Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-09-02
RUSSIAN wkTEi PLEASURES.
Country Parties in the Islands Near
st. Petersburg.
From the London TeIerranM

Country Parties in the Islands Near
st. Petersburg.
From the London Telegraph
OF all the social pleasures of st. Peters
burg winter-skating not excluded-the
most delightful are the country parties,
whether by day or by night. The suburbs
of the capital are generally fiat and UNI
interesting. The exception is the Ostrova,
or islands, with their dense masses of dark
green frs. pines and spruces, their flowing
blue or frozen white rivers, in which, in
spring and summer gilded domes and gor-
geous palaces are mirrored, their lofty
aisles of tangled frontage and fine stretches
of park and meadow. checkered with the
fantastic forms and rich coloring of villas
ana mansions in early Russian style.
Those Islands of the BleSt are the goal
of most of the pleasure parties which, by
day or by night, start from St. Petersburg.
Ihey usually take place in Lent. Before
the carnival there is no leisure for such
amusements, Fashions worshipers during
that time being sort of dancing dervfshes,
Whlrled about in a dizzy vortex Of balls,
70 whlch there Is no number and no end.
VI course, the night chosen must not be
cold, as cold is understood in the northern
PALMYRA 1t must not quite freeze the
blood in ones veins on the way. And that
Is what 1t threatened to do on the very
part i'll nights merry-making on the ISL
ands Having met together at the house of
the lady who had suggested the idea, we
waited an hour or two for the mercury to
rise above "a degrees below zero (Fahren-
heiD, but in vain. 1t dropped a degree
lower, In fact, and yet 1t was splendid night
for all that with not breeze to disturb
the snoWf1akes which clustered together
the black boughS or chung close to the
sere leaves of last years foliage on the
trees outside. mere breath of wind on a
night like that would be sharp enough to
cut life threads asunder like the scissors
or the rates. But even the cold alone often
does the work. and in the Opaque gray of
the morning twilight many a drasky driver
and his horse have been found sleeping the
last long sleep Of death. From the win
dows OF the snug apartments we could
see the blaze of enormous fires in the
streets, supplied by charitable people of
means. the red glow of the wood fire con-
trasting delightfully."- with the white, glis-
tening shroud of snow and the great, shift
ing shadows of covering peasants, wrapped
in shapeless~ sheepskns. That night we
forewent our intention Of visiting the ISL
ands
Generally the company drives off in troik-
as. A RUSSIAN troika is, in winter at least,
sleigh drawn by spirited coursers, three
abreast, to the Naturalization of peal
of silvery bells. The pleasure conferred by
thls mode OF locomotion, all the other con-
djtions being favorable, belongs to a cate
CORY by itself. Many Russians harbor a
passion for it. Ones sensations and feel
ings cannot be painted in words. Mercury,
on his way from Olympus to Troy bearing
q welcomed message to some favored NOR
tai, may be supposed to have felt and ap-
preciated it. But If the nights outing had
rot been carefully planned beforehand, If
it be the outcome Of a sudden whim on the
lady's part, 1t may be that there are no
troikaS to be had for love or money, both
of which are abundant In this case the
pleasure hunters make the best of the low
sleigh of everyday life which can just
hold pair. If they hold each other. This
the pairs generally do with praiseworthy
tenacity and conscientious steadfastness.
Then the exhilarating drive begins along
the Proskept of the Kamennoi Ostroff,
over streets, avenues and bridges, by which
one flies with lightning-like rapidity the
wildly enthusiastic yamshshik driver,
whose quaint headgear Is decked out with
peacock feathers, urging his steeds to kill
themselves in the service of the fair ladies'
There is something positively blissful in
the keen enjoyment Of such rush through
the night; Its effects are moral as well as
physical. 1t raises the heart and diffuses
a roseate light and warmth over the psyche
and the mind which the latter lavishly
projects into space. One is on good terms
with nature and mankind and ones self.
The trees and bushes. parks and meadows
seem so many pictures, viewed thus cheerful
ly from under the warm fur oloaks and
wraps. The doubly purified ozone of the
atmosphere comes to one with some of the
effects of iced champagne, enhancing hum
dredfold the intense delight Of pleasant
companionship. At last we pull up at one
of the special restaurants the islands,
sometimes built of ice. and the entertain
ment begins. The restaurant for which we
were bound on the cold night described
above was an exact reproduction of the
ice house built at the command of the
Tsartsa Anna Joannovna, who compelled
an aged couple to undergo the ceremony of
a mock marriage and then to freeze to
death therein for her pleasure.
If the outing has been deliberately plan
ned beforehand a number of rooms at one
and the guests. who in this case are the
ladies, enter apartments bathed in soft
subdued light. the air laden with faint
scents of spring buds, summer flowers and
autumn fruits, which have come from the
sunny south. The prelude to the nights
is formed by the musical
motion of beauteous shapes clothed in
silks or satns. tripping from room
to room by short swallow flights of song
that dip their wings in tears and skim
away" and by the glance of smiling eyes
like stars half quenchcd in mists of silver
dew, which draw out souls and lure them
to unsounded depths, the mermaid lured
the angler in Goethe's ballad The
program of the night depends upon the
tastes of the party. but one Of its inevita-
bic items is the singing of gypsy songs by
a choir of more or less young and very
ardent ladies of the Romany persuasion
from Moscow-who charge so much for each