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rick the Great aptly illustrated by saying that "when you fight with a Russian you must kill him first and knock him down afterward." But let them once be deprived of their leader or lose their solid formation, and their helplessness becomes instantly manifest.

Excitement here is now a veritable epidemic. Go where you will, charity-boxes, designating the purpose for which alms are solicited, and each boasting the bright crimson cross stamped on a pure white surface, meet your eye. They are affixed to the walls of the various ooclitzas (or roads) traversing this mighty city; they greet you at the entrance of every church and cathedral, the charming little English church occupying a site in the Tchernetchefsky Perculok forming no exception to the rule; do you happen to enter "Gurin's," the well-known Muscovitish restaurant, the probability is that your charity "on behalf of the sick and wounded" is instantly demanded by a lady, who, duly escorted by some member of the "nobler sex," has taken upon herself the duty of "begging" in this particular district. The topic of—as also endless incidents attendant upon—this deplorable war meets one at every point—in the lowest peeteny-dom (drinking-house); in every shop; in the very droshky which one hires, the driver (eczvostchik) being invariably well versed in the latest phases of the combat.

To-day a fresh impetus has been given by the departure from Moscow, after a two days' stay here, of a portion of the Imperial Guards from St. Petersburg en route for the field—were it not better to say many fields?—of battle. This body, numbering about thirty-six hundred officers and soldiers, was despatched from the modern capital in instalments of six hundred men. The Guards, it must be remembered, constitute the flower and pride of the Russian army, and it is impossible that they could be regarded in any other light. A veritable set of giants, so to speak, they one and all appeared, clad in their rough brown winter gear, with heavy top-boots, and carrying heavy knapsacks with superfluous pairs of nailed high boots strapped thereon.

The organization of the Imperial Guard dates from the reign of the most autocratic of the czars. Peter the Great, left fatherless at an early age, spent his childhood in the village of Preobragensky, situated not many versts from Moscow, where his greatest delight, as he grew in years, was to assemble the youths of the village and train them into a fighting corps, constituting himself their captain. But the youthful hero was not content with this venture. He also made friends with the boys of the neighboring village—Semenovsky by name—and assembled them in like fashion. Hence the names attached to the first and second regiments of the Infanterie de la Garde—Preobragensky and Semenovsky. In after-life Peter retained the rank in early days thus self assumed, remaining captain of his favorite Preobragensky regiment.

The Infanterie de la Garde consists of three divisions, each comprising four regiments. The first division, besides the two already named, includes the regiments designated as Ismailovsky and the Chasseurs de la Garde. The regiments of the second division are named, respectively, Pavlovsky, Les Grenadiers de la Garde, Moscovsky, and De Finlande. The third division embraces the Volensky and Letovsky regiments, as also those dubbed L'Empereur d'Autriche and L'Empereur de Prusse. The cavalry has also three divisions, the first comprising the four regiments named Les Chevalier Gardes, Les Gardes à Cheval, Les Cuirassiers de l'Empereur and Les Cuirassiers de l'Impératrice; the second, Les Hussards de l'Empereur, Les Lanciers du Grand Duc Nicolas, Les Grenadiers à Cheval, and Les Dragons de l'Empereur; and the third, two regiments, Les Lanciers de l'Empereur and Les Hussards de Grodno.

Soon after six o’clock A.M., on a bleak and rainy morning, I found my way in a horribly shaky and shabby droshky to the railway terminus, where the soldiers were gathered, many of them accompanied by friends and near relations,