On my return I wsited the hut of a Cossack, which lay by the roadside. He and his comrades were from beyond the Danube, and formed part of the coast-guard. Some were below on the water fishing for the benefit of the little menage. Their Imt, which lay half concealed under some bushes, on the point of a little cape, was extremely neat, and contained their beds, their household utensils, their arms, and a looking-glass. Whether this neatness was to be attributed to their ovn love of order, or to the vigilant superintendence of their officers, I know not.
During the last Turkish war these Cossacks came over to the Russians, but they were previously in the service of the Turks. They said they had a far pleasanter life with the Padishah, or Pasha, as they called liim. They had had fifty rubles' pay every foui' months, and now they had so little that their fathers had to send them help from their native villages. Here also the service, they said, was so hard, they were never free, and when keeping watch they were obliged to stand Uke statues. Under the padishah they might He dovni on the grass, or even now and then take a nap. They had indeed severe campaigns to make through Anatoli against the mountain people (the Kurds), and against the Arabs beyond Jerusalem who were as black as the earth of the steppes. They had liardships enough with the Turks, but they got plenty of booty. In Turkey there was every thing that heart could wish — bread and fruit, and wood and women — but here nothing but steppe, steppe, steppe ! The worst of all, however, was the quarantine duty, for they never knew exactly whom it was they were to shoot, and whom not. These men had travelled a great deal, and I amused myself some time in studying geography in their accounts ; it was just like attempting to decipher some old and half-defaced inscription.
In passing through the great vineyard of Count Woronzoff, I learnt that out of the 60,000 vines, 40,000 had been destroyed during the preceding severe winter by the frost, and from this fact some judgment may be formed, as to how far the south of Russia is likely to become a vinegrowing country.
There is, however, one kind of garden which is seen all round Odessa in the highest state of perfection, and which it would therefore be unpardonable to pass over, namely, the melon-gardens of the Malorassians, called from the Tartar word " bashta?is.^' They are found all over the south of Russia, the Crimea, and the Ukraine ; among the Tartars of the Caucasus, and beyond the Caspian Sea as far as Great Tartaiy.
In these gardens are cultivated melons, cucumbers, and all plants of this species, besides onions, beet-root, and other vegetables ; but the crown of the garden, and the universal favourite, is the water-melon. This excellent and juicy fruit appears to have been created with especial reference to the wants of the steppe ; and as the aloes in the sandy deserts of Africa, and several kinds of cactus in the Llanos of South America, preserve the moisture so precious to animals, so does the water-melou draw from the waste and arid steppe, in the driest years, its sweetest and most refreshing juice.
This juice is so abundant that it might serve as a substitute for spring water, and indeed at every breakfast and dinner in Little Russia, along with the bread and bacon stands a water-melon, out of which every guest takes a slice, and bites it from time to time as one might sip a glass of water. The immense quantities of this fruit which are brought to market might seem almost incredible. Even in the little tovm of Poltova one sees whole mountains of them, and they regularly make their appearance at every table, from the highest to the lowest, and people take them in the morning as we do coffee. They are preserved fresh during a great part of the winter, by being covered with clay, and then packed closely in cellars. There are several kinds of them — some are white inside, some yellow, and some of a beautiful pink. The latter, perhaps seduced by the colour, I always considered the best.
Innumerable in these bashtans are the varieties of gourds, of extraordinary size, and most singular form. Some are ash-grav, like the oxen of the steppe, and as large as a sack of flour ; some have dark green stripes on a light ground, and always exactly ten ; some ai-e more than an ell long,
and oiily one or two inches in diameter ; others are very small, and look precisely like a wooden pear ; while others, as if Nature wished to play mankind a trick, present, in size, shape, and colour, the most perfect resemblance to oranges. Every day I discovered among them some strange new form, and many serve lor no other purpose than for playthings or ornaments.