Roads were wretched, being mere tracks a foot deep in mud, and looked as though they had never been repaired, or even made.
Houses built low with no upper storey, walls of wooden beams and roofs of thatch. Men mostly clad in sheep skins, and women in red dresses with a red cloth over the head, bare legs and sandals. Winter wheat well grown.
19th October.—Passed a good night, despite five in the compartment. This morning much colder, and at 10 o’clock saw snow, at first lying in drifts, but gradually increasing as the day wore on until everything was covered, while ponds were frozen.
Hardly any good houses. Peasants with hair four or five inches long and wearing sheep skin coats and knee-boots, came to stations to look at the train. The women had shawls over their heads, and squelched through the mud and slush with bare feet. All looked cold and dejected, while the landscape was most depressing.
With the exception of a few wild and tame pigeons, saw hardly any birds, but turkeys at a farm.
Arrived in Moscow at 4 p.m., and drove in a droski (four-wheel cab) to the Slavianski Hotel, where my passport was again required.
In the evening, after an excellent dinner, I went to a first-class variety entertainment at the Aquarium theatre.
My bedroom at the hotel was warmed in a curious manner. There was neither stove nor hot-water-pipe, but in one of the walls at some seven feet from the floor was a round hole about three inches in diameter.
Being curious to know what this hole could be for, I put my hand up to it, and was greatly surprised to find a current of hot air pouring into the room, which was thereby kept at a most comfortable temperature both by day and night.
20th October.—It was a miserable day with rain and snow, so that while the streets, which are wretchedly paved with big blocks of stone, were bad for wheeled traffic, there was not sufficient snow for sleighing.