-walled,
green-roofed, with golden cross, like the average country church, with
some weather stains, and here and there a paling missing from the fence.
Near at hand was the new schoolhouse, with accommodations for the
master, recently erected by our host. Beyond this began the inclosure
surrounding the manor house, and including the cottages of the coachmen
and the steward with their hemp and garden plots, the stables and
carriage houses, the rickyard with its steam threshing machine and
driers, and a vast abandoned garden, as well as the gardens in use. The
large brick mansion, with projecting wings, had its drawing-rooms at the
back, where a spacious veranda opened upon a flower-bordered lawn,
terminating in shady acacia walks, and a grove which screened from sight
the peasant cottages on the opposite bank of the river. A hedge
concealed the vegetable garden, where the village urchins were in the
habit of pilfering their beloved cucumbers with perfect impunity, since
a wholesome spanking, even though administered by the Elder of the
Commune, might result in the spanker's exile to Siberia. Another
instance of the manner in which the peasants are protected by the law,
in their wrongs as well as their rights, may be illustrated by the case
of a load of hay belonging to the owner of the estate, which, entering
the village in goodly proportions, is reduced to a few petty armfuls by
the time it reaches the barn, because of the handfuls snatched in
passing by every man, woman, and child in the place.

No sound of the village reached us in our retreat except the choral
songs of the maidens on holiday evenings. We tempted them to the lawn
one night, and overcame their bashfulness by money for nuts and apples.
The airs which they sang were charming, but their voices were undeniably
shrill and nasal, and not always in harmony. We found them as reluctant
to dance as had been the peasants at Count Tolstoy's village. Here we
established ourselves for the harvest-tide.

II.

Our life at Prince X.'s estate on the Volga flowed on in a
semi-monotonous, wholly delightful state of lotus-eating idleness,
though it assuredly was not a case which came under the witty
description once launched by Turgeneff broadside at his countrymen: "The
Russian country proprietor comes to revel and simmer in his ennui like a
mushroom frying in sour cream." Ennui shunned that happy valley. We
passed the hot mornings at work on the veranda or in the wel