Travels in the Steppes of the Caspian Sea, the Crimea, the Caucasus Part 7

After waiting several hours we at last procured horses that conveyed us rapidly to the next post; but there we had another stoppage. The clerk had a fancy to squeeze our purses, and knew no better way of doing so than by refusing us horses. Commands, threats, and abuse, never for a moment ruffled his dogged composure. Unfortunately our Cossack had been seized with a violent fever, and remained behind at Marioupol; had he been with us the clerk would hardly have ventured on his tricks, for he would have been sure of a sound drubbing. But this manner of enforcing compliance was not in our way, and as we had written authority to hire horses from the peasants wherever we found them, we sent Anthony to the next village, and thought no more about being supplied by the postmaster. Our unconcern began to alarm the clerk; gangs of horses were every moment returning from pasture, and he saw plainly that his position was becoming critical. After an hour's absence Anthony appeared in the distance with three stout horses and a driver. I will not attempt to depict the consternation of the Jew when he was a.s.sured that the team was really for us. He threw himself at our feet, knocked his head against the ground, and in short, evinced such a pa.s.sion of grovelling fear, that disgusted and wearied with his importunities, we at last promised not to make any complaint against him. We made all haste to quit the spot, and in five hours afterwards we were in Taganrok.

The town, situated on the bay of the same name at the northern extremity of the Sea of Azov, is the chief place of a distinct administrative district, dependent on Iekaterinoslav only as regards the courts of law, and comprising within its limits, Rostof, Marioupol, Nakitchevane, and a little territory lying round the northern end of the sea, and encompa.s.sed by the country of the Don. Its boundaries are, on one side, the Mious, which falls into the Sea of Azov, and on the other side, the Government of the Cossacks of the Black Sea.

Taganrok was founded in 1706, by Peter the Great, after the taking of Azov, and was demolished in pursuance of the treaty of the Pruth. War with Turkey having been renewed, it was rebuilt in 1709, and fortified; and a harbour was constructed, surrounded with a mole, the remains of which are still seen just level with the surface of the water.

This harbour is a long rectangle, with a single entrance towards the west. There is some idea of renovating it, by reconstructing its mole, and clearing it of the sand with which it has been long choked; but this project, if carried into effect, will not remove the natural defects of the Taganrok roadstead. The water is so low, that vessels are obliged to lie from four to six leagues off the sh.o.r.e, and to load and unload their cargoes in a curious round-about, and very expensive manner. Waggons surmounted with platforms loaded with grain, perform the first part of the process, and advance in files, often to a distance of half a league into the sea. There they are unloaded into large barges, and these almost always require the aid of a third auxiliary, before their freight is finally s.h.i.+pped.

On approaching Taganrok, one almost fancies the town before him is Odessa. Its position on the Sea of Azov, the character of the landscape, its churches, its great extent, and every feature of the place, even to the fortress commanding it, combine to favour the illusion.

Taganrok has thriven rapidly, as Peter the Great foresaw it would do, and has become one of the most commercial towns of Southern Russia. Its trade, however, has considerably diminished since the suppression of its lazaret, and the closure of the Sea of Azov, in consequence of a fifty days' quarantine established at Kertch. The town now contains 16,000 inhabitants.

Peter the Great's sojourn in Taganrok, is commemorated by an oak wood of his own planting. Such a memorial of a great prince is certainly better than a pompous monument; more durable, and more philanthropic, particularly in a country dest.i.tute of forests.

It was at Taganrok that the Emperor Alexander died, far away from the splendours of St. Petersburg. As we visited the modest dwelling that served him for his last abode, all the events of the great epoch in which he was one of the most ill.u.s.trious actors crowded on our memories.

The bed-room where he died has been converted into a _chapelle ardente_, but in every other respect the house has been preserved with religious care, just as he left it.

There was a fair in the town when we arrived. The suffocating heat, the clouds of dust, and the crowded state of all the hotels, at first made us look unfavourably on the place, but the diversions of the fair soon reconciled us to the inconveniences of our lodgings.

In Russia, fairs still retain an importance they scarcely any longer possess in our more civilised countries. Every town has its own, which is more or less frequented; that of Nijni Novgorod is reputed the most considerable on the European continent; all the nations of Europe and Asia, send their representatives to it. Next after it, the fair of Karkhof, is in high esteem among merchants for its rich furs. These fairs often last more than a month, and they are impatiently looked forward to by all the country n.o.bles, whom they enable for a while to breathe as it were the odour of fas.h.i.+onable town life. b.a.l.l.s, theatres, shopping, music, horse races--what a world of pleasures in the compa.s.s of a few days! And every one sets about enjoying them with feverish ardour. Every thing else is interrupted; the fair to-day, all other concerns to-morrow. At some little distance from Taganrok, there are huge bazaars filled with oriental merchandise, and the covered alleys are crowded with fas.h.i.+onable loungers in the evening. A very curious spectacle indeed is this labyrinth of Persian cloths, slippers, furs, Parisian bonnets and caps, shawls from Kashmir, and a thousand other articles too numerous to detail. Every thing is arranged to the best advantage, and the eye is delighted with the picturesque and fantastic medley of colours and forms.

Europe and Asia are matched against each other, and exert all their arts of fascination to allure purchasers. In spite of all the elegance of the French fas.h.i.+ons, it must be owned that our little bonnets and our scanty mantillas cut but a sorry figure beside the muslins interwoven with gold and silver, the rich termalamas and the furs that adorn the shops of the country. And yet all eyes, all desires, all purses turn towards the productions of France. Some faded ribands and trumpery bonnets attract a greater number of pretty customers than all the gorgeous wares of Asia.

During our stay at Taganrok, we were invited to a ball at the mansion of General Khersanof, son-in-law of the celebrated Hetman Platof. The general possesses the handsomest residence in the town, and keeps his state like a real prince, amidst the motley society of a commercial town. All his apartments are stuccoed and decorated with equal taste and magnificence. The windows consist of single panes of plate gla.s.s more than three yards high. The furniture, l.u.s.tres, ceilings, and pictures, all display a feeling for the fine arts, and a sumptuosity governed by good taste, which may well surprise us in a Cossack.

In front of the mansion lies a handsome garden, which was lighted up with coloured lamps for the occasion. The whole front of the dwelling was brilliantly illuminated. It was a magic _coup d'oeil_, particularly as it was aided by the transparent atmosphere of a beautiful summer night, that vied in purity with the clearest of those of the south.

On entering the first _salon_, we were met by the general, who immediately presented us to his two wives. But the reader will say, is bigamy allowed among the Cossacks? Not exactly so; but if the laws and public opinion are against it, still a man of high station may easily evade both; and General Khersanof has been living for many years in open, avowed bigamy, without finding that his _salons_ are the less frequented on account of such a trifle. In Russia, wealth covers every thing with its glittering veil, and sanctions every kind of eccentricity, however opposed to the usages of the land, provided it redeem them by plenty of b.a.l.l.s and entertainments. Public opinion, such as exists in France, is here altogether unknown. The majority leave scruples of conscience to timorous souls, without even so much as acknowledging their merit.

A man the slave of his word, and a woman of her reputation, could not be understood in a country where caprice reigns as absolute sovereign. A Russian lady, to whom I made some remarks on this subject, answered _navely_, that none but low people could be affected by scandal, inasmuch as censure can only proceed from superiors. She was perfectly right, for, situated as the n.o.bility are, who would dare to criticise and condemn their faults? In order that public opinion should exist, there must be an independent cla.s.s, capable of uttering its judgments without fearing the vengeance of those it calls before its bar; there must be a free country in which the acts of every individual may be impartially appreciated; in short, the words justice, honour, honesty, and delicacy of feeling must have a real meaning, instead of being the sport of an elegant and corrupt caste, that systematically makes a mock of every thing not subservient to its caprices and pa.s.sions.

Notwithstanding their opulence, and the society that frequents their _salons_, Mesdames Khersanof retain a simplicity of manners and costume in curious contrast with every thing around them. An embarra.s.sed air, vulgar features, an absence of all dignity in bearing and in conversation, and an ungainly style of dress--this was all that struck us as most remarkable about them. The younger wore a silk gown of a sombre colour, with a short body and straight sleeves, and so narrow that it might be taken for a bag. A silk kerchief covered her shoulders and part of her neck, and her little cap put me strongly in mind of the head-gear of our master-cooks. The whole costume was mean, awkward, and insipid. Except a few brilliants in her girdle and her cap, she showed no other trace of that Asiatic splendour which is still affected by many other women of this country.

It is said that the two co-wives live on the best possible terms with each other. The general seems quite at his ease with respect to them, and goes from the one to the other with the same marks of attention and affection. His first wife is very old, and might be taken for the mother of the second. We were a.s.sured that being greatly distressed at having no children, she had herself advised her husband to make a new choice.

The general fixed on a very pretty young peasant working on his own property. In order to diminish the great disparity of rank between them, he married her to one of his officers, who, on coming out of church, received orders to depart instantly on a distant mission, from which he never returned. Some time afterwards the young woman was installed in the general's brilliant mansion, and presented to all his acquaintance as Madame Khersanof.

Two charming daughters are the fruit of this not very orthodox union.

Dressed in seraphines of blue silk, they performed the Russian and the Cossack dances with exquisite grace, and enchanted us during the whole continuance of the ball. The Russian dance fascinates by its simplicity and poetry, and differs entirely from all other national dances: it consists not so much in the steps, as in a pensive, natural pantomime, in which northern calmness and gravity are tempered by a charming grace and timidity. Less impa.s.sioned than the dances of Spain, it affects the senses with a gentle langour which it is not easy to resist.

We met with a Frenchman at Taganrok, a real hero of romance. At eighteen his adventurous temper impelled him to quit the service to go and play a part in the Greek revolution. He partic.i.p.ated in all the chances and dangers of the struggle against the Turks; and battling sometimes as a guerrillero, sometimes as a seaman, and sometimes as a diplomatist, he was thrown into more or less immediate contact with all those who shed such a l.u.s.tre on the war of independence. In one of his campaigns he chanced to save the life of a young and pretty Smyrniote, whom he lost no time in marrying and bearing far away from the scenes of ma.s.sacre with which the whole archipelago then abounded. A Russian n.o.bleman advised him to repair to Moscow, and furnished him with the means. His wife's magnificent Greek costume, her youth and beauty, produced an intense sensation in that capital. The whole court, which was then in Moscow, was full of interest for the young Smyrniote, and the empress even sought to attach her to her person by the most tempting offers.

Madame de V. refused them, preferring to remain with her husband, whose conduct, however, was far from irreproachable. Being young, very handsome, and of an enterprising character, his successes among the Muscovite ladies were very numerous; and he was everywhere known by the name of the handsome Frenchman.

An adventure that made a great deal of noise, and in which a lady of the court had completely compromised her reputation for his sake, obliged him to quit Moscow in the midst of his triumphs. He then led his wife from one capital to another, presenting her everywhere as an interesting victim of the Greek revolution. After this European tour, he returned to Paris, where he pa.s.sed some years. Many eminent artists of that city painted the portrait of his wife, who is still very beautiful. In 1838 he left Paris and settled in Taganrok as a teacher of the French language; and there this poet, traveller, man of the world, and _beau cavalier_ is throwing away almost all his advantages, which are of little service to him in the walk he has chosen, and in a town where there are so few persons capable of appreciating him.

Our whole colony in Taganrok consists of Doctor Meunier, who acts as consul; M. de V., and a Provencal lady, who keeps a boarding-school.

This Doctor Meunier is another original. He pa.s.sed I know not how many years in the service of the Shah of Persia, who had a great regard for him, and invested him on his departure with the order of the sun, a magnificent decoration, more brilliant than that of a grand cordon.

Having shrewdly availed himself of his extensive opportunities for observation, his acquaintance is highly to be prized by all who love to give their imagination free scope: his graphic and marvellous stories are like pages from the Arabian Nights. In an instant, he sets before his hearers palaces of gold and azure, bewitching almehs, towns ruined to their foundations, towers of human heads, a French milliner superintending the education of Persian ladies, princes, beggars, dervishes, unbounded luxury side by side with the most hideous poverty, and all that the East can show to move, allure, or terrify the soul.

One of the houses that offer most attractions for foreigners, is that of Mr. Yeams, brother of the English consul-general of Odessa. We found him possessed of all his brother's amiable qualities and perfect tact. When the English can shake off the stiffness with which they are so justly reproached, and their immoderate pride, they are perhaps the most agreeable of all acquaintances. They generally possess strong powers of observation and a.n.a.lysis, large and sound information, genuine dignity of conduct, and above all, a good-humoured kindliness, that is more winning for the pains they take to conceal it.

While looking over Mr. Yeams' English, French, and German library, and the journals of all nations that lie on the tables, it is not easy to believe oneself on the sh.o.r.es of the Sea of Azov, and on the outskirts of Europe. The "Journal des Debats," the "Times," and the "Augsburg Gazette," put you _au courant_ of the affairs of Europe, as though Paris and London were not a thousand leagues away from you.

It is not to be conceived into what a confusion of ideas one is cast at first, by the sight of a room filled with books, maps, journals, familiar articles of furniture, and people talking French: you ask yourself what is become of the days and nights you have spent in galloping post, the vast extent of sea you have crossed, the leagues of land and water, the regions and the climes you have left between you and your native country.

With the advances civilisation is daily making, distances will soon be annulled; for distance to my thinking, consists not in difference of longitude, but in diversity of manners and ideas. I certainly felt myself nearer to France in Taganrok than I should have been in certain cantons of Switzerland or Germany.

On the eve of our departure we attended some horse-races, that interested us only by the number and the variety of the spectators.

There we began to make acquaintance with the Kalmucks, some of whom had come to the fair to sell their horses, the breed of which is in great request throughout the south of Russia. There was nothing very captivating in the Mongol features and savage appearance of these wors.h.i.+ppers of the Grand Lama; and when I saw the jealous and disdainful looks they cast on those around them, and heard their loud yells whenever a horse pa.s.sed at full speed before them, I could not help feeling some apprehension at the thought that I should soon have to throw myself on their hospitality.

Taganrok has the strongest resemblance to a Levantine town, so much are its Greek and Italian inhabitants in a majority over the rest of the population. Such was the perpetual hubbub, that we could hardly persuade ourselves we were in Russia, where the people usually make as little noise as possible, lest the echo of their voices should reach St.

Petersburg. The Greeks, though subjected to the imperial _regime_, are less circ.u.mspect, and retain under the northern sky the vivacity and restless temperament that characterise their race. We particularly admired that day, a number of young Greek women, whose black eyes and elegant figures attracted every gaze. A string of carriages was drawn up round part of the race-course, and enabled us to review all the aristocratic families of the town and neighbourhood. The ladies were dressed as for a ball, with short sleeves, their heads uncovered and decked with flowers.

A blazing sun and whirlwinds of dust, such as would be thought fabulous in any other country, soon dimmed all this finery, and drove away most of the spectators: we were not the last to seek refuge in the covered alleys of a neighbouring bazaar, where we had ices and delicious water-melons set before us in the Armenian cafe for a few kopeks.

FOOTNOTES:

[6] A _hectare_ is a little more than two acres.

CHAPTER XII.

DEPARTURE FROM TAGANROK--SUNSET IN THE STEPPES--A GIPSY CAMP --ROSTOF; A TOWN UNPARALLELED IN THE EMPIRE--NAVIGATION OF THE DON--AZOV; ST. DIMITRI--ASPECT OF THE DON--NAKITCHEVANE, AND ITS ARMENIAN COLONY.

As we turned our backs on Taganrok, we could easily foresee what we should have to suffer during our journey. A long drought and a temperature of 99 had already changed the verdant plains of the Don into an arid desert. At times the wind raised such billows of dust around us, that the sky was completely veiled from our eyes; our breath failed us, and the blood boiled in our ears; our sufferings for the moment were horrible. The hot air of a conflagration does not cause a more painful sense of suffocation than that produced by the wind of the desert. The horses could not stand against it, but stopped and hung down their heads, seeming as much distressed as ourselves.

As we approached the Don the country was not quite such a dead, unbroken flat as before; a few Cossack stanitzas began to show themselves among the clumps of trees on the banks of the river. Deep gullies lined with foliage, and the traces of several streams, show how agreeable this part of the steppes must be in spring; but at the period of our journey every thing had been dried up and almost calcined by the rays of a sun which no cloud had obscured for two months.

Before reaching Rostof, we pa.s.sed through a large Armenian village. Its picturesque position, in the midst of a ravine, and the oriental fas.h.i.+on of its houses, give some interest and variety to these lonely regions, and transiently busy the imagination. The evening promised to be very beautiful; something serene, calm, and melancholy, had succeeded to the enervating heat of the day.

Sunset in the steppes is like sunset nowhere else. In a country of varied surface, the gradually lengthening shadows give warning long beforehand that the sun is approaching the horizon. But here there is nothing to intercept its rays until the moment it sinks below the line of the steppe; then the night falls with unequalled rapidity; in a few moments all trace is gone of that brilliant luminary that just before was making the whole west ablaze. It is a magnificent transformation, a sudden transition to which the grandeur of the scene adds almost supernatural majesty and strangeness.

Fatigued by the rapidity with which we had been travelling since we left Taganrok, I took advantage of our halt at a post station, not far from the village, to ascend the rising ground that concealed the road from my view.

As I have said, the night had come down suddenly, and there remained in the west but a few pale red stripes that were fading away with every second. At the opposite point of the horizon the broad red glowing moon, such as it appears when it issues from the sea, was climbing majestically towards the zenith, and already filled that region of the heavens with a soft and mysterious radiance. The greater part of the steppe was still in gloom, whilst a golden fringe marked the limits of earth and sky: the effect was very singular and splendid.

When I reached the summit of the hill an involuntary cry of surprise and alarm escaped me. I remained motionless before the unexpected scene that presented itself to my eyes--a whole gipsy camp, realising one of Sir Walter Scott's most striking fictions. Dispersed over the whole surface of the globe, and placed at the bottom of the social scale, this vagrant people forms in Russia, as elsewhere, a real tribe of pariahs, whose presence is regarded with disgust, even by the peasants. The government has attempted to settle a colony of these Bedouins of Europe in Bessarabia, but with little success. .h.i.therto. True to the traditional usages of their race, the Tsigans abhor every thing belonging to agriculture and regular habits. No bond has ever been found strong enough to check that nomade humour they inherit from their forefathers, and which has resisted the rude climate of Russia and the despotism of its government. Just as in Italy and Spain, they roam from village to village, plying various trades, stealing horses, poultry, and fruit, telling fortunes, procuring by fraud or entreaty the means of barely keeping themselves alive, and infinitely preferring such a vagabond and lazy existence to the comfort they might easily secure with a moderate amount of labour.

Their manner of travelling reminds one of the emigrations of barbarous tribes. Marching always in numerous bodies, they pa.s.s from place to place with all they possess. The women, children, and aged persons, are huddled together in a sort of cart called _pavoshk_, drawn each by one or two small horses with long manes. All their wealth consists of a few coa.r.s.e brown blankets, which form their tents by night, and in some tools employed in their chief trade, that of farriery.

All travellers who have visited Russia, speak with enthusiasm of the gipsy singing heard in the Moscow _salons_. No race perhaps possesses an apt.i.tude for music in a higher degree than these gipsies. In many other respects too, their intelligence appeared to us remarkable. A long abode in Moldavia, where there are said to be more than 100,000 Tsigans, enabled us to study with facility the curious habits of this people, and to collect a great number of facts, which would not perhaps be without interest for the majority of readers.[7]

The Tsigans pa.s.s the fine season in travelling from fair to fair, encamping for some weeks in the neighbourhood of the towns, and living, heedless of the future, in thorough Asiatic indolence; but when the snows set in, and the northern blasts sweep those vast plains as level as the sea, the condition of these wretched creatures is such, as may well excite the strongest pity. But half clad, cowling in huts sunk below the surface of the ground, and dest.i.tute of the commonest necessaries, it is inconceivable how they live through the winter.

Horrible as such a state of existence must be, they never give it a thought from the moment the breath of the south enables them to resume their vagrant career. Recklessness is the predominant feature in their character, and the most frightful sufferings cannot force them to bestow a moment's consideration on the future.