Russia is a country slowly emerging from barbarism. Of their condition in the time of Peter the Great, something may be judged by the regulation he made, ordering the ladies of his court not to get drunk upon any pretence whatever, and forbidding gentlemen to do so before ten o’clock. The empress Catherine ordered certain Russian ladies to be publicly knouted for some indiscretions. French manners now prevail among the higher ranks, who are generally frank, hospitable and courtly. The women are serious and dignified, with something of oriental languor. Their forms of society are ceremonious, compared with the lively graces of the Poles, of whose manners they are apt to judge severely. A French writer has asserted that of all countries, except France, it is perhaps the most agreeable to be a woman in Russia; but when he said this, he must have been thinking only of cities, and of a favored class in those cities. The Russian ladies are proverbial for the facility with which they acquire foreign languages. They speak and write French like native Parisians, though often unable to spell the Russian tongue, which is seldom spoken in polite circles. Among the higher ranks, whose blood is mingled with that of Georgians, Circassians, and Poles, there are some women of extraordinary beauty; but the Russian females are in general short, clumsy, round-faced and sallow. They daub their faces with red and white paint, and in some districts stain their teeth black. The peasantry use no cradles. The babe is placed on a mattress, inclosed in a frame like that used for embroidery, and suspended from the ceiling by four cords, after the manner of the Hindoos. Russian fathers, of all classes, generally arrange marriages for their children, without consulting their inclinations. Among the peasantry, if a girl has the name of being a good housewife, her parents will not fail to have applications for her, whatever may be her age, or personal endowments. As soon as a young man is old enough to be married, his parents seek a wife for him, and all is settled before the young couple know any thing of the matter. Porter gives very unfavorable ideas of the morality of the Russian nobility. He says the marriage tie is little regarded, but the women are less profligate than the men. It ought, however, in justice, to be remembered that a traveller has a better chance to see the vices of a country, than its virtues. Although the Russians, in common with their neighbors of Sweden and Lapland, have an Asiatic fondness for frequent bathing, they are so dirty with regard to their garments, that even the wealthy are generally more or less infested with vermin. The Cossack women are very cleanly and industrious. In the absence of their husbands they supply their places, by taking charge of all their usual occupations in addition to their own. It is rare for a Cossack woman not to know some trade, such as dyeing cloth, tanning leather, &c.