as well Russian as English; and he mentions it as a circumstance worthy of remark, that he met among the former with many persons of much worth and honour.
Captain Valensky, the Persian ambassador, having contracted a friendship for him during their journey, continued to regard him with the same feelings after their return; and when, on hearing that the czar was about to despatch an embassy to China, Bell expressed an ardent desire to accompany it, recommended him in such a manner to the ambassador, Captain Ismailoff, as not only procured his reception into the suite of the mission, but the friendship of that worthy man for the remainder of his life.
Our traveller set out from Petersburg on his way to China on the 14th of July, 1719, and proceeded through Moscow to Kazan, where he awaited the setting in of winter, the journey through Siberia being to be performed in sledges. The poor Swedish generals who had been taken prisoners at Pultowa were still here, regretting, naturally enough, but unavailingly, their long detention from their native land. On the 24th of November, the snow having fallen sufficiently to smooth the roads, Bell and a portion of the ambassador's suite departed from Kazan. Their road lay through a fertile country, producing abundance of cattle, corn, and honey, and covered, in many places, by vast woods of tall oaks, fir, and birch. The beehives used here were of a remarkable form. The inhabitants, says Bell, take the trunk of a lime-tree, aspen, or any soft wood, of about five or six feet long; having scooped it hollow, they make a large aperture in one side, about a foot in length and four inches broad; they then fix cross rods within the trunk for the bees to build upon, and having done this, close up the place carefully with a board, leaving small notches for the bees to go in and out. These hives are planted in proper places at the side of a wood, and tied to a tree
