What a place of mystery is a Russian Fair, be it in the capital or at the outposts of the Empire!  There is nothing that may not be found there.  One never knows what extraordinary or wonderful thing one may light upon there.  Among old rusty fire-irons one finds an ancient sword offered as a poker; among the litter of holy and secular secondhand books, hand-painted missals of the earliest Russian times.

Nothing is ever thrown away; even rusty nails find their way to the bazar.  The miscellanies of a stall might upon occasion be what is left behind after a house removal.  On one table at Batum I observed two moth-eaten rusty fezes, a battered but unopened tin of herrings in tomato-sauce, another tin half-emptied, a guitar with one string, a good hammer, a door-mat worn to holes, the clearing of a book-case, an old saucepan, an old kerosene stove, a broken coffee-grinder, and a rusty spring mattress.  Under the stall were two Persian greyhounds, also for sale.  The shopmen ask outrageous prices, but do not expect to be paid them.

“How much the kerosinka?” I asked in sport.

“Ten shillings,” said an old, sorrowful-looking Persian.

I laughed sarcastically, and was about to move away.  The Persian was taking the oil-stove to bits to show me its inward perfection.

“Name your price,” said he.

I did not want a kerosene stove, but for fun I tried him on a low figure—­

“Sixpence,” I said.

“Whew!” The Persian looked about him dreamily.  Did he sleep, did he dream?

“You don’t buy a machine for sixpence,” said he.  “I bought this second-hand for eight-and-sixpence.  I can offer it to you for nine shillings as a favour.”

“Oh no, sixpence; not a farthing more.”

I walked away.

“Five shillings,” cried the Persian—­“four shillings.”

“Ninepence,” I replied, and moved farther away.

“Two shillings.”  He bawled something more, inaudibly, but I was already out of hearing.  I happened to repass his stall accidentally later in the morning.

“That kerosinka,” said the Persian—­“take it; it is yours at one shilling and sixpence.”

I felt so sorry for the unhappy hawker, but I could not possibly buy an oil-stove.  I could not take one as a gift; but I looked through his old books and there found, in a tattered condition, The Red Laughter, by Leonid Andreef, a drama by Gorky, a long poem by Skitaletz, and a most interesting account of Chekhof’s life by Kouprin, all of which I bought after a short haggle for fivepence, twenty copecks.  I was the richer by my visit to his stall, for I found good reading for at least a week.  And the old Persian accepted the silver coin and dropped it into an old wooden box, looking the while with melancholy upon the unsold kerosinka.

VIII

A TURKISH COFFEE-HOUSE