Excerpt from Men and Things Russian: Or Holiday Travels in the Lands of the Czar We had to lie in Leith Roads for a couple of hours or so before the ship's papers could be got ready for the Russian Customs at Cronstadt, and as a large vessel was lying at some little distance from us, Captain Barnetson steamed round her that we might have a look at an Atlantic steamer which had been run ashore, got Off, and patched up, and which the owners were then trying to sell to the Russian Government, to be added to the six cruisers they had already fitted out for the purpose of 'sweeping British merchant shipping Off the seas, ' as it was called, when a few months ago English and Russian relationships were somewhat strained. Six or seven Russian cruisers carry the broom at the mast-head, and sweep the seas of British bottoms! What a piece of nonsense! Surely the Russian Admiralty must have opened its eyes rather wide when it read one morning, how that in the British House of Commons, the First Lord of the Admiralty said on the previous night that he had forty large and power ful merchant vessels told Off to serve as cruisers, with their armament ready to be put on board at an hour's notice, should the occasion arise. Two can play at a game of brag. But we shall not say too much about this, for if England can put forty cruisers over against seven of Russia, it almost stands to a certainty that Russia may set Afghanistan over against Cyprus. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.