RUSSIAN PORTRAITS.

BEFORE I proceed, it will be necessary to sketch the portrait of this man. Aulic Counsellor Schstschekatichin, (may I be allowed to write this barbarous name here for the last time, and to call him henceforward merely by his title ?) the Counsellor, I say, was a very swarthy man, almost black, about forty years of age, having very much the look of a satyr. Whenever he would assume an affable mien, two oblique wrinkles divided his face to the very corner of his eyes, and imparted to his whole countenance the expression of disdain. From the stiffness of his carriage, it was evident that he had been in the army; and from certain deficiencies of common decorum, that he was an uneducated man, and had never frequented good company. For instance, he rarely made use of a pocket-handkerchief; he drank out of a bottle, though a glass stood before him, and committed many other acts of similar indecency. To the grossest ignorance he joined every outward sign of excessive devotion. He had not the least idea of the causes of the common phenomena of nature; and such a stranger was he to literature, that the names of Homer, Cicero, Voltaire, Shakspeare, or Kant, had never reached his ear. He had no desire to learn any. thing; but by way of amends he could make the sign of the cross upon his forehead and breast with uncommon dexterity. Every time he awoke, every time he espied a church at a distance, the point of a steeple, or the image of a saint; every time he ate or drank (which was very often); every time it thundered, or when we passed by a churchyard, my Counsellor took off his hat and crossed himself in every direction. He did not however treat all

churches alike; if they were constructed of wood, he paid them but little attention; but if they were built of stone, his respect considerably increased, and it became much more profound at the sight of a town with large domes and lofty steeples. This was, perhaps, to express his thanks to God that he had been enabled to bring his victim so far on his way. I do not, however, recollect that I ever saw him pray, either with his lips or eyes; but of signs of the cross he was extremely lavish. Though he had very little reason for it, yet he entertained a very high opinion of himself. He would never listen to any kind of explanation, nor admit any sort of reasoning, let the subject of conversation be ever so important. He always persisted in his own opinion, ornamenting his countenance at the same time with the two deep wrinkles already mentioned. If a man may be called beneficent for throwing farthings, right or wrong, out of the window, our Counsellor was of that description. No beggar solicited in vain; and although he perceived his purse to grow lighter, that was no reason with him for withholding his bounty. From the hurry he was always in to get rid of his small coin, it appeared that he considered this alms-giving in detail as a most sacred duty. Not unfrequently would he throw a copeck (about a halfpenny) out of the carriage, after we had passed a beggar; and it was indifferent to him whether the poor wretch had any eyes, or not; whether he was maimed or lame, able or unable to see or pick up the money. He was devoid of all moral feeling; innocence and guilt were the same to him.

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Alexander Schulkins was about thirty years of age; a man without the least ray of cultivation, a

sort of brute, but of a good kind. He had a Calmuck countenance, a round face, a turned-up nose, high cheek-bones, black hair, large chest and shoulders. On his left side he wore the escutcheon of a senate-courier, and round his waist was strapped a pocket, to hold dispatches. His great delight was eating and drinking; he was not very choice in his food; he ate and drank everything that came in his way; and from the manner in which he acquitted himself, it was evident this was his principal business. When he took his soup, he threw his head back, introduced the spoon up to the han dle into his mouth, and in this manner poured the contents down his throat, without allowing his palate to taste of it. During this time he looked towards the ceiling, and compressed his short forehead into a thousand little horizontal wrinkles, which set every hair in his head in motion. In like manner he devoured his meat; not chewing, but merely swallowing it down. Whenever I left a bone on my plate, he would instantly lay hold of it and gnaw it like a dog. A glass of brandy must have been uncommonly large, if he did not dispatch it in a single draught, and always in the manner his food went down, which, as I have already observed, was directly into his throat. He could drink a great quantity of spirits without being at all intoxicated, and all mixtures were alike to him; tea, coffee, brandy, and punch; upon all of which, taken in the space of a quarter of an hour, I have seen him throw down two chopins of quass. In short, he could eat and drink and sleep at will, and at all hours of the day and night. may add, that the Aulic Counsellor was his equal in the exercise of those fine talents, and was but little inferior to him in his taste for strong liquors.

But rude as he was, Alexander Schulkins had the advantage of the other in a moral point of view. He often betrayed a sensibility of disposition, which excited the most violent emotions; not durable, indeed, but very sudden. He had some little knowledge, but the Counsellor had none at all. I recollect one day, that seeing a cuckoo, he observed that the bird always laid its eggs in the nest of another, and left to the owner the care of hatching them. The Counsellor began to laugh; when Alexander asked me if the circumstance was not true? I replied it was; when the Counsellor called forth his nasal wrinkle, and cast a look of pity on us both.

KOTZEBUE.

THE TORRID AND FRIGID ZONES.

How oblique and faintly looks the sun on yonder climates, far removed from him! How tedious are the winters there! How deep the horrors of the night, and how uncomfortable even the light of day! The freezing winds employ their fiercest breath, yet are not spent with blowing. The sea, which elsewhere is scarce confined within its limits, lies here immured in walls of crystal. The snow covers the hills, and almost fills the lowest valleys. How wide and deep it lies, incumbent over the plains, hiding the sluggish rivers, the shrubs, and trees, the dens of beasts, and mansions of distressed and feeble men! See! where they lie confined, hardly secure against the raging cold, or the attacks of the wild beasts, now masters of the. wasted field, and forced by hunger out of the naked woods.

Yet, not disheartened, (such is the force of human breasts,) but thus provided for, by art and prudence, the kind, compensating gifts of Heaven, men and their herds may wait for a release. For at length the sun, approaching, melts the snow, sets longing men at liberty, and affords them means and time to make provision against the next return of cold. It breaks the icy fetters of the main; where vast sea-monsters pierce through floating islands, with arms which can withstand the crystal rock: while others, who of themselves seem great as islands, are by their bulk alone armed against all but man; whose superiority over creatures of such stupendous size and force should make him mindful of his privilege of reason, and force him humbly to adore the great Composer of these wondrous frames, and Author of his own superior wisdom.

But, leaving these dull climates, so little favoured by the sun, for those happier regions, on which he looks more kindly, making perpetual summer, how great an alteration do we find! His purer light confounds weak-sighted mortals, pierced by his scorching beams. Scarce can they tread the glowing ground. The air they breathe cannot enough abate the fire, which burns within their panting breasts. Their bodies melt. Overcome and fainting, they seek the shade, and wait the cool refreshments of the night. Yet oft the boun. teous Creator bestows other refreshments. He casts a veil of clouds before them, and raises gentle gales; favoured by which the men and beasts pursue their labours; and plants, refreshed by dews and showers, can gladly bear the warmest

sunbeams.

SHAFTESBURY,