The Steppes of Southern Russia: General Aspect, Climate, Flora, Fauna and Locusts

When the snow melts on the steppe, the spring may be said to commence. This usually takes place in April, but May is sometimes far advanced before the mass of water has had time to find its way into tlie rivers. During this melting reason, the whole surface of the steppe is converted into a sea of mud, through which neither man nor beast can wade without positive danger. Through every ravine rushes a torrent of the dirtiest water that can well be imagined, and about the dwellings of men the accumulated filth of the winter Is at once exposed to view, by the disappearance of the snowy mantle that, for a season, had charitably covered a multitude of sins. This operation Is frequently interrupted by the return of frost, and the descent of fresh masses of snow, for there is no country, perhaps, where Winter makes a harder fight for it, before he allows himself to be beaten out of the field. For a few days, perhaps, a delightful south wind will diversify the plain with tulips, crocuses, and hyacinths ; then all at once a rude north-easter will come scouring from the Ural mountains, making the flowers vanish in a trice, and enveloping the whole scene anew in one wlilte shroud ; another shift of tlie wind, and a gale from the north-west, will come sweeping along, discharging its heavy clouds, and washing the face of the steppe from the Ural to the Carpathians. When at last boisterous old Hyems has really been forced to beat his retreat, a most delightful period of the year succeeds, and the steppe, covered with a beautiful and luxuriant herbage, smiles hke a lovely oasis between the parched desolation of the summer and the dreary waste of the winter. The whole earth now seems clad in the colour of Hope, while the sky assumes that of Truth ; and though it Is certainly monotonous enough to behold nothing but blue above and green below, yet the recollection of past hardships, and the consciousness of present abundance, make the season one of rejoicing to the native, and even excite for a while tlie admiration of the stranger. The latter^ however, is certain, before long, to grow weary of a spring miadorncd by a single flowering shrub, unvaried by a single bubbling brook. Not a Iiill to break the tedium of the landscape, through which a well-mounted rider may gallop for hundreds of leagues, and scarcely meet an object to make him conscious that he has quitted the spot wlicnce he started I From Hungary he may urge his steed to the borders of Circassia without passing one grove of trees ; from the Carpathians to the capital of Mongolia he will not once be gladdened by the sound of a streamlet murmuring over its pebbly bed. Grass, grass, grass — and nothing but grass ! Nor must this grass be supposed to resemble that which embelUshes the velvet lawn of an English park. The herbage of the steppe is so coarse that an English labourer would have to look long before he found a place soft enough for an afternoon nap ; and then, the tulips and hyacinths must not be judged by the beautiful specimens reared by a Dutch florist.