ir, but the
trees were small and widely scattered; still the chief feature was a
dead flat covered with scrub.

Russia, however, is very far from being a barren and unfruitful country.
There are large tracts near its numerous rivers which yield an abundant
harvest of all descriptions of corn, and there are forests full of the
finest trees, whilst fruits of many descriptions also are produced.
This particular road, however, gives a stranger a very unfavourable
impression of the country; still there were many things to interest our
friends. About a mile, it seemed, from each other were little oblong
wooden cottages, with a square enclosure in the rear and a platform in
front, all so exactly alike that Harry said they looked as if they had
been taken out of some Dutch brobdignag toy-box and placed along the
road. In front of each hut, as the train passed along, appeared a
guard, presenting arms with an iron-headed pike; and so exactly did one
look like the other that Harry said he was certain there must be some
spring underground which made them all pop up as the train passed along.
There must be at least five hundred along the line--every hut, man,
cap, pike, and greatcoat formed after the same model; there were guards,
also, at all the signal stations. Whenever, also, the train stopped, a
fierce-looking guard, in the uniform of the French gendarmes,--
bright-blue coats, helmets, and silver ornaments,--stood immoveable as
sentries before each of the carriages, to prevent people from doing
anything they ought not to do: altogether there seemed to be a very
wholesome discipline established along the line. At all the
stopping-places there were a number of Swiss-looking cottages,
apparently newly erected; while the bridges and palings, and flights of
steps and banisters, and refreshment booths, and vast long sheds in
which heaps of logs were piled up, all looked as if they had been made
in Switzerland, and were exactly like the models which come in neat
white wooden boxes to England from that country of mountains and snow.
They were very neat, and pretty, and picturesque, but certainly did not
look as if they belonged to the place.

At every station there are refreshments of some sort. Our friends
observed fruits, raspberries, strawberries, and peaches, though of an
untempting appearance and very dear; and also cakes of various forms,
bread, beer, and of course quass.

At all the larger stations there are large, long,