The Russian manner of living was not quite suitable to us, although more regular than we had lately been accustomed to. They eat but one meal a-day, and that about twelve or one o'clock. The everlasting samovar fills up the morning and evening with its incessant bubbling and spluttering. Much tea-drinking is calculated to take the edge off a ravenous appetite, and in addition to the fluid we were fain to eat all the little cakes that usually accompany the samovar, in order to tide over the long twenty-four hours that interfered between regular meals. The stock dish of the Russians is a vegetable soup, with beef boiled in it. It is called shtchee, and is good or bad, according to the materials available for its manufacture, and the skill of the cook. Our cook in Kiachta was a lady of the mature age of eighty-two, who was justly proud of her attainments. The shtchee is enough of itself to make a substantial meal, as the bouilli is served up with it; but it is generally followed by a solid piece of roast beef. The bread is very good and white, but a strange custom prevails of putting black bread on the table along with the white, for the apparent purpose of showing off by contrast the extreme whiteness of the white, for no one ever touches the black when he can get the other. The real black bread is heavier, and as clammy as if potatoes entered largely into its composition. It is used almost exclusively by the peasants, and is doubly economical, being in the first instance cheap in price, and moreover a very little of it goes a long way, as it resists digestion as long as a hard-boiled egg. The black bread used by the well-to-do classes is a compromise, and is of a black-brown colour, known as demi-blanc.
The Kiachta community is for the most part permanent. The official portion of it is of course migratory, as the Government employés look for promotion to other regions, but some of them also settle down in Kiachta and found families. Many of the merchants also move westward, or intend to do so, but the whole substratum of peasants, artisans and tradesmen is a settled population. They talk little of Petersburg and Moscow, and when they do, it is with a kind of distant awe, as if these holy places belonged to a higher world. Irkutsk is the centre of their thoughts, the pivot on which they move. Whatever is defective in Kiachta is sure to be found in perfection in Irkutsk; the best hotels, horses, carriages, doctors, houses, churches, shops—everything—are there. A journey to Irkutsk is not an unfrequent occurrence, but a journey to Moscow is something to be talked about on every convenient occasion for the remainder of one's life-time.
The town was founded in 1728, as an entrepôt of the caravan trade with China, and to that alone does it owe its importance. Tea has always been much the largest item in this trade, and although Kiachta must continue to command the trade between China and Eastern Siberia, the direct importation of sea-borne teas to the Baltic ports cuts off an important source of prosperity from Kiachta. The mercantile community have, up to last year, endeavoured to compete with their rivals, and pushed into China to purchase the tea in the same markets; but the conditions of the trade are so much altered that they are deprived of their former facilities for bartering Russian produce, and in other respects the caravan trade is too heavily weighted ever to compete successfully with the long sea route. Even in Russia, wedded as the masses are to prejudice, common sense must gain the day in the end, particularly where roubles and kopeks are in question.
We did not grudge ourselves a few days' rest at Kiachta, considering we had accomplished the most tedious part of the journey, and henceforward would get over the ground as fast as horses' legs could carry us. But no such luck was in store for us. The first news we had from the commissary and others, was that the whole country between the shores of the Baikal lake and Kiachta was inundated by the flooding of the river Selenga. It seemed that our adverse fortune was to follow us along the whole journey. We need not have been surprised, however, at the intelligence we received of the condition of the Selenga, since into it all the rivers we had crossed in Mongolia discharge themselves. The post from Europe was long overdue, and no news had been received from the Baikal for ten days. We were constrained perforce to remain quiescent until the waters should subside, and a day or two after our arrival a courier who came with the missing mail reported a slight improvement in the communication, he having succeeded in carrying the mail in small boats from station to station. Our time was not, however, misspent, for we had a number of preparations to make for our journey. In the first place we had to exchange our Chinese silver into Russian paper money. We were prepared of course to lose on this operation, but were agreeably surprised to find we had got off with only about one per cent. For one tael of sycee we received 2r. 15kop., which, at the then value of three shillings to the rouble, gave us 6s. 54⁄10d. for our tael, which was worth roundly 6s. 6d. We had then our ponies and carts to dispose of, and my pony was quickly sold for ten roubles, of which my share was eight, that is twenty-four shillings for what cost thirty-two,—so far so good. But, when we came to offer the carts for sale, difficulties presented themselves. No one had ever heard of such articles being sold in Kiachta. This seemed strange, for the Chinese—if not the Russians—use no other conveyance in their frequent journeys to China. The carts are made only in China, and therefore ought to be at a premium in Kiachta. But the Russians were not to be reasoned with in this way, but maintained that it was hopeless to attempt to sell our carts, and we abandoned the idea. We happened, however, to mention the subject to some Chinese in Maimachin, and having persuaded them to come to Troitskosarfsk, and see the articles, we concluded a bargain, on the eve of our departure, for sixty-five roubles, about half what they cost.
It was necessary to our comfort to purchase a tarantass, or large travelling carriage. It was possible to travel without one, using the kibitka, or small carriage, provided at the post-stations; but that mode of travelling involved the annoyance of changing at every station, which, with our huge amount of baggage, would have been intolerable. We had some trouble to find a tarantass, and when we had got one it was not quite what it should have been—indeed we should have done better to have used the post kibitkas as far as Irkutsk, and bought a tarantass there, where we would have had a better selection.
In Maimachin we purchased some goat skins, with hair twelve inches long. These we had sown together into a sack for each of us to put our legs into when sitting in the carriage; a very simple contrivance, well worthy of the attention of all travellers in those regions in cold weather, and which contributed in no small degree to our comfort on the road.
The remnant of our stores, &c., tent, saddles, and such like, had to be abandoned in Kiachta, and we could only make room in the tarantass for a little brandy, and some tins of bacon, and smoked tongues. Hitherto we had trusted nothing to the chance supplies of provisions that might be found on the road; but now, being in a civilised (?) country, we depended solely on its resources, such as they were.
We had no trouble with our papers in Kiachta, and our luggage was never looked at; neither did we require to take out a Russian passport, but merely had to get our Peking ones viséd for Irkutsk by the master of police, which formality enabled us to obtain from the chief of the posts a padaroshna, or pass for post-horses, which are entirely under Government control. In addition to this, Mr. Pfaffius supplied us with a special pass, to give greater effect to the padaroshna, and to ensure us proper attention from the various station masters as far as Irkutsk. This document was to be exchanged for a similar one, which we hoped to obtain from the higher authorities at the provincial capital. We experienced the greatest civility and ready assistance from all the Russian officials with whom we came in contact in Kiachta, and the bugbear of troublesome interference by the authorities vanished away.
We soon got tired waiting for better news of the state of the roads between us and Lake Baikal, and determined to start on the 7th of October at all hazards. The steady frosty weather, with occasional falls of snow, gave us warning of winter, and of the uncertainty of getting our heavy carriage over half-frozen rivers. Every day was important at such a critical season, and the motherly counsels of the good old lady we were living with, to postpone our journey till December, when the snow roads would be in perfect order, only made us the more impatient to be off. Had we stayed another day we might have been tempted to give ear to these reiterated remonstrances against tempting Providence by starting at such a time.
Some hours were occupied in loading our tarantass, for we discovered to our dismay that the machine, large as it was, was still too small for our baggage and ourselves. After several attempts to dovetail unwieldy boxes into corners and use up all smaller articles as broken stowage, we eventually succeeded, between the inside and the outside of the machine, to get everything on board, and with a severe struggle we squeezed ourselves in, horizontally, between the baggage and the hood of the conveyance. Our padaroshna was for three horses, but when the driver brought them to be harnessed, and saw the load he had to drag, he at once protested against going with less than four. We felt that he was quite right, but to establish a character it was necessary that we should be firm at the outset. To have admitted the necessity for four horses would have exposed us to all manner of impositions at the successive stations, where our ignorance of Russ would have placed us at the mercy of every ruffian of a postmaster. With great misgivings, therefore, we started with our three horses, driven by a Bouriat yemschik. The tarantass is a strong roughly made four-wheeled carriage, placed on poles, which rest across the two axletrees. The poles are made of soft wood, but have some spring in them, and the tarantass is at least more comfortable on rough roads than a Chinese two-wheeled cart. The hood comes well forward, and with an apron that comes up nearly to the top, and a curtain that can be let down from the front of the hood, the tarantass can be pretty well closed in.