about him and his is that I have yet to spend ten days in a gentler and sweeter neighborhood than those I enjoyed in and about Yasnaya Polyana. CHAPTER XIX I MEET GENERAL KUROPATKIN It is a far cry from Count Tolstoy and Yasnaya Polyana to General Kuropatkin and Central Asia, but while dealing with men and things Russian I might as well tell here as elsewhere of my visit to Central Asia in the fall of 1897. Again the motive was journalistic, and again I was the proud holder of a pass over all the Russian State Railways, not over the private lines, however, as the year before. I have to thank Prince Chilkoff, the Minister of Railways, for this second pass. He had become considerably interested in my travels, and on learning that I contemplated excursions into remote parts of Russia he kindly offered to ask the Tsar to grant me free transportation for three months "in order that my investigations might be facilitated." When the transportation finally reached me, it read: "With Imperial Permission." I have always thought that there was an undue amount of red-tape in getting the pass, but Prince Chilkoff personally assured me that he must formally ask the Tsar for it before it could be issued. This being true, the poor Tsar has more to attend to, particularly in these later days, than ought to fall to the lot of one man. Truly, he is an overworked man, if he must give attention to such minor details. No wonder if some anarchist pots him. There is not a railroad manager in the United States that could do all that the Tsar is alleged to have his hand in on the railroads, and at the same time run a great nation, a national church, and the largest army in the world. Consequently the Imperial permission did not make the impression upon me that it would have, had I believed that the Tsar had done anything more than nod his head, or make a scratch of the pen, when Prince Chilkoff asked for the pass.