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

FALSE TASTE OF THE RUSSIANS.217

than to Europe. The genius of the East hovers over Russia. The semicircle of edifices opposite the imperial palace, if observed sideways, at a proper distance, has the effect of an incomplete ancient amphitheatre. If examined more nearly, we see only a series of decorations that have to be replastered every year, in order to repair the ravages of the winter. The ancients built with indestructible materials under a favourable sky; here, under a climate which destroys everything, they raise palaces of wood, houses of plank, and temples of plaster; and, consequently, the Russian workmen pass their lives in rebuilding, during the summer, what the winter has demolished. Nothing resists the effects of this climate; even the edifices that appear the most ancient have been reconstructed but yesterday; stone lasts here no better than lime and mortar elsewhere. That enormous piece of o·ranite, which forms the shaft of the column of Alexander, is already worn by the frost. In Petersburg it is necessary to use bronze in order to sup-port granite ; yet notwithstanding these warnings, they never tire of imitating the taste of southern lands. They people the solitudes of the pole with statues and historical bas-reliefs, without considering that in their country monuments are even more evanescent than memories. Petersburg is but the scaffolding of a structure — when the structure is finished, the scaffolding will be removed. This chef-d'œuvre, not of architecture but of policy, is the New Byzantium, which, in the deep and secret aspirations of the Russian, is to be the future capital of Russia and the world.

Facino· the palace, an immense arcade pierces the

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