On to Moscow; Russian serfs

We of course had the privilege, being in our new Carriage, of stopping where & when we pleased, but no one thinks of sleeping in a Russian Hotel, they being almost universally filled with fleas & vermin. The Inns on this road furnish very good meals however, being kept principally by Germans.  Fortifying ourselves, with some bottles of wine (the water here is almost death to a stranger) a written vocabulary of what Russian we might need on the journey, expressed however in English characters, & for [attempting?] pronunciation (for a man to speak Russian well he must first have one of his jaws broken) and a good stock of patience.  We entered the Diligence which was to be our house for some eighty odd hours as it proved to be.  We had a lady in the party which tended [17] somewhat to make us a little more pleased with the trip.  Our horses (four in number[)] were all abreast, miserable looking beasts truly, and miserably harnessed; but able to go ahead, when urged on by the blows and cries of a Russian Muzhik—their serfs (of whom there are under the dominion of the Emperor 36,000,000 out of 56,000,000 inhabitants) and worse absolutely than our blacks, the only advantage that they have over our blacks being that they cannot be sold, only with the estate to which they belong.  They however are liable to be drawn for soldiers whenever the Emperor wants them, and every owner must furnish his quota.  They certainly approach nearer to brutes than any human beings I have ever seen, /their faces consequently are covered with hair as far as their faces are concerned, and the back part of their head, from their neck upwards is shaved close for the space of an inch or two, and the hair behind cut perfectly square, giving them a [18] very outré appearance.