“Kieff, ‘The Holy City,’ Sept. 21.—We made excursions from Moscow to all the great monasteries. There are few other sights of importance, but these, in Russia, are quite unique—immense spaces surrounded by walls, towers, and gates, which have stood many a siege, and which are like the towns in old woodcuts, and contain gardens, cemeteries, cathedrals, usually six churches with gilt domes and minarets, besides accommodation for 600 or 800 monks and nuns, who have their wells, gardens, farms, &c. One of those which I thought most attractive was Novo Devichi, rising from an arid sandy plain close to the town, but full of lovely flowers, which a kind old prioress came and gave us handfuls of. Then we went to the New Jerusalem, where the famous Nikon lived and is buried—many hours jolting along a no-road through the forests in a rough tarantass, but a beautiful place when you get there. Nikon chose it because he thought it so like the real Jerusalem, and changed the name of its river to Jordan, and made a Kedron. It was a quiet countrified spot, and the only one I have seen which the Mother and Lea would have enjoyed in the old days, and there was a primitive inn with kindly, gentle people. We also went to the famous Troitsa, the home and grave of Philaret. In all these excursions, as everywhere else, we found the ‘difficulties’ of Russian travel entire imagination: nothing can be easier.
“Nevertheless, the journey to Kieff by a slow train was terrible, lasting two days and a night, and awfully hot—across a hideous brown steppe the whole way, with scarcely a tree to vary it. (There are forests till Moscow, only steppes afterwards.) I was ill and wretched enough before this interesting place rose on its low hills above the Dnieper.
“To-day, however, has quite satisfied me that it was worth while to come. It is a most unique and beautiful place, the vast town, or rather three great towns, so embosomed in trees and gardens, that the houses are almost lost. But the greatest charm lies in the constant view over the glorious Dnieper, and the immense aërial plain beyond, with its delicate pink lights and blue shadows. Then Kieff is the Mecca of Russia, full of tombs of saints and holy images, and, though this is no special season, the thousands and thousands of pilgrims are most extraordinary—in sheep-skins and goat-skins, in fur caps, high-peaked head-dresses and turbans; in azure blue, bright pink, or pale primrose colour. I never could have believed without seeing it the reverence of the Russian religion, and it has seemed the same everywhere and in all classes. The bowing and curvetting and crossing before the icons is most extraordinary, and still more so the three prostrations which all make on approaching any holy place, bending down and kissing the dust in a way worthy of an acrobat, though treated as a matter of course by the devotees themselves. But the intense expression of devotion borne by these pilgrims (who have often walked from Archangel!) is such as I have never seen on other faces, and some of the old men and women especially would make the grandest studies for pictures of saintly apostles and matrons. To see a smart young officer unhesitatingly prostrate himself and kiss the ground on sight of an icon (in the mud of this morning even), in the presence of equally smart companions, has something deeply touching in it, and one wonders if any young guardsman in England would do the same if and because he thought it right.”
“In the Warsaw train, Sept. 25.—In this smoothly gliding train, which takes one in fifty-four weary hours across the steppes, it is as easy to write as in the study at home. I should be most comfortable if it were not that my companion (in the compartment for two) is the most odious type of American I ever came across. ‘I guess you will not want to have the windows of this carriage opened till you get to Warsaw, because I will not submit to it: I am in my right, and I will not submit to it.’
“We were arrested again yesterday at Kieff, though then only by priests—veiled priests—for daring to sketch the outside of one of their sacred chapels; but after being hurried about from place to place for an hour, and shut up in a courtyard, with a wooden bench to sit upon, for another, we were regaled with a pile of beautiful grapes and apples, and sent about our business. This constant worrying when drawing has really made Russia very tiresome; but for those who do not want to draw, I do not see what difficulties travelling in the country can present, and Russians are always civil, even when arresting you.”
“Warsaw, Sept. 27.—We arrived at the junction station of Brest more than two hours late, for on some of the Russian lines no hours are obligatory, and you are quite at the mercy of conductors and their whims for spending ten, thirty, or even forty minutes in gossiping at side stations. So the Warsaw train had left Brest, and we had five hours to wait for another. Ill and wretched, I left the horrible room where a crowd of people were smoking, spitting, and smelling, and made my way to a sort of deserted public garden, where cows were browsing on the lilacs. Here, from mere want of something to do, I began to sketch some cottages and bushes, when I was suddenly seized by two soldiers and carried off to the guard-house. Here a very furious bombastical old major cross-examined me, and went into a passion over each sketch in my book, with volleys of questions about each, and then he sent me with a military escort to the station to fetch my passport. It was right, of course, and at last, after several hours, I was dismissed with ‘Maintenant c’est fini;’ but after a quadruple walk of two miles each way, and over such a pavement as only Russia can supply.
“I never was at Warsaw before, and should not care to stay. The Vistula divides the town, which is full of palaces and gardens, but has older quarters full of Jews, which are like the old streets of Paris. This afternoon I drove to the old Sobieski palace of Villanov. Two horses were necessary, for just outside this capital city the roads are like the roughest of ploughed fields.”