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

in nothing. You must communicate officially with the heads of the so called public establishments, and you obtain no other permission than that of expressing before the legitimate authorities the admiration which politeness, prudence, and a gratitude of which the Russians are very jealous, demand. They refuse you nothing, but they accompany you every where : politeness becomes a pretext for maintaining a watch over you.

In this manner they tyrannise over us in pretending to do us honour. Such is the fate of privileged travellers. As to those who are not privileged, they see nothing at all. The country is so organised that without the immediate intervention of official persons no stranger can move about agreeably, or even safely. In all this, will be recognised the manners and the policy of the East, disguised under European urbanity. Such alliance of the East and the West, the results of which are discoverable at every step, is the grand characteristic of the Russian empire.

A semi-civilisation is always marked by formalities; refined civilisation dispenses with them, just as perfect good breeding banishes affectation.

The Russians are still persuaded of the efficaciousness of falsehood; and such illusion on the part of a people so well acquainted with it, amazes me. It is not that they lack quick perception, but in a land where the governors do not yet understand the advantages of liberty, even for themselves, the governed naturally shrink from the immediate inconveniences of truth. One is momentarily obliged to repeat that the people here, great and small, resemble the Greeks of the Lower Empire.