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

30A DISASTER AT THE FETE.

it became dark, the illuminations, of which I have already spoken, commenced.

We had expected, during a great part of the day, that, owing to the weather, they would not have taken place. About three o'clock, while at dinner in the English palace, a squall of wind passed over Peterhoff, violently agitated the trees, and strewed the park with their branches. While coolly watching the storm, we little thought that the sisters, mothers, and friends of crowds seated at the same table with us were perishing on the water, under its terrible agency. Our thoughtless curiosity was approaching to gaiety at the very time that a great number of small vessels, which had left Petersburg for Peterhoff, were foundering in the gulf. It is now admitted that two hundred persons were drowned ; others say fifteen hundred or two thousand : no one knows the truth, and the journals will not speak of the occurrence ; this would be to distress the empress, and to accuse the emperor.

The disaster was kept a secret during the entire evening, nothing transpired until after the fete ; and this morning the court neither appears more nor less sad than usual. There, etiquette forbids to speak of that which occupies the thoughts of all; and even beyond the palace, little is said. The life of man in this country is such as to be deemed of trifling importance even by themselves. Each one feels his existence to hang upon a thread.

Every year accidents, similar, although less extensive, cast a gloom over the fete of Peterhoff, which would change into an act of deep mourning, a solemn funeral, if others, like me, thought upon all that this