The lanes separating the _isbas_ into a very unconventional imitation of blocks was well-nigh impassable, save where logs and lengths of rough board had been precariously anchored by stones, so as to allow the inhabitants at least to reach the _kabàk_--or drinking-shop--this indispensable adjunct of any human habitation, especially in the North, wherever that North may befind itself. It is a populous village, numbering twelve hundred “souls,” as is plainly testified in orthodox characters by a painted sign at the entrance of the chief thoroughfare. Also its _kabàk_ is of a better class than is usually found in such villages, for upon its once whitewashed walls are tacked highly inflamed pictures of many saints and sinners (mostly obtained from wandering peddlers), and the short curtains of the square windows are of heavy red material, large enough to be drawn straight across the double glass of an evening, when “lights out” should be the order of the hour. Of course the atmosphere of the place is neither better nor worse than is to be encountered in similar places the Empire over. An unhappy mixture of _vòdka_, _kwàss_, red-cabbage soup--wherein clots of sour milk are wont to lurk--stale tobacco, and the odor of humanity clad in thick woolens and greasy sheepskins gives it its unfragrant character during the day, while at night these amiable factors are overtoned by the smoking kerosene-lamps which an all-wise Providence has been powerless to spare to the _mujiks_ in this their era of progress. Tverna has the fortune to be situated in one of Russia’s most prosperous provinces. Unlike Sámàrâ, Vintkà, and many others, it does not belong to a famine government, also the cholera is seldom heard of there, but, nevertheless, it has its drawbacks; for as it is of great agrarian and political importance, it is visited more frequently than is wholesome for it by professional agitators, who, daring the might of Prince Basil Palitzin, invade its purlieus whenever that kindly lord ventures to absent himself. It is well known that when the “presence flag” waves its silken folds above the Castle, peace and quiet abide in Tverna; but the minute it is hauled down and the tröika bearing him away has disappeared from view, the trouble-makers are once more at their evil work. All day it had been raining densely, and a disheartening evening was setting in, with no prospect whatsoever of better things for the morrow. In the _kabàk_ were assembled the more important members of the village council, the _staròstá_--a gigantic man, blond as ripe corn, pink-faced, and with a pair of prominent eyes--so beautifully blue that it is a pity to have to call them stupid--and a dozen or so of less illustrious persons, content with sitting in corners and listening to the pow-wow.