Page:The Boy Travellers in the Russian Empire.djvu/120

114 —some poised on their hoofs like the wooden animals in a child's "Noah's Ark;" others on their sides, with their legs projecting at right angles to their bodies; others, again, on their backs, with their feet in the air like inverted tables. The oxen are only less grotesque from having been cleft down their backs—an operation which seems to take them out

of the category of oxen and place them in that of beef. The pigs are drawn up in line against the wall, standing on their hind legs, with their forefeet extended above their heads, like trick-dogs going through their performances.

The partridges, quails, grouse, wood-hens, and other birds are lying together in a frozen mass, and by their side are ducks and geese with outstretched necks so straight and stiff that you might take one of these harmless creatures by the bill and, using it as a bludgeon, knock down your enemy with its body. The fowls have been plucked, plunged into water, and left to freeze; thus they are completely encased in ice, and in that condition will keep for any length of time as long as the weather continues cold.'