Page:Notes upon Russia (volume 2, 1851).djvu/36

fertile, that from one bushel of wheat often twenty, and sometimes thirty bushels, may be produced. The river Clesma [Kleasma] washes the city; in other respects it is begirt with large extensive woods. The Clesma, moreover, rises four German miles from Moscow, and is alike famous for, and rendered useful by, the numerous mills upon it; it is navigable twelve miles, as far as the town of Murom, situated on the bank of the Occa, into which river it falls. There was formerly a principality, situated amidst vast forests, twenty-four miles due east from Vladimir, inhabited by a people called Muromani, and which abounded in furs, honey, and fish.

Lower Novogorod is a large wood-built city, situated on a rock at the confluence of the Volga and Occa, with a stone fortification, built by the present monarch, Vasiley. They say that it is forty German miles east from Murom; and if so, Novogorod will be a hundred miles from Moscow. The country equals Vladimir in fertility and abundance. It forms the boundary, in this direction, of the Christian religion; for although the Prince of Muscovy has beyond this Novogorod a fortress named Sura, yet the intermediate people, who are called Czeremissi, do not follow the Christian, but the Mahometan religion. Moreover, there are other people, called Mordwa, mixed with the Czeremissi, who occupy a great part of the country this side of the Volga, as far as Sura. The Czeremissi live northwards beyond the Volga, and to make a distinction from them, those that live above Novogorod are called the Upper or Mountain Czeremissi; not, indeed, from any mountains, for there are none, but rather from the hills which they inhabit.

The river Sura divides the dominions of the Prince of Russia and the King of Kazan. Coming from the south, it bends its course eastward twenty-eight miles below Novogorod, and flows into the Volga. At the confluence of the two rivers. Prince Vasiley has built, on the further bank, a fort-