Already there are not a few of the younger generation--especially among the wealthy manufacturers of Moscow--who have been educated abroad, who may be described as tout a fait civilises, and whose mode of life differs little from that of the richer nobles; but they remain outside fashionable society, and constitute a "set" of their own.
As to the dishonesty which is said to be so common among the Russian commercial classes, it is difficult to form an accurate judgment.

That an enormous amount of unfair dealing does exist there can be no possible doubt, but in this matter a foreigner is likely to be unduly severe.

We are apt to apply unflinchingly our own standard of commercial morality, and to forget that trade in Russia is only emerging from that primitive condition in which fixed prices and moderate profits are entirely unknown.

And when we happen to detect positive dishonesty, it seems to us especially heinous, because the trickery employed is more primitive and awkward than that to which we are accustomed.

Trickery in weighing and measuring, for instance, which is by no means uncommon in Russia, is likely to make us more indignant than those ingenious methods of adulteration which are practised nearer home, and are regarded by many as almost legitimate.