IN SEARCH OF RUSSIAN BUTTERFLIES. 239 



The left bank of the Volga almost along its whole length is 

 flat, but the right bank on which Sarepta, as before mentioned, 

 is situated, is an almost continuous range of hills, in some places 

 attaining a height of over 1000 ft. ; at Sarepta they are from 

 200 ft. to 300 ft. in altitude. These hills have apparently 

 been formed in the long distant past by the prevailing wind 

 from the east blowing the sand formed in the river bed into 

 dunes ; these dunes being in the process of time converted 

 into solid earth by the growth of plants, the roots of which have 

 bound the soil together. The tops and sides are generally 

 covered with a growth of low plants ; in the folds and cross 

 ravines, however, there are woods and bushy slopes full of life 

 of all kinds, insect and otherwise. 



The Volga, which above Sarepta flows for several hundred 

 miles in a south-west direction, skirting for the whole distance 

 the base of the hills, has within comparatively recent times 

 carved out for itself a new course which commences immediately 

 north of the town ; this course leaves the hills and strikes out 

 across the steppe in a south-easterly direction. At Sarepta the 

 distance from the river to the hills is about two miles, and the 

 town lies on the level plain midway between the two. 



Having decided to make a stay of several weeks at Sarepta, 

 we left Novorossisk on the evening of May 18th, bound thither. 

 The distance is about 500 miles, across the steppe the whole 

 distance, in traversing which we did not see a hill or even an 

 undulation ; it was a weary journey, which the train is timed to 

 do in twenty-four hours, and which it actually accomplished in 

 twenty-seven hourSc This journey we did on bread, cheese, and 

 beer, for we were warned at the last moment at Novorossisk, too 

 late to take a supply of food with us, that the more solid eatables 

 to be had on route were bad, and that it was dangerous to 

 partake of them. 



At Sarepta I had obtained through a German correspondent 

 the address of a person who kept an inn, the only one there, 

 and on arrival, to our great relief, we found airy rooms, clean 

 beds, and wholesome, if rough, food, and in Herr Georg Enke a 

 most obliging, intelligent, and helpful host. 



I must confess that it was with a feeling of keen disappoint- 

 ment that I surveyed my surroundings on the morning after our 

 arrival. I had expected to find Sarepta, which contains some 

 six thousand people, a model town. I had pictured the steppe, 

 by some well-thought out scheme of irrigation, made to 

 blossom like the rose, and the whole district converted into 

 vineyards, fruit orchards, and gardens. There is some spas- 

 modic irrigation, but not by any means sufficient to transform 

 the arid plain into fertility, only just enough to water a few 

 gardens. There is no evidence of want of prosperity of a kind, 

 with plenty of good houses, for Russia, even some fruitful and 



