The envu'ons of Riga are as desolate as those of Mitau, to the traveller who only passes through, without strolling about to discover aU the snug retreats of men that lie liidden amid the forests, lakes, and marshes.
Tlie merchants of Riga, on the contrary, have sought out all the dry spots in the delta of the Dvvina, and decorated them with neat, unassuming, but charming little country-houses. These pretty villas are called Ilofchen, and multitudes of these Hofchen surround Riga. Every moderately wealthy merchant has some such retreat, where he passes a part of the summer with his family and his friends, in the exercise of graceful and liberal hospitality. The names of most of these Hofchen end with " holnif as Parzenholm, Schlumpholm, Steenholm, &c.
Further down the Dwina, at its mouth, lie Bolderaa and Dunamiinde ; further up the Dwina are three active German cities, closely connected with Riga : Friedrichstadt, nine miles distant ; Jacobstadt nine miles from Friedrichstadt ; and Diinaburg, nine miles from Jacobstadt. These Httle towns are all inhabited by Germans and Lettes, and the same remarks will apply to them that have already been made of other small places in these provinces. They all suffered terribly in the wars between the Swedes, Poles, and Russians. They have often in one year been successively burnt and sacked by three or four different parties.
Of the castles and Hofchen,, the following are the most important :
Uexkull, belonging to the well-known Uexkull family. Further up the river are Jungfernhof, Kohcnhusen, and Stockmannshof. the cheerful residence of the wealthy Lowenstern family. The two last have been sung by Kotzebue and Scldippenbach. Then comes ICreutzburg, an old posses- '
sion of the noble family of Korff, and still further on are the estates of tlie PlaterSyberg family.
We read not in geographies of these estates, and yet they exercise a far greater influence over the country and its inhabitants than many of the towns.
To the estate of Kreutzburg alone are attached 18,000 human subjects, while the Burgermeisters of the three small towns just named, put together, scarcely rule as many ; and these three towns do not together export as much corn, wood, flax, &c., as this one estate.
Twelve miles from the mouth of the Dwina, six miles from the eastern coast of Courland, and the western coast of Livonia, lies far from any other island, in the midst of the Riga Gulf, the solitary little island of Runoe. It is an unimportant piece of land, half-a-mile long, and half-a-mile broad, but even its very name, the Isle of Runes, excites peculiar expectation ; and in fact it differs essentially from the Esthonian, Livonian, and Lettish coasts by which it is surrounded.
They were German Scandinavians who christened the island, and separated it politically and morally from the surrounding nations, as completely as the waves do physically. It is unknown to us when, why, and how the Swedes settled in Runoe, and whether they found aboriginal inhabitants there or not. Enough, it is now inhabited by a people of Swedish origin, who remember nothing, however, of their mother country, and have no patriotism but for their sandy islet. They and their ancestors have been there since the memory of man, cultivating their sandy plains, catching seals, and saihng about between Courland, Livonia, and Oesel.
The island is very flat, without hills or rocks, and by no means of a picturesque aspect. On the whole its coast is as smooth as its surface, without any break or ruggedness whatever. Here and there very small bays run into the shore, which are used as landing places by the inhabitants. The island is very sandy, and has no rivers or streams. It is therefore not very fruitful, and though the islanders grow some com, yet their harvests are not sufficient for their own consumption, and they buy a part of their bread from the more fertile continent.
Formerly the island may have been covered with forests, but the inhabitants have built so many boats, and warmed themselves for so many winters, that those forests are now very much thinned. Scattered oaks, birches, firs, and bushes, alone remain.
As the winds and waves wafted over the seeds of oaks, firs, and birches, so the human settlers carried with them multitudes of all kinds of animals, oxen, horses, sheep, &c. The Runoe sheep is of the Oesel race ; wliich is farfamed here, for its long silky wool. The oxen and horses are of tlie same small breed found in all these northern countries. Wild beasts there are none. Perhaps, once in every ten or twenty years, a wolf or fox strays in winter from the ice of the Riga Gulf to the coast of Runoe, where the excellent shots of the islanders soon end his care^^r.