Under the system of serfage, now approaching its end, it was almost impossible that there should be such a thing as public morality in the lower classes. The Russians, both noble and serf, are false and dishonest to a proverb. Prostitution in such cases is a superfluous term: a woman had no right or opportunity to be virtuous. The morality of St. Petersburg is undoubtedly of the lowest, and yet we have not met with any accounts of local prostitution there. It is a city of men, containing one hundred thousand more males than females.[280] Kelly says the women form only two sevenths (2/7) of the entire population, and calls it "an alarming fact." The climate is unfavorable to female beauty, and it is generally conceded that the men are handsomer than the women. The German girls have an almost exclusive reputation for good looks in St. Petersburg. By reason of the disproportion of the sexes, it is said that ladies can not venture out unattended. This is etiquette among the higher classes of all Continental Europe, and the simple fact, without the reason, would not be surprising. The attention to minutiæ which distinguishes a despotism, and which is so remarkable a feature of Russian state craft, does not allow us to suppose there are no statistical papers on the subject of prostitution; on the contrary, it is perfectly well known that such are in existence. The secrecy which is scrupulously maintained in all public matters, and the watchful vigilance of the police over strangers, prevents them obtaining any information except on the most patent and notorious subjects. The remarks of travelers on Russian society are very vague and general, and unsupported by any of those details which could alone authenticate them. We have already alluded to the ancient Oriental seclusion of women among the Russians. This was so strict that a suitor never saw, or at least was presumed never to have seen, the face of his bride before marriage. In 1493, Ivan the Great told a German embassador who demanded his daughter in marriage for the Margrave of Baden, that Russians never showed their daughters to any one before the match was decided. Peter the Great abolished this lottery, and directed that the parties might see each other, but he still found it necessary to promulgate a strong ukase against parents compelling children to marry against their wishes.