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With great skill he touched on the steady southward advance of Russia into Persian territory from the distant days when, by a curious irony of fate, Russian and British enterprise combined to make entry into the country under the sanction of the Grand-Duke of Moscovy, to the present hour, when this great power of Russia long since alienated by interests and desires from her former co-operator had taken a step which in the eyes of every thinking man must possess a deep significance.
For example's sake, you may coast all Norway, Finmarke, and Lapland, and then bow southward to St. Nicholas, in Moscovy. You may likewise in the Mediterranean Sea fetch Constantinople and the mouth of the Don, yet is there no passage by sea through Moscovy into Pont Euxine, now called Mare Maggiore.
In 1586 the southern frontiers of Moscovy were fortified, and Kursk became one of the principal places on that line of defence against the Crimean Tartars and the Poles. We are now almost in the heart of the Chernozem, or black soil country, so called from the rich black loam of which its surface is composed to a depth of two and three yards and more.
Here, too, the Moscovy duck is numerous; and large flocks of two other kinds wheel round you as you pass on, but keep out of gun-shot. The milk-white egrets, and jabirus, are distinguished at a great distance; and in the æta and coucourito trees you may observe flocks of scarlet and blue aras feeding on the seeds. It is to these trees that the largest sort of toucan resorts.
Thence through Poland, Prussia, and Livonia, to the great dukedom of Moscovy; and thence back into Germany, and through the dominions of the Landgrave, and the dukedom of Saxony, into Denmark, Gothland, and Norway, penetrating to lat. 70°.N. In the course of these travels, which occupied him during 22 years, he saw, spoke to, and was conversant with, all the kings, princes, nobles, and chief cities of all Christendom; for which reason, I thought the great extent of his travels was worthy of remembrance.
The first objection is of no force, that general table of the world, set forth by Ortellius or Mercator, for it greatly skilleth not, being unskilfully drawn for that point, as manifestly it may appear unto any one that compareth the same with Gemma Frisius' universal map, with his round quartered card, with his globe, with Sebastian Cabot's table, and Ortellius' general map alone, worthily preferred in this case before all Mercator's and Ortellius' other doings: for that Cabot was not only a skilful seaman, but a long traveller, and such a one as entered personally that strait, sent by King Henry VII. to make this aforesaid discovery, as in his own discourse of navigation you may read in his card drawn with his own hand, that the mouth of the north-western strait lieth near the 318th meridian, between 61 and 64 degrees in the elevation, continuing the same breadth about ten degrees west, where it openeth southerly more and more, until it come under the tropic of Cancer; and so runneth into Mare del Sur, at the least 18 degrees more in breadth there than it was where it first began; otherwise I could as well imagine this passage to be more unlikely than the voyage to Moscovy, and more impossible than it for the far situation and continuance thereof in the frosty clime: as now I can affirm it to be very possible and most likely in comparison thereof, for that it neither coasteth so far north as the Moscovian passage doth, neither is this strait so long as that, before it bow down southerly towards the sun again.
Homer, Strabo, Aristotle, Dionysius, Mela, Pliny, Pius, affirm the continent of Asia, Africa, and Europe, to be environed with the ocean. And thus much for the first part of my answer unto the fourth objection. Into what gulf do the Moscovian rivers Onega, Dwina, Ob, pour out their streams? northward out of Moscovy into the sea. Which way doth that sea strike?
We all remember the salutary influence of Clotilde and Bertha which bore the traditions of the Jordan to the Seine and the Thames: it should not be forgotten that to the fortunate alliance of Waldimir, the Duke of Moscovy, with the sister of the Greek Emperor Basil, is to be ascribed the remarkable circumstance, that the intellectual development of all the Russias has been conducted on Arabian principles.
The mariners and passengers were often inquisitive to know who I was; and, pursuant to the advice of Marcus Ruffus, I passed myself among them as the physician and servant of Despima, the consort of the grand duke of Moscovy, to whom I was going.
"That renowned General P.A., Czar of Moscovy, having poured forth ample libations of wine, whilst sitting on the brink of this fountain fell into, and ennobled its waters about three o'clock in the afternoon of the 16th of April, 1717."
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