This long meal at Prince Galitzin's reminds me of another, which probably never ended at all. I had engaged to dine with a big, stout, enormously wealthy banker of Moscow. We were eighteen at table; never in my life did I see such a collection of ugly and insignificant faces--typical faces of money-makers. When I had looked at them all once I dared not raise my eyes again, for fear of meeting one of those visages. There was no conversation; they might have been taken for dummies if they had not eaten like ogres. Four hours went by in this fashion, and I was bored to the verge of nausea. At last I made up my mind, and feigning indisposition I left them sitting at the table--where they perhaps still are. It was an unlucky day, for that evening a rather comical episode occurred, though it did not amuse me in the least. For some reason or other I was obliged to make a call upon an Englishwoman. A lady of my acquaintance took me there, and left me for some time, after promising to come back for me. As ill-luck would have it, this Englishwoman knew not a word of French, and myself not a word of English, and it may readily be conceived how great was our mutual embarrassment. I still see her before a little table, between two candles lighting up a face as pale as death. She thought it her duty, from politeness, to keep talking to me in a language I could not understand, and I reciprocated by addressing her in French, which she understood no better. We remained together more than an hour, which hour seemed to me a century, and I imagine the poor Englishwoman must have found it just as long. At the period when I was in Moscow the wealthiest resident of the town, and perhaps of all Russia, was Prince Bezborodko. He could have raised, it is said, an army of 30,000 men on his estate, so many peasants did he own, these people, as everybody knows, being considered as part of the soil in Russia. On his different properties he owned a large number of serfs, whom he treated with the greatest kindness, and whom he caused to be instructed in various trades. When I went to see him he showed me rooms full of furniture, bought in Paris from the workshops of the famous upholsterer, Daguere. Most of this furniture had been imitated by his serfs, and it was impossible to distinguish between copy and original. It is this fine work which leads me to assert that the Russian people are gifted with remarkable intelligence; they understand everything, and seem endowed with the talent of execution. Thus the Prince de Ligne wrote: "I see Russians who are told to be sailors, huntsmen, musicians, engineers, painters, actors, and who become all these things according to their masters' wish. I see others sing and dance in the trenches, plunged in snow and mud, in the midst of musket and cannon shots. And they are all alert, attentive, obedient, and respectful."