In 1824, when the " League of Virtue" in Vihia was discovered, Mickievitsh, with about forty other young men, were disposed of in different parts of the interior of Russia as tutors, secretaries, and so forth. Mickievitsh came as assistant to the governor-general to Moscow, whence he made several journeys into the interior, and to Crimea, which place he celebrated in some very beautiful sonnets. When, in 1830, his distressed country called on all her children, whose death or banishment she was afterwards doomed to mourn, Micldevitsh shared the latter fate, and went to Paris. His verses must have been beautiful, for while Polevoi spoke of them, he forgot the foreigner in me, and his national antipathy to the Poles, and seizing my arm, cried, " Ah, my God, if you could but understand that ! Oh that is beautiful, magnificent, grand !"
The wife and children of Polevoi came in, and our literary conversation concluded with a cheerful tea soiree. I prolonged the evening visit the more willingly, because it was my last in Moscow : the next day I was to set off for the south.
When we hear a man much spoken of with whom we are not personally acquainted, our imagination generally forms a picture of him, which as often vanishes and is forgotten when he becomes known, and we find quite another being than the creature of our fancy. It is the same when we read the description of a country or place, before the place itself has been, visited by us. The traveller finds something quite different from what he had expected. The thing is always a hundred thousand times more complete and perfect than any description, and each individual mind reflects things in a manner peculiar to itself. In contemplating the subjects themselves the descriptions are forgotten, or the representation seems so imperfect in the presence of the represented, that every one thinks himself at liberty to describe them again. As the remarkable features and pecuharities of Moscow are known amongst us but imperfectly, this is more likely to occur to the traveller there than elsewhere, and in the pictures here attempted of objects so often painted, hidylgence may the more readily bo hoped for.
THE GERMAN PROVINCES ON THE BALTIC.
No host ever appeared to me so attentive to strangers as Mr. Meissel, of Llbau. At night I always found upon the table by my bedside, not only a decanter of fresh filtered water — for at Libau all water must be filtered before it is fit to drink — but also a large flask of sweet beer. In the morning a well-filled tobajpco-pipe lay before me, and a lad stood by my bedside holding a well-warmed dressing-gown and a pair of slippers, in which he caught me as I stepped out of bed. Detained by these and similar comforts, it was late before I found myself in the streets of Libau.
I could not as yet forget my voyage from Lubeck, for the whole world seemed revolving round me, and it was not till after I had taken a composing powder, that the town of Libau began to stand still, and to stop the wliirling dance of its houses, churches, and streets, so that I could examine them at my leisure. The architecture of Libau is the same as that of Memel, Mitau, Windau, and almost all the little northern towns of the Baltic. It is as different from the style in wliich the Russian towns are built, as from that of the old German cities of Riga, Reval, Konigsberg, and Elbing. The modern Russian architecture, which prevails not only in Moscow and St. Petersburg, but which aU the larger towns of Russia are adopting, is particularly distinguished by a lavish abundance of pillars, by smooth roofs covered with green iron, by wide spacious streets, and a great regularity of plan; the gothic architectme of the old German towns by high pointed houses, by crooked naiTOw streets, and great irregularity. Libau and similar towns are built mostly of wood — the walls are thin — the houses are very broad, deep, and low, undecorated by pillars or balconies, but are very neat and cheerful. This kind of architecture prevails very much in the north, being well adapted to the climate and to the materials at hand. The houses, with the exception of a few belonging to the richest inhabitants, are of one story; they occupy an extraordinary space in consequence, and often inclose spacious com-ts. Of course such towns lose all stateliness and splendour of appearance, and from a distance are by no meatis so interesting as the German cities, with their gothic towers and gable roofs, or the Russian with their columns, domes, and cupolas; but the interiors of the houses are far more light, cheerful, and
)lcasing. There are no gloomy corners and dark pokmg holes to be found lerc, but every where lajge, light, airy spaces. The environs of Libau are the most dreary and melancholy that can be