Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

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10 DISPROPORTION OF WOMEN TO MEN.

have hitherto met in the streets, not a single one has appeared to me to possess beauty, and the greater number among them are ugly and dirty to a degree that is repulsive. Astonishment is excited by the recollection that they are the wives and mothers of men with features so fine and regular, profiles so perfectly Grecian, and forms so elegant and supple as those seen among even the lowest classes of the nation. There are no where old men so handsome, nor old women so hideous, as in Russia. I have seen few of the citizens' wives. One of the singularities of Petersburg is, that the number of women in proportion to that of the men is less than in other capitals. I am assured that the former do not at the utmost form more than a third of the total population of the city. Their scarcity causes them to be only too highly prized. They attract so eager an attention that there are few who risk themselves alone after a certain hour in the streets of the less populous quarters. In the capital of a country altogether military, and among a people addicted to drunkenness, this discreetness appears to me sufficiently well founded. At all times the Russian women show themselves less in public than the French: it is not necessary to go far back to find the time when they passed their lives shut up like the women of Asia. This reserve, the remembrance of which still lingers, recalls, like so many other Russian customs, the origin of the people. It contributes to the dnlness of the streets and the fetes of Petersburg. The finest sights in this citv are the parades, which strengthens my former observation, that the Russian capital is a camp, somewhat more stable and pacific than a mere bivouac.