, like the sun, cheering good
and bad alike. The traveller is welcomed
without a letter of introduction, seated at
the family table, asked no embarrassing
questions, and taken at his own estimate.
A Russian will cheerfully ruin himsel
rather tina treat a guest to coarse fare
or deny help to a hungry man. money
has not earned us; it is we who have
earned the money" says the %proverb.
Some months ago two hungry univer-
sity students in the south of Russia, COM
ing home to their W bare room after a
hard days work for their living, caught a
thief running off with their books.
Are you the fellow who stole other
books of ours Yesterday" they asked.
Il am, little fathers. but hunger and
want drove me to it. l am starving.'
oO dIe We. DiolIeI, VI IlcNl uOOI ~ IL,
and you ought not to have hit upon us
as your victim"
well. your door is more easily opened;
that's how it is" was the answer.
I'VE want those books for our exam
nation, brother. SO you must get them
back for US. But as you are cold and
hungry now, come in and join us in our
supper. 1t is not much, but such as it is
you are welcome. Here are 20 copecks for
tho hoar. V,1n ont and fatch If
And the three ate and drank together,
for hospitality is a religion and charity
it's foundation.
Like religion. it is often abused, but it
never succumbs to the ordeal. One of the
greatest and best known of contemporary
Russians, whose name is a clarion to his
countrymen, kept open house in his man
sion in the country. One day a we'll
spoken gentleman drove up to the door,
deposited his luggage and asked for hos
pitality for a few weeks. Although ut
terly unknown to the host and hostess,
his claims We're at once allowed. and the
best spare room was placed at his dis
posal.
Some days later his wife, a charming
lady, appeared with her luggage and
asked to be accommodated, too. She was
duly installed in her husbands apart
ment, and received a chamber X to it
as a sitting room, and everything went
smoothly and sweetly as an idyl. But at
last trouble came. One morning the hos
pitable host and hostess were awakened
by "ructions'' in the guests quarters. On
their going to inquire into the cause they
were appealed to by the lady and the
gentleman to act as umpires in the dis
pute.
The pair. it appeared, were not married
to Zach other yet, but were going to be as
soon as they could obtain divorces from
their legitimate spouses, who were living
at home, and whom they had left for a
spell. The question on which they differed
was whether it was worth while paying
the ~Xtravaga sum needed for a di-
vorce. The gentleman. said 1t was not:
the lady stoutly maintained that 1t was.
The hostess, who was a bit of a Puri-
tan, and a stickler for the proprieties,
nearly tainted when the problem was put
before her. The amorOus pair who thus
attempted to turn a h~ospitable mansion
into a mere hotel were deposited with
bag and baggage at a distant railway
station a few hours later. But the gen.
erous people thus imposed upon are as
Unsuitable as ever.