The stretch which we have traversed on our way from the monastery, and which is punctuated at the corner of the canal and the Prospekt by the pleasing brick and granite palace of the Emperor’s brother, Grand Duke Sergiei Alexandrovitch, which formerly belonged to Prince Byeloselsky-Byelozersky, was the suburb belonging to Lieutenant-Colonel Anitchkoff, who built the first bridge, of wood, in 1715.  As late as the reign of Alexander I., all persons entering the town were required to inscribe their names in the register kept at the barrier placed at this bridge.  Some roguish fellows having conspired to cast ridicule on this custom, by writing absurd names, the guards were instructed to make an example of the next jester whose name should strike them as suspicious.  Fate willed that the imperial comptroller, Baltazar Baltazarovitch Kampenhausen, with his Russianized German name, should fall a victim to this order, and he was detained until his fantastic cognomen, so harsh to Slavic ears, could be investigated.

By day or by night, in winter or summer, it is a pure delight to stand on the Anitchkoff Bridge and survey the scene on either hand.  If we gaze to the north toward what is one of the oldest parts settled on the rivulet-riddled so-called “mainland,” in this Northern Venice, we see the long, plain facade of the Katherine Institute for the education of the daughters of officers, originally built by Peter the Great for his daughter Anna, as the “Italian Palace,” but used only for the palace servants, until it was built over and converted to its present purpose.  Beyond, we catch a glimpse of the yellow wings of Count Scheremetieff’s ancient house and its great iron railing, behind which, in a spacious courtyard, after the Moscow fashion so rare in thrifty Petersburg, the main building lies invisible to us.  If we look to the south, we find the long ochre mass of the Anitchkoff Palace, facing on the Nevsky, upon the right shore; on the left, beyond the palace of Sergiei Alexandrovitch, the branch of the Alexander Nevsky Monastery, in old Russian style, with highly colored saints and heads of seraphim on the outer walls; and a perspective of light, stuccoed building,—­dwellings, markets, churches,—­until the eye halts with pleasure on the distant blue dome of the Troitzky cathedral, studded with golden stars.  Indeed, it is difficult to discover a vista in St. Petersburg which does not charm us with a glimpse of one or more of these cross-crowned domes, floating, bubble-like, in the pale azure of the sky.  Though they are far from being as beautiful in form or coloring as those of Moscow, they satisfy us at the moment.

If it is on a winter night that we take up our stand here, we may catch a distant glimpse of the numerous “skating-gardens,” laid out upon the ice cleared on the snowy surface of the canal.  The ice-hills will be black with forms flitting swiftly down the shining roads on sledges or skates, illuminated by the electric light; a band will be braying blithely, regardless of the piercing cold, and the skaters will dance on, in their fancy-dress ball or prize races, or otherwise, clad so thinly as to amaze the shivering foreigner as he hugs his furs.