Though the Exhibition has been opened a whole month, the section of Central Asia is not quite ready yet; it is only the section of Turkestan which came to an end, thanks to the energy of our delegate. Next to it are the sections of the Caucasus and Siberia. A crowd of Russian workmen, wearing red shirts, put the finishing stroke to them.
The best place at the Exhibition is assigned to Central Asia, called “Russie des Indes,” quite near the Trocadero. This section, which is a duplicate in miniature of the Kremlin, in Moscow, is surrounded by a high crenelated wall with a row of turrets ornamented with the Russian Double Eagle. When you enter it, the Russian architecture gives place to an Arabian style. An immense panorama represents a large square in Samarkand, with a lively crowd of natives; only when seen quite close, one perceives that it is but a picture, not a reality. Our section is striking by its vivid and bright colouring. A fountain plays in the middle of an immense hall, decorated with beautiful Asiatic carpets and armour, and filled with all kinds of products of our possessions in Central Asia. The best appreciators of a remarkable collection of plants and seeds, appeared to be a legion of mice; these gnawing little animals arranged for themselves, in broad daylight, Lucullus-like repasts, without being disturbed in the least by the crowd of visitors. The grains disappeared visibly, and poison was put in every attractive place, but the cunning mice, preferring the tasty grains, carried their victory on to the battle-field.
Next to our Asiatic section stands the pavilion of Polar Russia. The morose Siberian nature is such a contrast with our bright Turkestan. The panels on the walls represent a seal-chase; all sorts of stuffed polar animals fill the big halls, as well as an ethnographic collection of manikins, which represents in a very life-like manner, different types of the inhabitants of Siberia. The model of a sledge, harnessed with a team of dogs, reminded me vividly of our drive on the frozen Amour during carnival-week at Khabarovsk. On long tables, in the middle of the hall, lay all sorts of furs: beautiful sables, blue fox, beaver, etc. It is curious that according to official information, only 7-8 beavers are killed yearly in Kamtchatka. How can we explain then that hundreds of real beaver skins are sold in Russia. (It is the fur-traders only who can unriddle the thing).
The Caucasus section is just opposite. In a large separate building a panorama represents the new Siberian railway-line. The Sleeping-car Company has exposed the model of a Transcaspian train, composed of an engine and three cars belonging to the International Company, in which one experiences the illusion of a journey through Siberia. The guard whistles, the train seems to move, but in reality it is only the panorama on the walls which is put into motion by a special mechanism. The travellers perceive through the windows the whole way leading from Moscow right to the terminus station—Pekin. When you pass through all the cars, to the other end of the hall, you are in the Chinese section, where the front gate represents a part of the walls of the city of Pekin.
The next day after our arrival at Paris, the section of Central Asia was inaugurated. To get there we had to elbow our way through a throng. A Te Deum was sung by the singers of the Russian Church, whilst all the Kremlin bells were ringing a full peal at which my Russian heart bounded with joy. That day we spent six hours at the Exhibition, and did not sit down for one minute. I was awfully hungry, having eaten only one croissant since morning, and Sergy carried me off to the Trocadero to have dinner in one of the best restaurants. The hall was full of guests. Two very disreputable-looking creatures sat at the table next our own; they were painted with cheap cosmetics, and the heat took off their paint, which came out in the wrong places, and very soon the powder on their faces was becoming paste, and the red on their cheeks and the black of their eyebrows began to run down in streaks, metamorphosing them into tattooed papouses, which didn’t hinder them in the least from casting coquettish glances around. They tried to make eyes at my cavaliers, but it was all in vain; their charms left them quite unmoved. We were too tired to walk home and got into a cab whose driver, with folded arms and bowed head, was nodding on his seat, his nose buried in an open newspaper. Both coachman and horse were dozing the whole way, and it is only a miracle that we got to our villa without running into other carriages.
Next day President Loubet visited our section, where he was presented with a map of France worked “in relievo,” in a frame of jasper; the seas were made of marble, the rivers of silver and the towns of precious stones, got from the Ural mountains. The huge emerald representing the city of Marseilles cost eight thousand roubles. President Loubet is a very different sort of person from what I had expected the ruler of France to be; he is an insignificant-looking little old man, saluting cordially from right to left. A Russian lady, who heard us speaking our mother-tongue, mingled into our conversation. Before leaving our section she favoured me with a condescending nod and a limp hand-shake, but when she heard our interpreter addressing me by my rank, she rushed back and squeezed my fingers effusively. Nasty woman!
We visited that day the Algerian village in the Trocadero Gardens. Superb natives, arrayed in rich costumes, sat on the threshold of their open booths, shrieking out the virtues of their wares. Close to the village stands the Dahomey pavilion, with its straw-thatched roof. Black natives stood on watch, perched on the top of a high tower. In the Singhalese village I patted the small brown babies, calling to mind my sojourn in Colombo. We entered a barrack close by, from which resounded the frantic strains of weird native music. Inside, women clad in Oriental costumes, gleaming with golden coins on their waists and wrists, performed the Danse du Ventre to the accompaniment of clapping hands. One of the beautiful “odalisques” stepped down from the estrade and passed round with a plate into which people dropped money. One glance was enough to show that this would-be Daughter of the Desert was a typical “Parisienne” from the “quartier des Batignolles.”
The pavilions of the different States are picturesquely scattered along the banks of the Seine. All these magnificent buildings, made of plaster, will be in three months’ time reduced to the level of the “Champ de Mars.” One can’t believe that these enormous palaces are only temporary visitors, like the people, and will be destroyed in a few months, after the closing of the Exhibition. It is only the “Palais des Beaux Arts,” built of brick and mortar, which will not be thrown down. A most beautiful and interesting collection of old masters is exhibited in this building. We became so fascinated with some of these wonders, that we could hardly get away from the place. It amused me to see how insufficiently cloaked statues upset the decorum of a pair of prim old maids in large turned-down hats surrounded by green gauze veils, unlovely and unloved creatures, belonging to that sort of Puritans who do not admit kisses because no one ever kissed them. This part of the Exhibition is situated near the principal entry on the side of the Place de la Concorde, with the famous “Parisienne” made of stone and perched very high on the top of a triumphal arch. It is queer to see the reproduction of a fashionable lady dressed up-to-date, posted in such a dangerous and uncomfortable place; we are accustomed to see symbolic figures in that risky position, defying in posture to the laws of equilibrium.
There was a great crowd walking about the Exhibition, a constant going to-and-fro of people who had come from all quarters of the globe. The human whirlpool made me quite giddy. Several bands play in different parts of the grounds near the “Pont Alexandre III.,” which illustrates in stone and bronze the famous Russian Czar. We listened to the music of an American orchestra led by Sousa, the king of marches, in like manner as Strauss and Waldteufel had been the kings of the waltz in times of yore.