Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

CHARACTER OF THEIR SCENERY.165

also farther distant from the fashionable quarters, and includes both town and country. At one moment you may suppose yourself looking upon real woods, fields, and villages; in the next, the view of houses in the shape of temples, of pilasters forming the framework of hot-houses, of colonnaded palaces, of theatres with antique peristyles, prove that you have not left the city.

The Russians are rightly proud of this garden raised at so much expence on the spongy soil of Petersburg. But if Nature is conquered, she remembers her defeat, and submits with bad grace. Happy the lands where heaven and earth unite and mutually vie in embellishing the abodes of man, and in rendering his life pleasant and easy !

I should insist less on the disadvantages of this unfavoured land, I should not regret so greatly, while travelling in the north, the sun of the south, if the Russians affected less to undervalue, the gifts of which their country is deprived. Their perfect content extends even to the climate and the soil; naturally given to boasting, they have the folly to glory even in the physical as well as the social aspect which surrounds them. These pretensions prevent my bearing so resignedly as I ought to do, and as I had intended, with all the inconveniences of northern countries.

The delta formed between the city and one of the embouchures of the Neva, is now entirely covered by this species of park; it is nevertheless included within the precincts of Petersburg: the Russian cities embrace the country also. This tract would have become one of (he most populous quar-