Littell's Living Age/Volume 178/Issue 2301/A Russian General's Gipsy Quarters

A Russian General’s Gipsy Quarters. — A charming sketch of the quarters of the chief architect of the Transcaspian Railway, General Annenkoff, is given in the Pietersburger Zeitung. Nearly midway between Samarkand and Amu-Daria, says a correspondent at the gipsy encampment, on a soil of clay and gravel, stands the railway train in which we live. It consists of from forty to fifty carriages. The first carriage is the residence of General Annenkoff; on the lower floor are his workroom, his sleeping apartment, and the rooms of his secretary; on the upper floor are the quarters of the servants and interpreters. The second carriage is the general dining-hall, in which from twelve to twenty persons breakfast and have dinner — namely, the officers of the railway battalion, the officials, the secretary, and invited and casual visitors. The casual visitors are persons who have come by the new railway which has not yet been publicly opened, and who are on their way further into the country. The next carriages are made into a kitchen and a pantry, which is replenished by purchases at the two nearest towns and at the surrounding villages. One of the general’s servants drives twice a week to Tchardshui to buy white bread, vegetables, and now and then excellent fish and fresh caviar. The Buchara beef and mutton are very good and cheap; the natives have plenty of poultry for sale, and enormous quantities of wild ducks, thousands of which have their homes on the inland lake . Dried fruit, rice, and oatmeal are bought of the Persian traders who follow the new railway line, and Buchara melons, the excellence of which Sultan Ibn Batnia recognized as long ago as 1335, and pomegranates are every day brought fresh to our doors. The officers’ carriages are charmingly decorated with carpets and rugs which the emir has sent them. On the upper floors of their carriages their servants and grooms have their rooms, and the saddle-horses live in front of the train, where they are tied to posts. A post and telegraph office, a hospital with a doctor’s residence, and a chemist’s shop complete the staff quarters, besides which there are a number of carriages for soldiers and workmen. At Kisil-Tepo the station is finished, and at many other stations across the lines the work is briskly going on, and thousands of newly planted streets and trees round them are just beginning to shoot.