We shirked our meals at the establishment with great regularity, with the exception of morning coffee, which was unavoidable, but we did justice to its kumys, which was superb.  Theoretically, the mares should have had the advantage of better pasturage, at a greater distance from town; but, as they cannot be driven far to milk without detriment, that plan involves making the kumys at a distance, and transporting it to the “cure.”  There is another famous establishment, situated a mile beyond ours, where this plan is pursued.  Ten miles away the mares pasture, and the kumys is made at a subsidiary cure, where cheap quarters are provided for poorer patients.  But, either on account of the transportation under the hot sun, or because the professional “taster” is lacking in delicacy of perception, we found the kumys at this rival establishment coarse in both flavor and smell, in comparison with that at our hostelry.

Our mares, on the contrary, were kept close by, and the kumys was prepared on the spot.  It is the first article of faith in the creed of the kumys expert that no one can prepare this milk wine properly except Tatars.  Hence, when any one wishes to drink it at home, a Tatar is sent for, the necessary mares are set aside for him, and he makes what is required.  But the second article of faith is that kumys is much better when made in large quantities.  The third is that a kumys specialist, or doctor, is as indispensable for the regulation of the cure as he is at mineral springs.  The fourth article in the creed is that mares grazing on the rich plume-grass of the steppe produce milk which is particularly rich in sugar, very poor in fat, and similar to woman’s milk in its proportion of albumen, though better furnished:  all which facts combine to give kumys whose chemical proportions differ greatly from those of kumys prepared elsewhere.  Moreover, on private estates it is not always possible to observe all the conditions regarding the choice and care of the mares.

At our establishment there were several Tatars to milk the mares and make the kumys.  The wife of one of them, a Tatar beauty, was the professional taster, who issued her orders like an autocrat on that delicate point.  She never condescended to work, and it was our opinion that she ought to devote herself to dress, in her many leisure hours, instead of lounging about in ugly calico sacks and petticoats, as hideous as though they had originated in a backwoods farm in New England.  She explained, however, that she was in a sort of mourning.  Her husband was absent, and she could not make herself beautiful for any one until his return, which she was expecting every moment.  She spent most of her time in gazing, from a balcony on the cliff, up the river, toward the bend backed by beautiful hills, to espy her husband on the steamer.  As he did not come, we persuaded her, by arguments couched in silver speech, to adorn herself on the sly for us.  Then she was afraid that the missing