of small shopkeepers who are the life and soul of Chinese cities. The largest building in Kiachta is called the Custom House, but it is no longer used as such, all duties on merchandise having been recently abolished through the enlightened exertions of the present Governor-General of Eastern Siberia, who has done much to develop trade in his government. And truly the whole of that inaccessible region, including the Amoor provinces, is so ill-favoured by nature in its geographical position, and so thinly inhabited by a race who have had all enterprize ground out of them by centuries of oppression, that it is only by coaxing and nursing that prosperity can ever take root and flourish. The old Custom House is now occupied by the chief of _postes_ and some other Government officials. It is situated on an elevation above the town and at the far end of Troitskosarfsk, at as great a distance as possible from the residence of the Commissary of the Frontier, who holds his court at the opposite extremity of Kiachta. Having much business to transact at both these places, we hired a droshkie by the day at two roubles, an old shabby looking machine, very groggy on the springs, with two wild half-broken ponies tied to it with ropes, and an unkempt _moujik_ on the box. In this turn-out we rattled along the dusty streets of Kiachta, passed by everything we saw excepting costermongers' carts. I felt very small, perched on the old rattle-trap, and had it not been for the "honour of the thing" I would infinitely have preferred walking or riding, but that was not to be thought of in a Russian, and especially a Siberian, town. Our reputation was at stake.