ome folk-songs. No bashful schoolgirls could have
resisted our entreaties with more tortuous graces than did those
untutored peasants. One of them was such an exact blond copy of a pretty
brunette American, whom we had always regarded as the most affected of
her sex, that we fairly stared him out of countenance, in our amazement;
and we made mental apologies to the American on the spot.

"Please sing 'Adown dear Mother Volga,'" the conversation ran.

"We can't sing." "We don't know it." "You sing it and show us how, and
we will join in."

The Affected One capped the climax with "It's not in the mo-o-o-ode now,
that song!" with a delicate assumption of languor which made his
comrades explode in suppressed convulsions of mirth. Finally they
supplied the key, but not the keynote.

"Give us some _vodka_, and we may, perhaps, remember something."

Promises of _vodka_ at the end of the voyage, when the danger was over,
were rejected without hesitation. We reached our breakfast-ground in
profound silence.

Fortunately, the catch of sterlet at this stand had been good. The
fishermen grilled some "in their own fat," by salting them and spitting
them alive on peeled willow wands, which they thrust into the ground, in
a slanting position, over a bed of glowing coals. Anything more
delicious it would be difficult to imagine; and we began to revise our
opinion of the sterlet. In the mean time our boatmen had discovered some
small, sour ground blackberries, which they gallantly presented to us in
their caps. Their feelings were so deeply wounded by our attempts to
refuse this delicacy that we accepted and actually ate them, to the
great satisfaction of the songless rogues who stood over us.

Our own fishing with a line resulted in nothing but the sport and
sunburn. We bought a quantity of sterlet, lest the fishermen at the camp
where we had planned to dine should have been unlucky, placed them in a
net such as is used in towns for carrying fish from market, and trailed
them in the water behind our boat.

We were destined to experience all possible aspects of a Volga
excursion, that day, short of absolute shipwreck. As we floated down the
mighty stream, a violent thunderstorm broke over our heads with the
suddenness characteristic of the country. We were wet to the skin before
we could get at the rain-cloaks on which we were sitting, but our
boatmen remained as dry as ever, to our mystification. In the middle of
the storm, ou