It is not to be conceived into what a confusion of ideas one is cast at first, by the sight of a room filled with books, maps, journals, familiar articles of furniture, and people talking French: you ask yourself what is become of the days and nights you have spent in galloping post, the vast extent of sea you have crossed, the leagues of land and water, the regions and the climes you have left between you and your native country.
With the advances civilisation is daily making, distances will soon be annulled; for distance to my thinking, consists not in difference of longitude, but in diversity of manners and ideas. I certainly felt myself nearer to France in Taganrok than I should have been in certain cantons of Switzerland or Germany.
On the eve of our departure we attended some horse-races, that interested us only by the number and the variety of the spectators. There we began to make acquaintance with the Kalmucks, some of whom had come to the fair to sell their horses, the breed of which is in great request throughout the south of Russia. There was nothing very captivating in the Mongol features and savage appearance of these worshippers of the Grand Lama; and when I saw the jealous and disdainful looks they cast on those around them, and heard their loud yells whenever a horse passed at full speed before them, I could not help feeling some apprehension at the thought that I should soon have to throw myself on their hospitality.
Taganrok has the strongest resemblance to a Levantine town, so much are its Greek and Italian inhabitants in a majority over the rest of the population. Such was the perpetual hubbub, that we could hardly persuade ourselves we were in Russia, where the people usually make as little noise as possible, lest the echo of their voices should reach St. Petersburg. The Greeks, though subjected to the imperial regime, are less circumspect, and retain under the northern sky the vivacity and restless temperament that characterise their race. We particularly admired that day, a number of young Greek women, whose black eyes and elegant figures attracted every gaze. A string of carriages was drawn up round part of the race-course, and enabled us to review all the aristocratic families of the town and neighbourhood. The ladies were dressed as for a ball, with short sleeves, their heads uncovered and decked with flowers.
A blazing sun and whirlwinds of dust, such as would be thought fabulous in any other country, soon dimmed all this finery, and drove away most of the spectators: we were not the last to seek refuge in the covered alleys of a neighbouring bazaar, where we had ices and delicious water-melons set before us in the Armenian cafe for a few kopeks.
[6] A hectare is a little more than two acres.