Nowadays there are rich villages around Nikopol and Berislav. Many of them belonged to Prince Potemkin, and now constitute the estates of the wealthy banker Stieglitz. From Nikopol there is one transfer to Berislav. This city has a remarkable cathedral: it was located in the Zaporozhye Sich, and was all cut down from thick oak beams. Prince Potemkin transported him to Berislav. Berislav was once called Miletopol. In the old days, the Russians renamed it Belaya Vezheya, and the Tatars - Kazikermen. It was built on the right, steep bank of the Dnipro, and belonged to the Cossacks. Some writers believe that this city was founded by the Milesians, and from them it received its name Miletopolis. Its location is beautiful. Here I crossed the Dnipro, drove through Kakhovka, and along a sandy, boring road I dragged myself to Perekop.
Without yet dealing with Taurida, which I am entering into and about which I will begin to talk in the second chapter, by the way I will say here two words about the mounds that are often found in the Ekaterinoslav, Kherson and Crimean steppes. Many writers suggest that they, like those of Kerch and those that are often found in Asia Minor, are nothing more than tombstones; others take them for sentry beacons: this, by the way, is the opinion of the Duke of Ragusa, expressed by him on his last journey through midday Russia. But I cannot agree with either opinion. By order of Prince Potemkin, and after him, several mounds were torn apart by some curious people; even others were dug through, in a cross shape; but no tombs were found in any of them, and below the traces of anything buried here: no bones, no ashes, not the slightest sign of a cemetery. Then notice the unchanging, uniform arrangement of these mounds, precisely in threes: two are almost next to each other, and the third forms a triangle with them. One of the three is always bigger and taller than the others. This shows, it seems to me, that the mounds had some permanent and always the same purpose. If these were tombstones, there would be more of them, and sometimes just one at a time. What would their triangular arrangement serve? Why is one, precisely and every time, greater and higher than the others? It is also difficult to say that they served as lighthouses: they often have no communication with each other. Lighthouses should be located in a chain, stretching from a certain place to another, which is not the case here at all.
Then the ugly stone idols, which were located on almost all the mounds, and on some of them have survived to this day, despite the rough and bad work, in which the artist’s intention to depict a person is barely recognizable, however, they show the facial features of the Scythian nomadic peoples, or the Cumans and Pechenegs, who descended from them. But why is there always a male image on the large mound, and next to it, on the second mound, a female image, but on the third there was never any idol? I assume, based on the fragments of Scythian and Polovtsian customs known to us, that the mounds served at the camps of these nomadic peoples to place the Prince, or Khan, on the larger one, from where he could survey at one glance all the people located around him; on the second mound were his wife, or wives, and on the third was the priest, or the first priest. In the square between them, the elders of the people probably gathered before the eyes of the Prince for a meeting: here matters were decided and measures were taken for the general well-being; peace or war were proclaimed here. The Horde, moving from one nomadic camp to another, found ready-made mounds everywhere. It should also be noted that always, if the terrain allowed it, they stood near the water.
In the steppe, before reaching Perekop, I saw for the first time in my life a wonderful natural phenomenon: it is a mirage. I use the French name here because it seems to me that it is not in Russian, or I don’t know it. Early in the morning, when the sun's rays were still sliding almost horizontally across the sky, I saw, as if half a mile in front of me, a wide river. I could even see her jets. Here my geographical knowledge was completely upset: I did not understand what kind of river this was? Where did she wander into the steppe, in which, according to my information, there is no water? The more I reasoned, the more I became lost in my thoughts; finally decided to ask the driver.
-What kind of river is this? - I asked. “There is no river here,” he answered me calmly. - So this is right the lake? - And there is no lake here. - Are you blind, coachman! You see, water! - Yes, sir, this is an obsession. We see this often.
We galloped at full speed, and really should have reached the river long ago; but she remained with us at the same distance. I couldn't take my eyes off this phenomenon; but the sun became higher: the river, water and my dreams disappeared.