The chief summer residence of the Russian emperor among the Duderhof-hills (Duddergovski Gori) is Zarskoye Selo. Like the majority of all that is beautiful or useful in Russia, it owes its origin to Peter the Great. He built the first house here, and planted, eternal praise and honour to the illustrious gardener that he did so, the avenues of plane-trees with his own hand. But it was Elizabeth who built the large and magnificent castle, which was further embellished by Catherine ; and after the great fire, the destiny of every Russian palace, and of every Russian town, it was restored by Alexander. The interior offers treasures and magnificence enough to procure a Sheherazade, another truce of a thousand nights, to describe chambers of amber and mother of pearl ; columns of jasper, agate, and porphyry ; Chinese, Persian, and Turkish halls ; colonnades, marble baths, mosaic pavements, malachite vases, kiosks, even whole Chinese villages, Dutch and Swiss cow-houses, triumphal arches, rostral pillars, and bronze statues, which Catherine erected to her favourites, and Alexander to his " dear companions in arms," intermingled with fields of roses, hermitages, artificial ruins, Roman tombs, grottoes, and waterfalls.
The gaixlens of Zarskoye Selo are certainly the most carefully kept in the world ; the trees and flowers are watched and inspected with the most anxious minuteness. An old invalid soldier commands his 500 or 600 men as gardeners and overseers. After every falling leaf runs a veteran to pick it up ; and after a violent north wind they have enough to do, as may bo well imagined. Every tiny leaf that falls in pond or canal, is carefully fished out ; they dust and trim and polish the trees and paths in the gardens, as they do the looking-glasses and furniture of the saloons ; every stone that is kicked aside is laid strait again, and every blade of grass kept in a proper position. 1 once saw here an inquiry instituted about a broken flower, and carried on with as much solemnity as if it had been a capital oftence. All the gardeners were called together, the inspector held the flower in his hand, and every possible question was put, as to in whose division, and out of what bed, the flower might be ; whether plucked by a child, or broken by a dog; and all tliis investigation proceeded witli the profoundest seriousness, and the closest contemplation of the corpus delicti ; threats were lavished, rewards for the discovery of the offender were promised. Sec. The cost of all this polishing and furbishing alone is above 100,000 rubles yearly, but then the sacrifice keeps the gardens in the order of a ball-room. Tliey say that the Russian nation requires a despotic, all-meddling government : a Russian garden certainly requires eliarp discipline and a rigid poHce, to prevent all art and arrangement from flying away in storm and tempest. The gardens of Pavlovski are less magnificent but more attractive than those of Zai'skoye Selo. They lie but a few versts from the latter, and also among tlie Duderhoff hills. The castle of Pavlovsk, the summer residence of the deceased empress mother Maria, is more simple. . According to
Swinin, the walks in these gardens have a length of 150 versts ; and there is so much variety in the disposition of them, and in the shrubs and groupmg of the trees, that Russian literature may boast of several books written on this subject alone.
Of late Pavlovsk and Zarskoye Selo are much more frequented, in consequence of the railroad that connects them with the city, and they have now become the favourite resort for citizens of the middle classes, who flock hither in such numbers in summer to dine, drink champagne and punch, and so forth (not to sip a cup of coffee and carry off a remainder of sugar, as with us), that they alone would keep the line in full activity. The town of Pavlovsk consists almost entirely of small wooden houses, which are hired in the summer as country residences. The German colonists in the environs do their best to increase these pleasures by providing fresh milk, good bread, clean rooms, and other things which are generally looked for in vain in the Finnish and Russian villages.