Renner) who in the most handsome manner volunteered
his services as our interpreter as far as Moscow, we should have
justly merited the epithet of deaf and dumb, applied by the Russians
to persons unacquainted with their language. Well! even in this
state, our journey would have been quite safe and easy, so great is
the hospitality of the nobles and the people of Russia! On our first
entrance we learned that the direct road to Petersburg was already
occupied by the armies, and that we must go to Moscow in order to
get the means of conveyance there. This was another round of 200
leagues; but we had already made 1500, and I now feel pleased at
having seen Moscow.
The first province we had to cross, Volhynia, forms a part of
Russian Poland; it is a fertile country, over-run with Jews, like
Gallicia, but much less miserable. I stopped at the chateau of a
Polish nobleman to whom I had been recommended, who advised me to
hasten my journey, as the French were marching upon Volhynia, and
might easily enter it in eight days. The Poles, in general, like the
Russians much better than they do the Austrians; the Russians and
Poles are both of Sclavonian origin: they have been enemies, but
respect each other mutually, while the Germans, who are further
advanced in European civilization than the Sclavonians, have not
learned to do them justice in other respects.
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