Sanin was compelled to drink two large cups of excellent chocolate,
and to eat a considerable number of biscuits; no sooner had he
swallowed one than Gemma offered him another--and to refuse was
impossible! He soon felt at home: the time flew by with incredible
swiftness. He had to tell them a great deal--about Russia in general,
the Russian climate, Russian society, the Russian peasant--and
especially about the Cossacks; about the war of 1812, about Peter the
Great, about the Kremlin, and the Russian songs and bells. Both ladies
had a very faint conception of our vast and remote fatherland; Signora
Roselli, or as she was more often called, Frau Lenore, positively
dumfoundered Sanin with the question, whether there was still existing
at Petersburg the celebrated house of ice, built last century, about
which she had lately read a very curious article in one of her
husband's books, '_Bettezze delle arti_.' And in reply to Sanin's
exclamation, 'Do you really suppose that there is never any summer in
Russia?' Frau Lenore replied that till then she had always pictured
Russia like this--eternal snow, every one going about in furs, and all
military men, but the greatest hospitality, and all the peasants very
submissive! Sanin tried to impart to her and her daughter some more
exact information. When the conversation touched on Russian music,
they begged him at once to sing some Russian air and showed him a
diminutive piano with black keys instead of white and white instead
of black. He obeyed without making much ado and accompanying himself
with two fingers of the right hand and three of the left (the first,
second, and little finger) he sang in a thin nasal tenor, first 'The
Sarafan,' then 'Along a Paved Street.' The ladies praised his voice
and the music, but were more struck with the softness and sonorousness
of the Russian language and asked for a translation of the text. Sanin
complied with their wishes--but as the words of 'The Sarafan,' and
still more of 'Along a Paved Street' (_sur une rue pavee une jeune