He led me up a spiral stair, and opening a low door at the top, we entered a long, narrow room directly under the roof, and lighted only by a huge skylight. As I glanced about me, I realized that the place would furnish an admirable pretext for an accusation of familiarity with the black arts, far more plausible too than the one preferred against the book of algebra belonging to Matveief’s son. The room was bare of all luxury, furnished only in the plainest and most meager fashion, and fitted up for a laboratory. The skylight illumined the center of the apartment, leaving the corners gloomy; and out of the shadows, here and there, grinned a whitened skull, and there were various other fragments of the human anatomy about the place. The doctor’s instruments, keen and polished, were in evidence, and heavy volumes of science were piled from floor to roof, in ponderous stacks. There were many phials filled with various colored fluids, and a keen aromatic odor issued from a black kettle simmering over the fire, suspended on a hook and chain from the brick arch above the hearth. It was the very spot in which to conjure up a familiar spirit, and there was something of the same mystery and interest about the dignified figure of the Hebrew. His keen eye divined my thoughts. “You see the palpable evidence of my nefarious schemes, M. le Vicomte,” he said, smiling. “Here is the place to brew a poison for a czar. Alas! there is no foe so dangerous as ignorant superstition, and the average Russian of to-day is even more superstitious than the rest of the world. There is one man in that court, though, who is in advance of his times; one man who is equal to taking the helm, though the last one likely to be called, if the election of to-day hold.” I glanced at him interrogatively; I always liked to hear Von Gaden’s opinions. He continued at once,-- “I mean Prince Basil Galitsyn,” he said; “he is still a young man, but a born leader.” “All his attachment is for the Miloslavsky party though,” I replied. “Ay, he is for the Miloslavskys. In fact, there is a strong friendship between him and the Czarevna Sophia; for all that, he may yet be called to the helm, for who knows what will come?” “You know the young czar,” I said; “what do you think of him?” “Peter Alexeivitch is still a child,” Von Gaden replied slowly; “but I have observed him closely, for in him, I know, we see Russia’s future ruler, whoever reigns during his minority. His succession seems beyond dispute, in the long run. He is neither like his amiable father, Alexis, nor like the late czar, Feodor. He is a young barbarian,--fierce, cruel, daring. The boy is different from other boys. I think that Russia has much to fear, and more to hope, from that young Tartar.” I laughed. “It is well that these walls are without ears,” I said, “else what treason would this sound in Moscow!”