Waterbury Democrat., 1902-12-16
s SPENDING THE EVENING" What This Innocent Phrase Means in
 HOspitable St Petersburg.

An Englishman who has just re-
 turned from some years in St Peters.
 burg declares that Russian hospitality
 demands more from it's recipients than
 any other. The demand would seem
 to be mainly of a liquid nature. Here
 is his description of the way you
 'sspend the evening" in a Russian
 house. You no sooner make your
 appearance than your host drags you to his den and makes you take a drink. You find all the other men there, taking their pick of the bottles ranged along the hosts private side board, and helping themselves to a stiff one every few minutes. If you are wise and diplomatic, you will dodge as many of the ante-prandiaI drinks as possible. with view to your comfort later on. But you have got to be very skillful about this. Most
 Russian hosts have way of regard ing it as a sort of reflection upon their Istock of liquors, if not, indeed, on their
 own drinking habits, if their non Russian guests begin to fight shy. It doesn't spoil their hunger as it does ours. The more a Russian drinks, the more he wants to cot. That and the climate are. I take it, the saliva t1on or that nation of heavy drinkers. You sit down to dinner at six o'clock and it lasts till nine The ar ray of courses is staggering, and there's wine, it would seem, for every dish, let alone every course Men and
 women drink champagne like water, and the air is such that it does them little harm. Between every two or l three courses the cigarettes are passed around, to the women as well as the
 men, and everybody smokes and chat ters. After dinner you go to the thea l ter, where boxes have been engaged. That's part of spending the evening" You may smoke all you want to in the boxes, and by ten o'clock the drinking business begins again. Your hosts cabinet of liquors -a portable affair designed for theater use-has preced- I ed him to the box, with ice tank and lsyphons complete. The women as I rule take champagne but the men choose the liquors. Thus smoking land drinking pretty necessarily you watch the performance, walking about the boxes and ohattering between acts, until after midnight, when the show
 comes to an end
 Docs that end the evening? Not at lall. You return with your host and
 hostess to their home, where you find
 an elaborate supper served and wait llng. You do your best to do justice l to it, and toward ? a. m. an adjourn 5ment is made to the drawing room for
 an hour or so of music. The Russian
 women play and sing magnifcently,
 but you are expected to keep on drink
 ing while listening to them. By this
 time you are about ready to go home.
 But that would be discourteous Spending the evening is by no means
 lover yet. Card tables are brought out,
 and everybody plays-French games for the most part, perhaps a couple of
 Russian ones, once in while poker hand everybody gambles. You drink in cessantly while playing and munch lcavaire sandwiches. At last: it is
 now about , a. m.-the evening is lspent. You may go home if you wish.
 If not you signify your desire to sleep
 at your host s house, and you find your room all prepared. He is honor ed by your preference. but when you
 come to some hours later you feel that Iall you ever did in your college days Twas chiId's play by the side of a quiet evening with a Russian household. - 1 London Chronicle.