On the way to Ribinsk my carriage was occupied by a party of workmen, including a carpenter and a wheelwright, who were going to work on somebody’s property in the government of Tver; they did not know whose property, and they did not know whither they were going. They were under the authority of an old man who came and talked to me, because, he said, the company of the youths who were with him was tedious. He told me a great many things, but as he was hoarse and the train made a rattling noise, I could not hear a word he said. There were also in the carriage two Tartars and a small boy about thirteen years old, who had a domineering character and put himself in charge of the carriage. The discomfort of travelling third class in Russia does not consist in the accommodation, but in the fact that one is constantly waked during the night by passengers coming in and by the guard asking for one’s ticket. The small boy with the domineering character--he wore an old military cap on the back of his head as a sign of strength of purpose--contributed in no small degree to the general discomfort. He apparently was in no need of sleep, and he went from passenger to passenger telling them where they would have to change and where they would have to get out, and offering to open the window if needed. I had a primitive candlestick made of a candle stuck into a bottle; it fell on my head just as I went to sleep, so I put it on the floor and went to sleep again. But the small boy came and waked me and told me that my bottle was on the floor, and that he had put it back again. I thanked him, but directly he was out of sight I put it back again on the floor, and before long he came back, waked me a second time,--and told me that my candlestick had again fallen down. This time I told him, not without emphasis, to leave it alone, and I went to sleep again. But the little boy was not defeated; he waked me again with the information that a printed advertisement had fallen out of the book I had been reading, on to the floor. This time I told him that if he waked me again I should throw him out of the window. Later in the night a tidy-looking man of the middle class entered the carriage with his wife. They began to chatter, and to complain of the length of the benches, the officious boy with the domineering character lending them his sympathy and advice. This went on till one of the Tartars could bear it no longer, and he cried out in a loud voice that if they wanted beds six yards long they had better not travel in a train, and that they were making everybody else’s sleep impossible. I blessed that Tartar unawares, and after that there was peace.