CHAPTER III.
VOLUNTARY EXILE Ivanofka--History of the Place--The Steward of the Estate--Slav and Teutonic Natures--A German's View of the Emancipation--Justices of the Peace--New School of Morals--The Russian Language--Linguistic Talent of the Russians--My Teacher--A Big Dose of Current History.
This village, Ivanofka by name, in which I proposed to spend some months, was rather more picturesque than villages in these northern forests commonly are.

The peasants' huts, built on both sides of a straight road, were colourless enough, and the big church, with its five pear-shaped cupolas rising out of the bright green roof and its ugly belfry in the Renaissance style, was not by any means beautiful in itself; but when seen from a little distance, especially in the soft evening twilight, the whole might have been made the subject of a very pleasing picture.

From the point that a landscape-painter would naturally have chosen, the foreground was formed by a meadow, through which flowed sluggishly a meandering stream.

On a bit of rising ground to the right, and half concealed by an intervening cluster of old rich-coloured pines, stood the manor-house--a big, box-shaped, whitewashed building, with a verandah in front, overlooking a small plot that might some day become a flower-garden.

To the left of this stood the village, the houses grouping prettily with the big church, and a little farther in this direction was an avenue of graceful birches.