This preciosa and ne plus ultra of pearls was shown to few ; many favourable circumstances and powerful recommendations were necessary to obtain such a favour. One of my Moscow friends, who had succeeded in introducing himself to the cell of Mr. , and had received a promise that he should behold the pearl of pearls, informed me of the style and manner of the ceremony. On the appointed day he went with his friends to the convent, and found the old man awaiting his guests at a splendidly-covered breakfast-table, in his holiday clothes. Their reception had something of solemnity in it, and the breakfast passed off amid much talk about east and west, by way of prelude to the important occasion of their meeting. After breakfast, Turkish pipes and coffee were brought in ; a sign was given for the domestics to withdraw, and Mr. , who allowed no one to know where his treasure lay hidden, went himself into his sleeping cell, and brought out the casket wrapped in a rich covering. He first spread a piece of white satin on the table, and then, unlocking the casket, let the precious globule roll out before the enchanted eyes of the spectators. No one dared to touch it, but all burst into a general exclamation of admiration, and the old man's eyes gleamed hke his pearl. After rollingit about, to his own great delight and that of his guests, for some time, he related its history, returned it to its golden bed, and earned it back to his hiding-place.
During his last illness the old humourist never let his pearl out of his bed, and after his death it was with difficulty taken from his stiffened fingers. It found its way afterwards to the imperial treasury, where it may now enjoy the admiration of the world, from wliich its old master so enviously withheld it.
I went one day into the shop of a bookseller in Nicolai-street, to provide myself with a new instrument for my discoveries in the streets of Moscow, I mean a new Russian vocabulary, which I used to learn by heart. The Avorthy trader made me pay five rubles for it, whicli was certainly much more than it was worth. 1 felt wroth at the imposition, and being resolved to indemnify myself one way or the otlicr, I took a seat in his shop, and obtained all the information I could concerning tlio Moscow book trade.