Page:The Boy Travellers in the Russian Empire.djvu/171

Rh a section of fairy-land. Doctor Bronson told the youths that he was in St. Petersburg at the time of the marriage of the Emperor's son, the Grand-duke Vladimir, and one of the sights of the occasion was the illumination of the islands.

"We rode through three or four miles of illuminations," said the Doctor, "and it seemed as though they would never come to an end. At the very entrance of the islands we passed the summer residence of Count Gromoff, one of the millionaires of St. Petersburg, and found

it transformed into a palace of fire. Not a tree or bush in the large garden in front of the house was without its cluster of lanterns, and one of our party remarked that it seemed as though half the stars in the sky had fallen and found a lodgement there. In the centre of the scene were the monograms of the Emperor and Empress, and of the newly-wedded pair, outlined in gas-jets; above and behind them was an Imperial mantle surmounted with a crown, and all made with the burning gas. Then the whole cottage was delineated with thousands of lights, and we agreed that never in our lives had we seen such a