In time the country will free herself from this Asiatic abuse of power. With bold but cautious hand the Emperor has felt his way. His governors of provinces have been told to act with prudence; not to think of sending men into exile unless the case is flagrant, and only then after reference of all the facts to St. Petersburg. Some dozen years ago, before the new reforms had taken hold, and officers in the public service had come to count on the appeal being heard, a case occurred which allows one to give, in the form of an anecdote, a picture of the evils now being slowly rooted out. Count A----, a young vice-governor, fresh from college, came to live in a certain town of the Black Soil country. Fond of dogs and horses, fond of wines and dinners, the young gentleman found his official income far below his wants. He took "his own" (what Russian officials used to call vzietka) from every side; for he loved to keep his house open, his stable full, his card-room merry; and a nice house, a good stable, and a merry card-room, cost a good many rubles in the year. He was lucky with his cards--luckier, some losers said, than a perfectly honest player should be; yet the two ends of his income and his outgo never could be made to meet. The treasurer of the town was Andrew Ivanovitch Gorr, a man of peasant birth, who had been sent to college, and, after taking a good degree, had been put into the civil service, where, by his soft ways, his patient deference to those above him, and his perfect loyalty to his trust, he had risen to the post of treasurer in this provincial town. Count A---- called Andrew into his chamber, and bade him, with a careless gesture, pay a small debt for him. Andrew bowed, and waited for the rubles. A---- just waived him off; but seeing that he would not take the hint, the count said, "Yes, yes, pay the debt; we will arrange it in the afternoon." Then Andrew paid the money, and in less than a week he was asked to pay again. From week to week he went on paying, with due submission to his chief, but with an inward doubt as to whether this paying would come out well. Twice or thrice the count was good enough to speak of his affairs, and even to name a day when the money which he was taking from the public coffers should be replaced. In the mean time the debt was every week increasing in amount; so that the provincial chest was all but drained to pay the vice-governor's personal debts. Andrew was in despair, for the day was fast coming round when the Imperial auditors would come to revise his books and count the money in his box. Unless the fund was restored before they came he would be lost; for the balance was in his charge, and the count could hardly cover his default. On Andrew telling his wife what he had been drawn, by his habit of obeying orders, into doing, he was urged by that sage adviser to go at once to the governor and beg him to replace the cash before the auditors arrived.