The government, in its excessive care regarding instruction, has established colleges and schools for every branch and for every rank in society excepting _the serfs_, who, poor people! know very little more than the cattle they drive, or beyond their own name and that of their village. It is not an exaggeration to say that they do not know their grandfathers, for among the serfs there are no surnames; like a dog, they only bear one name while alive, and leave none behind them when they are dead. Nine out of every ten cannot tell you how old they are, so it may readily be imagined what the extent of their knowledge is. In speaking of this wronged and “evil entreated” class, I may mention, as _à propos_ to the subject of education, that I once went to a school which M. S——, a gentleman of the province of Twer, boasted he had established on his estate. He was possessed of nearly four thousand souls (_i.e._ men), so, of course, I expected to see a noisy crowd of merry boys all busily engaged in learning their A B C. I was shown into a small room in which were six or eight young lads standing with a dull and heavy look over some dirty books, the contents of which I had the curiosity to examine. The first one I took up was a Latin catalogue of the names of plants, with the pronunciation in Russian letters and the translation on the opposite page. No wonder, poor boy! he looked dull and heavy, to be obliged to con over those long botanical names in a language of which he knew nothing, and to repeat them like a parrot to the master, without feeling the least interest or meaning in the study. I expressed my surprise at his having to learn out of such a book, when I was informed that the lad was destined to be a _gardener on the estate_! and every one of those eight unhappy youths was only being taught to serve his owner’s interest. One was to be a steward, another a village apothecary for the serfs, and so on, just as if they were so many machines of flesh and blood which might be put to any use that their master pleased. This circumstance accounted sufficiently for the absence of the others, for, as they were destined to be merely field-labourers, it was not thought worth while to teach _them_ any more than the horses and oxen on the estate! The University at St. Petersburg is a long white-faced building on the quay of Vassili Ostroff. The students are taught as much as it is thought proper for them to know, and their studies are conducted under the watchful eye of the authorities; from all I could find out, astronomy seems the only science that is permitted to be thoroughly investigated by Russian subjects;[16] for the revolutions of the stars have not much to do with those of monarchies, nor the precession of the equinox with the advance of civilization.