Travels in the Steppes of the Caspian Sea, the Crimea, the Caucasus Part 30

CHAPTER x.x.xII.

A STORM IN THE CAUCASUS--NIGHT JOURNEY; DANGERS AND DIFFICULTIES--STAVROPOL--HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE GOVERNMENT OF THE CAUCASUS AND THE BLACK SEA COSSACKS.

At four o'clock on a dull morning we left Piatigorsk of charming memory, to strike once more into the mountains, where by the by, in less than an hour, we were met by one of the grandest and most violent storms I remember ever having witnessed. We had to endure its force for two long hours; and our situation was the more critical, since our _yems.h.i.+k_ (coachman), though quite familiar with the road, seemed almost at his wits' end. It was only by the gleam of the lightning he was able to make such brief observations of the ground as enabled him to guide his horses. This was certainly a very precarious resource, but there is a special providence for travellers. Lost in the midst of the mountains, and our sole hope of safety resting on the coolness and skill of a peasant, we escaped, we scarce knew how, from a seemingly inevitable catastrophe. A furious burst of rain, the last expiring effort of the storm, at last cleared the sky, which became coloured towards the west with purple bands, that contrasted gloriously with the darkness of the rest of the firmament. A magnificent rainbow, with one end springing from the highest peak of the Caucasus, whilst the other was lost in the mists of evening, gleamed before us for a few moments, and gradually dissolved away.

At half-past seven we reached the station, wet, weary, stupified, and very much surprised to find ourselves safe and sound after having pa.s.sed through so many dangers. Nevertheless, this recent alert by no means made us forego our original plan of travelling all night in order to reach Stavropol the next day. Nothing is so soon forgotten in travelling as danger. One is no sooner out of one sc.r.a.pe than he is ready to get into another, and a worse one, without giving a thought to his past alarms. You must get over the ground: that is your ruling thought. As for taking precautions, calculating the good or the bad chances of the journey, or troubling oneself about dangers to come, by reason of those already incurred, all this is quite out of the question. We were quite bent on travelling all night, but the idea was totally discountenanced by the postmaster and the Cossacks whom we fell in with at the station.

They told us there was a fair at Stavropol, and that the road was always somewhat dangerous on such occasions, particularly after sunset. A night or two before, several persons returning from the fair had been surprised and plundered by the Circa.s.sians, in spite of the many military posts along the road. Several other ugly stories were told us, in a tone that at last shook our resolution, and we were beginning very reluctantly to give up our project, when an unexpected incident made us recur to it again.

A Polish officer, who until then had kept aloof in a dark corner, seeing the annoyance we felt at this unforeseen delay, joined in the conversation, and offered to set out at once with us, if his company would be sufficient to restore our confidence. He, too, was going to Stavropol, and it was all the same to him whether he travelled that night or next day. The proposal, which was made with the most obliging frankness, agreed too well with our wishes to allow of any further hesitation, and we at once accepted it. The Pole had with him a servant very well armed, and the two together were such a reinforcement to our little troop as almost insured our safety. With great exultation we set about our preparations for departure, but the more experienced postmaster gave with reluctance the order to put the horses to, and could not help crossing himself repeatedly when he saw us get into the britchka, whilst the two yems.h.i.+ks failed not to imitate his example, and to lift their fur caps several times in token of devotion. The Russians always find means to mingle crossings with all the other acts of their hands, by which process they set their consciences entirely at rest. I am satisfied they cross themselves even when thieving, partly from habit, and partly in the hope of escaping without detection.

Once out of the yard, the pleasure of travelling on a mild and dim night through an unknown country, that presented itself to our eyes under vague and mysterious forms, so engrossed our minds that we thought no more of Circa.s.sians, or broken ground, or danger of any kind. The Pole's carriage preceded ours, and his Cossack began to sing in a low tone one of those sweet melancholy airs which are peculiar to the Malorussians.

The plaintive melody, mingled with the tinkling of the horses' bells, and the motion of the carriage lulled me into a dreamy repose, half way between sleeping and waking. I know not how long this state of hallucination lasted; but I was startled out of it by a pistol-shot fired close to me, and before I could collect my senses a second was fired, but at some distance. The carriage had stopped, the night was very dark, and my companions were quite silent. I was a good deal frightened, until my husband explained to me that the Polish officer had lost his way, and that our dragoman had fired his pistol as a signal to him, and that the second shot was an answer to the first. Being now satisfied that we had not half a dozen Circa.s.sians about us, I recovered courage enough to laugh at my first dismay. Anthony left us to look for our travelling companion, after arranging with us that a third shot should be the token of his having found him. We pa.s.sed half an hour in a state of painful anxiety, teasing ourselves with a thousand alarming conjectures, and dreading lest the report of fire-arms should bring down on us some of the Circa.s.sians who might be prowling in the neighbourhood. What would I not have then given to be far away from that road which we had been told was so terrible, and of which my imagination still more magnified the dangers!

At last the preconcerted signal was heard, and Anthony soon afterwards returned, but alone, and told us that we must go on without the Pole, whose pereclatnoi had stuck fast in a bad spot, and could not be extricated until daylight. The night was so dark, and the ground so dangerous, that notwithstanding his wish to ease our minds, the officer could not venture to come to us. This news was not calculated to abate our anxiety; we might in a moment be in the same predicament as the officer, supposing nothing worse should happen. The road, as the yems.h.i.+k told us, wound round a rock, and what proved that it was dangerous was that it was flanked in places with slight posts and rails. Such a precaution is so rare in Russia, that it may be taken as a certain indication of no common danger. We debated awhile whether it would not be more prudent to remain where we were until daybreak; but the coachman was so terrified at the thought of pa.s.sing a night in the mountains, that he gave us no peace till we moved forward. The prospect of tumbling down a precipice was decidedly less terrible to him than the thought of having to do with the Circa.s.sians. Alighting and leading his horses, he followed Anthony, who carefully sounded one side of the road. As we advanced on our perilous descent, the sound of a torrent roaring at the bottom smote our ears, as if to increase our perplexity; but in an hour's time we found ourselves safe and sound on the plain, and soon afterwards we reached the station, where our arrival excited great astonishment. The postmaster was enraged against his colleague, and could not conceive how he had come to give us horses at night, in defiance of the strict rules of the police. For his part he a.s.sured us that his duty forbade him to do any such thing, and that it was useless to ask him. I need not say, however, that this declaration itself was useless, for we had had quite enough of the road for that night. I never enjoyed the most comfortable chamber in a French or German hotel so much as I did the miserable lodging in which I then lay down on a bench covered only with a carpet.

We did not quit the station next day until the arrival of our travelling companion, whom we had reluctantly left in so unpleasant a predicament.

He was severely bruised by his fall, but laughed heartily at his mishap.

We set out together, very glad to get away from those fine mountains that were then gleaming in the rays of the morning. The events of the preceding night, though after all not very dramatic, had left so painful an impression on our mind, that the very sight of the mountains still caused us a secret dread. Instead, therefore, of quitting with regret so picturesque a region, the more homely and commonplace the country became, the more we admired it. We were just in the humour to be delighted with the steppes of the Black Sea; so much does the appreciation of scenery depend on the state of the mind.

During all this day's journey the road was covered with carriages, hors.e.m.e.n, and pedestrians, repairing to the fair of Stavropol, and affording samples of all the motley population of the vicinity, Circa.s.sians, Cossacks, Turcomans, Georgians, and Tatars; some in brilliant costume, caracoling on their high-bred Kalmuck or Persian horses, others stowed away with their families in carts covered with hides; others driving before them immense flocks of sheep or swine, that encompa.s.sed the carriages and hors.e.m.e.n, and occasioned some very comical incidents. Among all those whom business or pleasure was calling to the fair, we particularly noticed a very handsome young Circa.s.sian mounted on a richly caparisoned horse, and riding constantly beside a pavosk of more elegance than the rest, and the curtains of which were let down.

This was enough to stimulate our curiosity, for in these romantic regions the slightest incident affords matter for endless conjectures. I would have given something to be allowed to lift one of the curtains of the mysterious pavosk, or at the least to keep it in view until our arrival in Stavropol, but our postilion did not partake in our curiosity, and putting his horses to a gallop, he soon made us lose sight of the group. The last low range of the Caucasus, which gradually diminishes in height to Stavropol, formed an irregular line on our left, in which we caught many hasty glimpses of charming scenery. The vegetation still retained a great degree of freshness, in consequence of the mildness of the temperature, which at this season would have appeared to us extraordinary even in more southern countries.

It was late in the evening when we reached Stavropol, so that we could not avail ourselves of our letters of introduction, and were obliged to hunt for a lodging in the hotels of the princ.i.p.al street. But they were all full, and with great difficulty we succeeded, with the help of our Polish friend, in getting admission to the Great Saint Nicholas, a shabby inn, the common room of which was already tenanted by a dozen travellers. Nevertheless, we secured a little corner, and there we contrived to form a tolerable sort of divan with our cus.h.i.+ons and pelisses. I had now an opportunity of remarking how little notice travellers take of each other in this country. In this room, filled with people whose habits were so different from ours, we were as much at our ease as if the apartment belonged to us alone; and neither our language, behaviour, nor dress, appeared to attract any undue attention.

Stavropol, the capital of the whole Caucasus, is a very agreeable town, and appeared to us so much the more so from the animation lent it by the fair. But I perceive that in the course of these travels I have not named one town without immediately joining the word _fair_ to it. It must be owned that chance was most bountiful to us in throwing in our way so many occasions for conceiving a high idea of the commerce of Russia. At Stavropol, however, the fair occupied our attention much less than General Grabe, who was just a week returned from an expedition against the Circa.s.sians. His staff filled the whole town with the noise of their martial deeds. Every officer had his story of some glorious exploit, whereof of course he was himself the hero. Though so recently returned, General Grabe was already in busy preparation for another campaign, on which he built the greatest hopes. The good gentleman even pressed my husband very strongly to accompany him, as if it were a mere party of pleasure. He offered him his tent, instruments, and every thing necessary to render the excursion beneficial to science. Under any other circ.u.mstances my husband would no doubt have yielded to the temptation of visiting the tribes of the Caucasus in the very heart of their mountains, under the protection of a whole army, but it would have been madness to undertake such a journey after those we had but just completed.

Before we finally take leave of the Caucasian regions, it will not be amiss to give some historical account of that part of the empire, and of the Cossacks of the Black Sea, to whom is committed the perilous task of protecting the frontiers against the incessant attacks of the formidable mountain tribes.

It was by virtue of an ukase promulgated by Catherine II. in 1783, that Russia took full and entire possession of all the countries north of the Kouban and the Terek, which of yore formed the almost exclusive dominions of numerous hordes of black Nogais, some of them independent, others acknowledging the authority of the Tatar khans of the Crimea. But previously to this period the tzars were already in military occupation of the country, for it was in 1771 that they completed the armed line of the Caucasus, begun by Peter the Great, at the mouth of the Terek.

At first the new conquest was put under the direction of the military governor of Astrakhan; but the state of the southern frontiers soon became so serious in consequence of the war with the mountaineers, that it was found advisable to form all the provinces conquered by Catherine II. north of the Caucasus, into a distinct province. The government of the Caucasus thus const.i.tuted, is bounded on the north by the Kouma and the Manitch, which divide it from the territory of Astrakhan and from that of the Don Cossacks; on the west by the country of the Black Sea Cossacks; on the east by the Caspian, and on the south by the armed line of the Kouban and the Terek.

At the foot of the Caucasus, as everywhere else, the Russian occupation occasioned great migrations. All the black Nogais of the right bank of the Kouban, who had fought against Russia, withdrew beyond the river among the tribes of the mountain. The Kabardians forsook the environs of Georgief, and sought refuge deeper in the Caucasian chain, and it was only the black Nogais of the barren plains between the Terek and the Kouma that remained in their old abodes. Cut off from the independent tribes since the erection of the fortresses of Kisliar and Mosdok, they took no part in the events of the war, and so they remained in peaceable possession of their territory. As for the Kalmucks, who had been very bold and active auxiliaries of Russia, they preserved intact all the pasturages they now possess in the government of the Caucasus.

The Muscovite sway once established, and the frontiers put in a state of defence, the next step was to occupy the country along the northern verge of the Caucasus in some other way than by light troops. It was therefore determined to form numerous colonies of Muscovites and Cossacks, a project which the absolute power of the tzars enabled them quickly to fulfil. The present villages in the centre of the province along the banks of the Kouban, the Terek, the Kouma, the Egorlik and the Kalaous, were erected, and the military colonies of the Black Sea Cossacks were founded; several large proprietors seconded the efforts of the government, and prompted either by the spirit of speculation, or by the superabundance of their slaves, formed large establishments on the lands that had been gratuitously conferred upon them. Attempts, too, were made to settle some of the German families of Saratof on the Kouma.

But the results were far from realising the hopes of the government.

Compressed between the narrow limits in the districts of Stavropol and Georgief, bounded on the north and east by the uncultivated lands of the Turcomans and Kalmucks, on the south by the armed lines, continually attacked and overrun by the mountaineers, the colonies soon ceased to wear a thriving appearance; many sacked and burnt villages never rose again from their ashes, the German colony on the Kouma was destroyed, and now there remains no hope that the number of agricultural inhabitants will ever become sufficient to lend any real aid to the projects of the tzars. We have been in a great many villages on the Kouma, and the confluents of the Manitch, and found them scarcely able to supply their own wants. Their contributions to the commissariat are almost nothing, and the armies are always obliged to procure their stores from the central provinces of Russia.

Some settlements, indeed, such as Vladimirofka and Bourgon Madjar on the Kouma, directed by able men, have attained a high degree of prosperity; but these are exceptions, and they owe their wealth to the cultivation of the mulberry and the pine, and their numerous corn-mills, which const.i.tute for them a virtual monopoly. The cultivation of corn has had no share in the welfare of these colonies, the nature of the climate having always been unfavourable to it: the people of Vladimirofka and the neighbouring villages think themselves fortunate if they can raise corn enough for their own consumption.

Thus, while we cordially approve of the principle that suggested the foundation of these advanced posts of the Slavic population, and that strives to enlarge their growth, we are nevertheless convinced that in the present state of things, with the war in the Caucasus becoming every day more formidable, these colonies can never be conducive to the progress of Russia; unless, indeed, that should happen, which we think most unlikely, namely, that the government should so extend its conquests as to become undisputed possessor of the fertile regions beyond the Kouban, where the colonist could command sufficient natural resources.

The Cossacks better fulfilled the purpose for which they were settled on the frontier. Active, enterprising, and accustomed to partisan warfare, they were admirably adapted for resisting the incursions of the mountaineers. If they have been less efficient of late years, the blame must be laid on the inordinate demands of the government, the extreme contempt with which they are treated by the Russian generals, and, above all, the extinction of the privileges which had been wisely conferred on them in the beginning, and which alone could guarantee to the empire the maintenance of their vigorous military organisation.

The Black Sea Cossacks, as every one is aware, are descended from the Zaporogues of the Dniepr, whose famous military corporation appears to have been established towards the end of the fifteenth century.

Continually engaged against the Tatars of the Crimea, the Ukraine Cossacks founded at this period a sort of colony near the mouths of the Dniepr, consisting exclusively of unmarried men, whose special avocation it was to guard the frontiers. Their numbers rapidly increased, deserters from all nations being attracted to them by the hope of booty, and their setcha, or head-quarters, on an island of the Dniepr, became famous throughout the land for the military services and the valour of its inhabitants. In 1540, such was the importance of these colonies to Poland, that King Sigismund granted a large tract of land above the cataracts to the Zaporogues, in order to strengthen the barrier erected by them between his dominions and the Tatars.

The new settlements on the Dniepr for a long time followed the fortune of the Cossacks of Little Russia. But as their strength augmented continually, they at last detached themselves from the mother country, and became an independent military state. The supremacy of the tzars was imposed on Little Russia in 1664, and from that time the Zaporogues, deprived of their allies, and left entirely to their own resources, owned allegiance, according to circ.u.mstances, to the Turks or the Tatars, to Poland or Russia, until the rebellion of Mazeppa, in which they took part, led to the total destruction of their power. Some years afterwards we find them again rallied under the protection of the khans of the Crimea; but Russia soon a.s.sumed so formidable an att.i.tude in those parts, that they were at last constrained, in 1737, to acknowledge themselves va.s.sals of the empire.

But the political decline of the unfortunate Zaporogues did not stop there. During the war that preceded the treaty of Koutchouk Kainardji, a strong desire for independence was excited among them by the arbitrary acts of Russia. Many of their detachments fought even in the ranks of the Turks. Then it was that Catherine determined on completely rooting out the military colony of the Dniepr. The Zaporogues were expelled by force from their territory, which was given to other cultivators; and some of them emigrated beyond the Danube, while others were transported to the neighbourhood of Bielgorod. Ten years afterwards, when war broke out again with Turkey, a great number of the latter volunteered into the Russian armies. After the peace of Ja.s.sy, Prince Potemkin, who had formed them into regiments, was so pleased with their valour and fidelity, that he induced Catherine to settle them beyond the strait of the Kertch, and intrust them with the defence of the Circa.s.sian border.

They were also granted, along with the peninsula of Taman, the whole territory comprised between the Kouban and the Sea of Azof, and extending eastward to the confluent of the Laba, and northward to the river Eia. The Zaporogues then took the appellation of Cossacks of the Black Sea, and their organisation was a.s.similated to that of their brethren of the Don. They had an attaman, nominated for life by the emperor, out of a list of candidates chosen by themselves; and the civil and military affairs of the community were directed, under this supreme chief, by two permanent functionaries, and four a.s.sessors changed every three years. Other privileges were likewise accorded to them, consisting chiefly in exemption from all taxes, the free use of the salt-pools, the right of terminating all litigations without having recourse to the St.

Petersburg courts of appeal, and in the pledge given to them by the government, that their regiments should never be required to serve beyond their own territory.

Under the influence of Catherine's liberal inst.i.tutions, the military colony completely fulfilled the hopes of the government, and made rapid progress. The rich pastures of the Kouban were covered with immense mult.i.tudes of cattle, and agriculture, too, attained some degree of importance. The population also augmented considerably. The lands of the Kouban, as formerly those of the Don, became an asylum for a great number of fugitives, and the neighbouring provinces had often to complain of the escape of their slaves. But for the last twenty years the Black Sea Cossacks have been suffering from the effects of the new measures for equalisation and uniformity, and, like the Cossacks of the Don, they are now on the eve of being subjected to the ordinary laws and inst.i.tutions of the provinces of the empire. The first encroachment on their privileges, was their employment on active service during the late wars with Turkey and Persia. They were obliged to furnish four regiments, which lost an enormous number of men, and nearly all their horses. This first step taken, the government advanced rapidly in its course of reform, and in a few years the Cossacks were deprived of their right of electing their own functionaries, who were thenceforth nominated by the emperor alone. These administrative changes, conjoined with the military duties, which have increased to a most onerous extent in the course of the war against the mountaineers, have had a very depressing effect on the spirits of the population; and at this day the Cossacks of the Kouban are far different men from those fiery Zaporogues, whose vigorous aid was so eagerly sought by Russia, Poland, and Turkey. The military life is become a loathsome burden to them, and they now only fight by constraint or in self-defence. The Russians, accordingly, accuse them of cowardice; but the government, by destroying their privileges, and the commanders-in-chief by the scorn with which they treat them and the continual activity they impose on them, do all that in them lies to dishearten and debase them. It is they who are always put foremost in every expedition; every commanding officer sacrifices them without scruple, and makes targets of them for the b.a.l.l.s of the mountaineers. Is it reasonable, then, to expect alacrity and high courage on the part of men for whom military service is the breaking of every family tie, the destruction of all domestic prosperity, and who have not been left, in exchange for so many sacrifices, even the shadow of national independence?

At the time of my last journey to the Caucasus in 1840, the Cossacks of the Black Sea numbered about 112,000 souls, of whom 68,000 were males, residing in sixty-four villages, and on 36,000,000 hectares of land held in common property, like the country of the Don in former times. The colonial army counted at that period according to the registers, eleven regiments of cavalry, ten of infantry, of 800 men each, and two batteries of artillery, one of them mounted, making altogether a total of 20,000 men, nearly the third of the male population. No doubt, the army can never in any case reach the official amount of force, its ranks being continually thinned by disease and war; and although young men are forced to enter the service at the age of seventeen, and are often kept in it thirty or forty years, still it would be quite impossible to bring more than 12,000 or 14,000 into the field at once, without endangering the total destruction of the population. In a pecuniary point of view, no men could well be more unfortunate than the Cossacks of the Kouban, whether in campaign against the mountaineers, or merely cantoned as reserves in their villages, they receive absolutely nothing for their services. The regulations, indeed, declare that the regiments actually called out shall receive pay at the rate of six rubles annually for each private, thirty-five rubles for every non-commissioned officer, and 250 for every subaltern officer; but infallible means have been found for preventing these moderate allowances from ever reaching those to whom they are promised. The posting establishment throughout the Cossack country costs the government just as little as the maintenance of the troops, since horses, harness, hay, and corn are all furnished gratis by the colony. The postilions even receive no pay whatever; they are only allowed a little flour and groats, and for every thing else they and their families must s.h.i.+ft for themselves during their whole term of service. As for the progon (the posting-money paid by travellers), it belongs to the Cossack exchequer, and composes, with the proceeds of the farm of brandy, salt, and the fisheries, the sole revenues of the country.

When I was at Ekaterinodar, the capital of the country, during the season of field-work, and in a time of quiet, they reckoned fourteen regiments on active service. Accordingly, as might have been expected, agriculture had been long neglected, and the country was in a miserable state. Nothing was to be seen in the villages but infirm old men, invalids, widows, and orphans; and the existence of the colony depended on the toil of the women alone. The distress then became so great as to excite the uneasiness of the government, and commissioners were sent to examine into the state of things; but unfortunately the mission, like every thing of the kind, did no good. The truth remained completely concealed from the emperor. The blame was cast entirely on the Cossacks themselves, and nothing was done to remedy the sufferings of the population.

We do not know what measures have been adopted since our departure by the imperial government with respect to the present and future situation of the military colony of the Kouban. For our own parts, having had opportunities of appreciating the good qualities of the Tchornomorskie Cossacks, and all the capabilities which a wise administration would find in them, we cannot but heartily wish that the government may, with a better understanding of its own true interests, at least adopt towards them a line of conduct more in accordance with their wants and their laborious services.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII.

RAPID JOURNEY FROM STAVROPOL--RUSSIAN WEDDING--PERILOUS Pa.s.sAGE OF THE DON; ALL SORTS OF DISASTERS BY NIGHT-- TAGANROK; COMMENCEMENT OF THE COLD SEASON--THE GERMAN COLONIES REVISITED.

It would have been impossible to travel more rapidly than we did from Stavropol to the Don. The steppe is as smooth as a mirror, and the posting better conducted than in any other part. We no sooner reached a station, than horses, which had been brought out the moment we were descried, were put to, and galloped away with us without a moment's check to the next station. A temperature of at least 20 Reaumer, the beauty of the sky, and something light and joyous in the atmosphere, kept us in the highest spirits. In no country have I ever seen such mult.i.tudes of gossamer threads. The carriage, the horses, and our clothes were covered with those glistening prognostics of fair weather.

As we advanced towards the abodes of civilisation, our thoughts were all about the pleasure of arriving at Taganrok, to find our letters, our friends, our European habits again, and the comforts of which for many months we had enjoyed but casual s.n.a.t.c.hes. We rejoiced, therefore, in the speed with which we got over the ground, and scarcely cared to bestow a glance on the stanitzas that fled away behind us. In pa.s.sing through a Russian village, however, we were constrained to bestow some attention on outward objects, our carriage being stopped by a wedding party that filled the whole street. We counted a dozen pavosks filled with young people of both s.e.xes. The girls, with their heads bedizened with ribbons, screamed almost like savages, and rivalled the young men in impudence and coa.r.s.eness. It was a disgusting spectacle. The bride differed from the rest only by the greater profusion of ribbons and flowers that formed her head-gear; her face was as red, her gestures as indelicate, and her voice as loud and shrill as those of her companions.

It may seem scarcely credible, but we were but two-and-twenty hours travelling 316 versts, between Stavropol and the Don. We ate and slept in the carriage, and only alighted at the river side, where all sorts of tribulations awaited us. I cannot at this moment think of that memorable night without wondering at the pertinacity with which ill-luck clings to us when once it has fastened upon us. At ten at night, when we were some little way from the Don, we were told that the bridge was in a very bad state, and that we should probably be obliged to wait till the next day, before we could cross it. Such a delay was not what we had bargained for, especially as we had reckoned on enjoying that very night a good supper and a good bed under a friendly roof in Rostof. Then the weather, which had been so mild, had suddenly turned chill, and this was another motive to haste; so we went on without heeding what was told us; but when we came to the river, the tokens that the bridge was out of order, were but too manifest. Several carts stood there unyoked, and peasants lay beside them, patiently waiting the daylight. These men reiterated the bad news we had already heard; but then it was only eleven o'clock; if we waited we should have to pa.s.s nearly seven hours in the britchka, exposed to the cold night air, whereas once on the other side, we should reach Rostof in two hours. This consideration was too potent to allow of our receding from our purpose. At the same time we neglected no precaution that prudence required. The coachman and the Cossack were sent forward with a lantern to make a reconnaissance, and returning in half an hour, they reported that the pa.s.sage was not quite impracticable, only it would be necessary to be very cautious, for some parts of the bridge were so weak, that any imprudence might be fatal to us.

Without calculating the risks we were about to run, we at once alighted, and followed the carriage, which the coachman drove slowly, whilst the Cossack went ahead with the lantern, pointing out the places he ought to avoid. I do not think that in the whole course of my travels we were ever in so alarming a situation. The danger was imminent and indubitable. The cracking of the woodwork, the darkness, the noise of the water das.h.i.+ng through the decayed floor, that bent under our feet, and the cries of alarm uttered every moment by the coachman and the Cossack, were enough to fill us with dismay: yet the thought of death did not occur to me, or rather my mind was too confused to have any distinct thought at all. Frequently the wheels sank between the broken planks, and those were moments of racking anxiety; but at last by dint of perseverance we reached the opposite bank in safety. The pa.s.sage had lasted more than an hour; it was time for it to end, for I could hold out no longer; the water on the bridge was over our ancles. It may be imagined with what satisfaction we took our places again in the carriage. The dangers we had just incurred, and which we were then better able fully to understand, almost made us doubt our actual safety.

For a long while we seemed to hear the noise of the waves breaking against the bridge; but this feeling was soon dispelled by others; for our nocturnal adventures were by no means at an end.

At some versts from the Don our unlucky star put us into the hands of a drunken coachman, who after losing his way, I know not how often, and b.u.mping us over ditches and ploughed fields, actually brought us back in sight of the dreadful bridge which we still could not think of without shuddering. We tried in our distress to persuade ourselves we were mistaken, but the case was too plain; there was the Don in front of us, and there stood Axai, the village we had pa.s.sed through after getting into the britchka. Fancy our rage after floundering about for two hours to find ourselves just at the point from which we started. The only thing we could think of was to pa.s.s the night in a peasant's cabin; but our abominable coachman, whom the sight of the river had suddenly sobered, and who had reason to expect a sound drubbing, threw himself on his knees and so earnestly implored us to try the road to Rostof again, that we yielded to his entreaties. The difficulty was how to get back into the road, and we had many a start before we found it. The carriage was so violently shaken in crossing a ditch, that the coachman and Anthony were pitched from their seats, and the latter fell upon the pole, and became entangled in such a way that he was not easily extricated. His shouts for help, and his grimaces when my husband and the Cossack had set him on his legs were so desperate, that one would have thought half his bones were broken, though he had only a few trifling bruises. As for the yems.h.i.+k, he picked himself up very coolly, and climbed into his seat again as if nothing extraordinary had happened. To see the quiet way in which he resumed the reins, one would have supposed he had just risen from a bed of roses; such is the usual apathy of the Russian peasants.

It was four in the morning when we came in sight of Rostof, which is but twelve versts distant from the Don. Thus we spent a great part of the night in wandering about that town, like condemned ghosts, without deriving much advantage from our rash pa.s.sage of the river. It was well worth while to run the risk of drowning, when our calculations and efforts could be baffled by so vulgar a cause as the drunkenness of a coachman! But the sight of Rostof, where good cheer and hospitality awaited us, consoled us for all our mishaps. Yet even here, when we almost touched the goal, our patience was put to further trial; for alighting at the post station two versts from the town, our rascally coachman positively refused to drive us a foot beyond it. This was too much for the Cossack's endurance, so drawing out a long knout from his belt, he paid the fellow on the spot the whole reckoning he had intended to settle with him at the journey's end. The yems.h.i.+k's shouts brought all the people of the station about us, and the wife of the postmaster came and scolded him at such a rate, that at last he was forced to drive us to the town; but it was more than an hour before he set us down at Mr. Yeams's house. His drunkenness had now pa.s.sed into the sleepy stage, and he could only be kept to his work by constant thumping.

The house where we intended to lodge contained a corn store belonging to Mr. Yeams, English consul at Taganrok, who had obligingly invited us to use it when we quitted that town, and had sent orders to that effect to his clerk, M. Grenier: and so pleased were we with our quarters on our first visit to Rostof, that now the thought of going anywhere else never entered our heads. To have done so would have seemed an affront to Mr.

Yeams's cordial hospitality. While we were unpacking the carriage, Anthony went and knocked at the door, and the coachman, unyoking his horses, in a trice went off as fast as he could, without even waiting to ask for drink money. Some minutes elapsed; Hommaire, losing patience, knocks again, when at last out comes Anthony with a very long face, and tells us that M. Grenier, clerk and Provencal into the bargain, refused of his own authority to receive us, pretending that he had not a room for us. Unable to comprehend such conduct, and believing that there was some mistake in the case, my husband went himself to the man, who putting his nose out from under the blankets, told him impudently, we must go and look for a lodging elsewhere.

All comment on such behaviour would be superfluous. To shut the door at night against one's own country people, and one of them a woman, rather than incur a little personal trouble, was a proceeding that could enter the head of none but a Provencal. The Kalmucks might have given a lesson in politeness to this boor, who rolled himself up snugly to sleep, whilst we spent the night, benumbed and s.h.i.+vering, under his windows in his court-yard. It may be conceived in what a state I pa.s.sed the night; drenched with wet, worn down with mental and bodily fatigue, hungry, sleepy, and chilled by the sharp cold that at that season precedes sunrise, I was really unconscious of what was pa.s.sing around me. As soon as it was light the Cossack procured horses, and took us to the best hotel in Rostof, where a warm room, an excellent bowl of soup, and a large divan, soon set us to rights again. On our arrival at Taganrok all the Yeams family were indignant at the behaviour of our Provencal, and, had we been disposed to pay him in his own coin we might have done so.

They would have sent him his discharge forthwith, had we not interceded for him; the French consul wrote him a threatening letter, and with this our vengeance remained satisfied.

We learned at Taganrok that the strangest rumours had gone abroad respecting us. Some said that the Circa.s.sians had made us prisoners, others that we had perished of hunger and thirst in the Caspian steppes.

In short, every one had had his own melodramatic version of our supposed fate. I cannot describe all the kind interest that was shown on our safe return from so hazardous a journey. In spite of our wish to arrive as soon as possible in Odessa, we could not refrain from bestowing a week on friends who received us with such warm sympathy.

The winds from the Ural swept away in one night all that October had spared. The weather was still sunny when we arrived on the sh.o.r.es of the Sea of Azof; but on the next day the sky a.s.sumed that sombre chilly hue that always precedes the metels or snow-storms. The whole face of nature seemed prepared for the reception of winter, that eternal sovereign of northern lands. The sea-beach covered with a thin coating of ice, the harsh winds, the ground hardened by the frost, and the increasing lividness of the atmosphere, all betokened its coming, and made us keenly apprehensive of what we should have to suffer on our way to Odessa, where we were to take up our winter quarters, and from whence we were still 900 versts distant. With the rapidity of the Russian post the journey might be accomplished in ten days, if the weather were not unfavourable; but after the threatening symptoms I have mentioned, we might expect soon to have a fall of snow, and perhaps to be kept prisoners by it in some village.

Unfortunately for us it was the most dangerous season for travelling in Russia. The first snows, which are not firm enough to bear a sledge, are much feared by travellers, and almost every year cause many accidents.

At this period, too, the winds are very violent, and produce those frightful snow-storms which we have already described. It was a very cheerless prospect for persons so way-worn and weary as we were, to have incessantly to fight against the elements and other obstacles. I remember that in this last journey our need of rest was so urgent, that the poorest peasant seated by his stove was an object of envy to us.