But perhaps the most extraordinary and interesting of the wonders of the Hermitage are the Winter and Summer Gardens. As I strolled through the suites of apartments, and looked out through the windows of a long gallery, it was hardly possible to believe that the flourishing trees, shrubs, and flowers stood upon an artificial soil, raised nearly fifty feet above the surface of the earth. The Winter Garden is a large quadrangular conservatory, planted with laurels and orange trees, in which linnets and Canary birds formerly flew about enjoying the freedom of nature; but the feathered tribe have disappeared. The Summer Garden connected with it is four hundred feet long; and here, suspended, as it were, in the air, near the top of the palace, I strolled along gravel-walks, and among parterres of shrubs and flowers growing in rich luxuriance, and under a thick foliage inhaled their delightful fragrance. It is idle to attempt a description of this scene.
I returned to my Pole, whom I found at his window with a melancholy and sentimental visage, his beautiful epistle returned upon his hands--having, in sportsman's phrase, entirely missed fire--and then lying with a most reproving look on his table. My friend had come up to St. Petersburgh in consequence of a lawsuit, and as this occupied but a small portion of his time, he had involved himself in a lovesuit, and, so far as I could see, with about an equal chance of success in both. L'amour was the great business of his life, and he could not be content unless he had on hand what he called une affaire du coeur.
[1] The Winter Palace has since been destroyed by fire. The author has not seen any account of the particulars, but has heard that the contents of the Diamond Chamber were saved.
An Imperial Fête.--Nicolas of Russia.--Varied Splendours.--A Soliloquy.--House of Peter the Great.--A Boatrace.--Czarskoselo.--The Amber Chamber.--Catharine II.--The Emperor Alexander.
THE next day was that appointed for the great fête at Peterhoff. In spite of the confining nature of his two suits, my Pole had determined to accompany me thither, being prompted somewhat by the expectation of seeing his damsel; and, no way disheartened by the fate of his first letter, he had manufactured another, by comparison with which the first was an icicle. I admitted it to be a masterpiece, though when he gave it to a servant to carry over, as we were on the point of setting off, suggested that it might be worth while to wait and pick it up when she threw it out of the window. But he had great confidence, and thought much better of her spirit for sending back his first letter.