everyone was seated at table, by white mantles trimmed with ermine.
All these features have an importance of their own with regard to the history of the country and the formation of the national ideas and habits; for they inculcated the conviction that the Russian people, in itself, was nothing, and had nothing. Everything was summed up in the Sovereign's person, and to him everything belonged. The ceremonial observed at these banquets contributed to this belief. The Tsar, having first crossed himself devoutly, helped himself to a slice of meat carved by the equerry carver, offered morsels of it to some of the great personages present, and overlooked the distribution of the dishes amongst the other guests, the bearers of the portions saying to each person, 'The Tsar sends you this,' whereupon the recipient rose in his place and thanked the donor. The same ceremony attended the pouring out of the various beverages. The quality of these last was generally praised by foreigners, but the saffron used in seasoning the dishes, the sauces made of sour milk, and the condiments, cucumber and vinegar, introduced into many of them, were unpleasant to their palates; while the necessity of remaining at table for five or six hours, and drinking every cup of wine sent them, was a trial to the toughest. Further, there was a custom whereby the Sovereign, after the banquet, sent his chief guests, at their own houses, a further supply of victuals and drink, which they were expected to share, then and there, with the Tsar's officers who had brought it. On one occasion one of the Emperor's Ambassadors thus received seven goblets of Burgundy, as many each of Rhine wine, Muscat, French white wine, Canary, Alicant, and Malmsey, twelve measures of the best hydromel, seven hundred jars of an inferior quality, eight dishes of roast swan, as many of spiced crane, several dishes of cocks dressed with ginger, boned fowls, black-cock cooked in saffron, hazel-grouse cooked in cream, ducks with cucumber, geese with rice, hares with dumplings and turnips, elks' brains, inmumerable cakes and pies made with meat, cheese, or sugar, besides pancakes, fritters, jellies, creams, and preserved walnuts. And the poor man had just risen from table!
In that country, truly, Gargantua dwelt in flesh and blood.
At Court, as in all private houses, feasts, immoderate and excessive eating and drinking, were the indispensable accompaniment of every merry-making, and the greatest entertainment that could be offered. And, in spite of the Church's anathemas, other pleasures were by no means banished. One special chamber, the potiéchnaïa palata, had charge of these, in fact. Games were much played in the Tsar's immediate circle—
