awakened by the loud and continued howl of dogs. I crept from my miserable bed; the ground around was actually flooded with the heavy rain, the moon had not yet arisen. Again the sound reached my ears, seeming to come down the valley through which the river flowed, it was not the cry of the native dog, but I feared it came from the "dingoes" of the aborigines; long and anxiously did I listen to the frequently repeated howls.

At first I proposed to myself to proceed down the river in a contrary direction to that from whence the sounds seemed to emanate; the probability of being in the vicinity of some station then presented itself to me, and I resolved to venture along the bank in order to discover in what neighbourhood I really was. Cautiously I groped my way along till I found myself directly opposite to where the cries still continued to come, I looked in vain for the fires of the aborigines; no light was to be seen. I remained an hour at the foot of a white gum, till the moon rose, shedding a scanty light through the misty clouds, on the scenery around, and there joyously I perceived directly opposite to me two or three slab huts. My loud and startling "coohy" sounded through the forest, and I had but a short time to wait before men's voices were heard, and an inquiring shout saluted my ears. Having made my position known, I was informed that, in consequence of the swollen state of the stream, it would be almost dangerous to cross it, but that owing to my miserable position, the attempt would be made. A canoe formed out of the trunk of a tree, with its two ends square, covered with a piece of green hide to prevent its filling, was soon launched, and by the aid of a rope that extended across the river, and was fastened on either side, it was soon hauled across, close to where I stood. Having entered I seated myself at one end, while my conductor stood at the other; gradually we moved out, till we got into the strength of the stream, which was such that the end of the canoe at which my conductor sat, was, in consequence of his retaining the frail bark against the current, buried under water, so that he was compelled to let go, and permit us to float down with the stream, with the canoe half filled. Dreading a collision with some of the logs that crowded the stream, we took advantage of a near approach to a point of land, to jump out, and swim for the bank, which we succeeded in gaining, but in a most miserable plight; having thrown off my coat, waistcoat and boots, in the canoe, and my pistols having been left behind also. A five minutes' walk across a fenced-in paddock brought us to the station, which I found to belong to a Mr. Riddell. was most hospitably received, furnished with clothes, and after a good rest, I crossed the river the following day, with a party of eight mounted men to proceed in search of my horse, whose body I found with torn saddle, and plundered saddle-bags, some distance down the gully where I had experienced so much danger.

Here I

On my return I obtained the loan of a horse from the superintendent of Mr. Riddell's stations, and in company with Mr. M'Intosh, a squatter, and two other companions, proceeded on my journey to Port Phillip, calling at M'Leod's station, which was further down the river, and reached Melbourne without any adventure worth relating, on the evening of the sixth day.

J. B.

THE last load of the goods and chattels belonging to Adrian Prokhóroff, the coffin-maker, was piled up on the hearse, which now played the part of a waggon, and the pair of rusty jades which dragged it had set off from the Basmánnaia to the Nikítskaia, whither the coffinmaker was about to move with all his household. Having shut up his shop, he nailed to the gate of the house a notice, that it was to be sold or let on lease, and betook himself, on foot, to his new quarters. As he approached the neat little yellow house, which he had so long coveted, and which he had at last purchased for a tolerably heavy sum, the old coffin-maker felt with astonishment that his heart was not filled with delight, as he had so often anticipated. As he crossed the strange threshold, and found his new dwelling in all the uproar and confusion of removing, he sighed for the tumble-down old abode, where, during the space of eighteen years all had been kept in the most strict order; and he began to scold his two daughters and his maid-servant for the slowness of their movements, himself setting also vigorously to work to help them. In a short time order was established; the shrine with the images, the press with the crockery, the table, sofa, and bed, took up their proper positions in the various corners of the back-parlour; in the kitchen and front room were displayed the productions of the master's trade:* coffins of all colours and all dimensions, and presses full of mourning hats, cloaks, and torches. Over the door dangled a sign, representing a bloated Cupid holding a reversed flambeau, with the inscription, "Coffins, plain and fancy, made, lined, and covered; and second-hand ones sold, lent on hire, and repaired." The young ladies retired to their own room; Adrian walked round and inspected his dwelling, then sat down by the window, and ordered the samovár† to be got ready.

The enlightened reader is aware, that Shakspeare and Walter Scott have both represented their grave-diggers as people of a merry and sportive disposition, in order that, by means of the opposition between the nature of the workman and the character of his work, they might more powerfully strike our imagination. Our respect, however, for truth, will prevent us from following their example, and compels us to confess that the temper of our coffin-maker was in perfect unison with

* The coffin is in Russia generally painted some exceedingly bright and striking colour, as rose, sky-blue, scarlet, &c.; and the funeral procession is led by a number of persons (generally soldiers hired for the purpose), dressed in broad flapped hats, long mourning cloaks, and bearing torches. These men are what we call in England "mutes."

"Samovar," literally "self-boiler." The Russian tea-urn; differing from the English utensil, in being heated by lighted charcoal burning in a kind of little grate at the bottom of a chimney traversing the whole apparatus perpendicularly. The samovar is universally used in Russia by all ranks.

his melancholy trade. Adrian Prokhóroff was almost invariably gloomy and pensive. He seldom broke silence except to scold his daughters, when he found them interrupting their work to look out of the window at the passers-by, or to demand for his goods the most exorbitant price from those who had the ill-fortune (or, as it sometimes occurs, the satisfaction) to require them. And thus it happened that Adrian, as he sat by his window, and emptied his regular seventh cup of tea, was as usual plunged in melancholy reflections. He was thinking of a violent shower of rain which a week before had encountered the funeral of a retired brigadier, and had deluged it at the very beginning of the procession. Many of his best cloaks had been so shrunk by it as to be almost ruined, and many of his hats had been soaked quite out of shape. He foresaw with horror an unavoidable outlay, for his old stock of funeral apparatus had returned home in a most pitiable condition. He hoped to recover some of his loss by the funeral of old Triukhína, the merchant's widow, who had been at death's door for a whole twelvemonth. But Triukhína was dying in the Razguliáia, and Prokhóroff was afraid that her "heirs and assigns," notwithstanding the old lady's formal promise that he should have the job, might think it superfluous to send for him from such a distance, and might deal with the nearest undertaker.

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These meditations were unexpectedly interrupted by three freemasonic knocks at the door. "Who is there?" asked the coffin-maker. The door opened, and a person, who could be known at one glance for a German working-man, entered the room, and with a joyous air approached the coffin-maker. "Excuse me, my good neighbour," said he, with that droll accent and pronunciation which we Russians have never, to this day, learned to hear without laughing, excuse me if I disturb you. I was very anxious to make your acquaintance. I am a boot-maker; my name is Gottlieb Schultz, I live over the way there, in that little house opposite your windows. To-morrow I celebrate my silver wedding, and I am come to beg you and your daughters to dine with us in a friendly way." The invitation was graciously accepted. The coffin-maker entreated the boot-maker to sit down and take a cup of tea; and, thanks to the open-hearted temper of Gottlieb Schultz, they soon began to entertain a friendly conversation. "And how go your affairs, my dear sir?" enquired Adrian. "Why, he, he !" replied Schultz, "pretty fairish for that. I can't complain. But my trade is a different thing from yours; the live man can get on without boots, but a dead one can't live without a coffin."- "That's a real fact," remarked Adrian; "at the same time, if the live man has nothing to buy boots with, why, saving your presence, he goes barefoot; but the dead beggar can get himself a coffin for nothing." In this fashion the conversation was still prolonged between them for some time; at last the boot-maker rose and said farewell to the coffin-maker, renewing, as he did so, his invitation for the morrow.

The next day, exactly at twelve o'clock, the coffin-maker and his daughters came out of the gate of the new house, and crossed the street to their neighbour's. I will not describe either Adrian Prokhoroff's Russian kaftan, nor the European costume of Akulína and Dária, for

* Silver wedding, silburna zocszrit, the celebration among the Germans of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the wedding-day. The golden wedding, that of the fiftieth.

I intend on this occasion to depart from the custom so universal among the romance-writers of the present day. I consider it necessary, however, to remark, that both the young ladies wore yellow bonnets and red shoes, a degree of splendour which, with them, was always reserved for very high and solemn occasions.

The close and narrow lodging of the boot-maker was already filled with guests, for the most part German tradesmen, with their wives and foremen; the Russian dignitaries were represented by one officer, Iúrko, a Finn gentleman, holding the office of búdolchnik, who had managed to acquire, despite his somewhat undignified profession, the particular friendship of the host. For twenty-five years he had served with honour and distinction in that profession, like the postilion in Pogoriélsku's tale. The conflagration of the year 1812, which annihilated the ancient metropolis of Russia, involved in the common ruins his yellow búdka. But immediately on the evacuation of the city by the enemy, there arose on the same spot a new and commodious edifice, painted grey, with white columns of the Doric order, and Iúrko began once more to walk backwards and forwards before the door, with armour of dowlas and bright battle-axe. He was acquainted with the greater part of the Germans who resided in the neighbourhood of the Nikítskii gate; some of them were, indeed, in the habit of occasionally passing the night at Iúrko's,-I mean the night which intervenes between Sunday and Monday. Adrian immediately made acquaintance with this individual, shrewdly foreseeing that he was a person of whose good offices one would have need sooner or later; and when the guests sat down to table, the new friends were placed next to each other. Mr. and Mrs. Schultz and their daughter Löttchen, a young lady of seventeen, dined in company with the guests, and found time to exercise the duties of hospitality, and to help the cook to wait at table. The beer flowed abundantly; Iúrko ate for half a dozen; Adrian kept pace with him; his daughters displayed their most recherché airs and graces; the conversation in German grew louder and louder. Suddenly the host begged the attention of the company, and uncorking a well-sealed bottle, loudly announced in Russian, "To the health of my good Louisa!" Bang went the gooseberry wine. The host then tenderly kissed the still blooming cheek of his "fat, fair, and forty" spouse, and the guests with uproarious enthusiasm drained their glasses to the health of the good Louisa. "To the health of my kind guests!" exclaimed the entertainer, uncorking a second bottle;-and the guests thanked him, emptying their glasses once again. Then toasts began to follow each other without intermission; they drank the health of each guest separately; they drank to Moscow, and to a whole dozen of German towns; they drank to all the guilds in general, and to each in particular, they drank the health of the masters and foremen. Adrian toped away with the most zealous industry, and grew exhilarated to such a degree, that he proposed some merry and face

* “Búdotchnik," a soldier of the police, performing the duty of a street watchman. The word is derived from "búdka," signifying one of the little wooden houses so frequently to be met in every Russian street, in which live a pair of these guardians of the peace, one of whom is always on duty before the door, dressed in a species of uniform, and armed with a battle-axe. They arrest drunkards and uproarious persons, imprisoning them for the night in their búdka, inflictthe slighter punishments ordered by the police, &c.

tious toast. Suddenly one of the guests, a stumpy baker, raised his glass and roared out, "To the health of the good folks we work for, unserer Ländleute!" This proposition, like all the others, was accepted with unanimity and delight. The guests began to bow to each other, tailor to boot-maker, boot-maker to tailor, baker to both, everybody to baker, and so on. Iúrko, amid these mutual salutations, cried out, turning to his neighbour, "Come, old boy! drink the health of your customers, the dead 'uns!" Everybody roared with laughter, but the coffin-maker accounted himself insulted, and looked sulky. No one, however, remarked this, the party continued to drink, and it was not till the bells were ringing for evening service that they rose from table.

The guests separated late, and, for the most part, in a very merry humour. A stumpy baker and a book-binder, whose countenance had the air of being" splendidly bound in red morocco," politely conducted Iúrko to his budka, exemplifying, on this occasion, the Russian proverb, "paid debts are pretty deeds." The coffin-maker got home drunk and angry. "Who says, I should like to know," he grumbled aloud, "that my trade is not as good as another? What, is a coffinmaker the hangman's fellow? What do they laugh at, the outlandish heretics! What, is a coffin-maker to be a Christ-tide tom-fool? I meant to ask them to my house-warming, and give them a feast,-ay, galore! but now, I'll see them- I'll invite those that I work for; good, Christian dead 'uns!"-" Why, master," said the maid-servant, who was pulling off his shoes and stockings, "what stuff is that you're talking? Cross yourself, master; cross yourself. Ask dead people to a house-warming! why, 'tis horrid to think of!"-" By the mass, but I will ask them," rejoined Adrian, "and for to-morrow, too. Do me the honour, my kind masters and mistresses, to come and sup with nie to-morrow evening; I will treat you as well as I can." With these words the coffin-maker got into bed, and was instantly fast asleep and snoring.

It was still dark when they came to wake Adrian. Old Mrs. Triukhína had just given up the ghost, and a special messenger on horseback, sent by her steward, galloped up to Adrian's house with the news. The coffin-maker gave this herald of good tidings a grívennik,* to drink his health, dressed himself hastily, took a drójki, and set off for the Razguliáia. At the gate of the departed he found the police already in attendance, and the shop-keepers as busy and noisy as ravens which have just caught the smell of a dead body. The corpse of the old woman was lying on a table, as yellow as wax, but as yet undisfigured by corruption. Around her were thronging her relations, neighbours, and servants. All the windows were open; tapers were burning round the corpse, the priests were reading the prayers. Adrian went up to Triukhina's nephew, a young shopkeeper in a fashionable frock-coat, and informed him that coffin, tapers, pall, and all the rest belonging to his department, would be immediately supplied in the most respectable style. The heir thanked him in a careless tone, saying, that no difficulty would be made about the price, which would be left to the undertaker's conscience. The coffin-maker, according to his custom, swore solemnly that he would not ask too much; he exchanged a significant glance with the book-keeper, and departed to Grívennik, a small silver coin, ten kopeks silver.