The samovar, which, literally, means "self-boiler," is made of brass lined with tin, with a tube in the centre. In fact, it resembles the English urn, except that in the centre-tube red-hot cinders are placed instead of the iron heater. Of course, the charcoal, or _braise_, has to be ignited in a back kitchen or court-yard; for in a room the carbonic acid proceeding from it would prove injurious. It has no advantage then, whatever, over the English urn, except that it can be heated with facility in the open air, with nothing but some charcoal, a few sticks of thin dry wood, and a lucifer; hence its value at picnics, where it is considered indispensable. In the woods of Sakolniki, in the gardens of Marina Roschia, and in the grounds adjoining the Petrovski Palace, all close to Moscow, large supplies of samovars are kept at the tea-houses, and each visitor, or party of visitors, is supplied with one. Indeed, the quantity of tea consumed at these suburban retreats in the spring and summer is prodigious. In Russia there is no interval between winter and spring. As soon as the frost breaks up the grass sprouts, the trees blossom, and all nature is alive. In that country of extremes there is sometimes as much difference between April and May as there is in England between January and June. The summer is celebrated by various promenades to the country, which take place at Easter, on the first of May, Ascension Day, Trinity Sunday, and other occasions. The great majority of these promenades are of a festive nature, but some, like that which is made on the 19th of May to the monastery and cemetery of the Don, have a penitential, or, at least, a mournful character. The samovar, however, is present even in the churchyard. I never joined in one of the funeral pilgrimages to the Donskoi convent; but in other cemeteries outside Moscow and St. Petersburg (intramural burial not being tolerated), I noticed that the custodians kept in their lodges a supply of samovars for the benefit of visitors. And, after all, what can be more appropriate than an urn in a cemetery? Between St. Petersburg and Kovno or Tauroggen, there are upwards of fifty "stations," at each of which tea can be procured. Travellers whose route does not lie along the government post-roads, take samovars with them in their carnages; and small samovars that can be packed into the narrowest compass are made for the use of officers starting on a campaign, and other persons likely to find themselves in places where it may be difficult to procure hot water. Small tea-caddies are also manufactured with a similar object. Each caddy contains one or more glasses; for men among themselves usually drink their tea, not out of tea-cups, but out of tumblers. Not many years since it was the fashion to give cups to women and tumblers to men in the evening; but the tumbler is gradually being banished, at least from the drawing-room.