Ahead of them a few lights twinkled feebly, sometimes visible and then
hidden again as they rode over the rolling hillocks. One plain ever
suggests another, but the resemblance between the steppes of Tver and
the great Sahara is at times startling. There is in both that roll as of
the sea--the great roll that heaves unceasingly round the Capes of Good
Hope and Horn. Looked at casually, Tver and Sahara's plains are level,
and it is only in crossing them that one realizes the gentle up and down
beneath the horses' feet.

Soon Steinmetz raised his head and sniffed in a loud Teutonic manner. It
was the reek of water; for great rivers, like the ocean, have their
smell. And the Volga is a revelation. Men travel far to see a city, but
few seem curious about a river. Every river has, nevertheless, its
individuality, its great silent interest. Every river has, moreover, its
influence, which extends to the people who pass their lives within sight
of its waters. Thus the Guadalquivir is rapid, mysterious,
untrammelled--breaking frequently from its boundary. And it runs through
Andalusia. The Nile--the river of ages--runs clear, untroubled through
the centuries, between banks untouched by man. The Rhine--romantic,
cultivated, artificial, with a rough subcurrent and a muddy bed--through
Germany. The Seine and the Thames--shallow--shallow--shallow. And
we--who live upon their banks!

The Volga--immense, stupendous, a great power, an influence two thousand
four hundred miles long. Some have seen the Danube, and think they have
seen a great river. So they have; but the Russian giant is seven hundred
miles longer. A vast yellow stream, moving on to the distant sea--slow,
gentle, inexorable, overwhelming.

All great things in nature have the power of crushing the human