Page:Notes upon Russia (volume 2, 1851).djvu/46

answered, that the prince's dominions were not yet cleansed, but that now the fitting time was come for sweeping all garbage out of the empire. Ivan Vasileivich first added this province to his dominions after he had routed the army of Alexander, the grand-duke of Lithuania, at the river Vedrosch.

The princes of Sewera, moreover, derive their race from Dimitry, grand-duke of Muscovy. Dimitry had three sons, Vasiley, Andrew, and George. Of these, Vasiley, as the eldest, succeeded his father in the kingdom; and from the other two, Andrew and George, the princes of Sewera have derived the origin of their race.

Czernigov is thirty miles distant from Kiev, and as much from Potivlo. Potivlo is a hundred and forty German miles distant from Moscow, sixty from Kiev, and thirty-eight from Branski. This latter lies beyond a large wood, twenty-four miles in breadth.

Novogrodeck is eighteen miles from Potivlo, and fourteen from Staradub. Staradub is thirty-two miles from Potivlo.

In going through the desert of Potivlo into Taurida, one meets with the rivers Ina, Samara, and Ariel, — the two last of which are rather broad and deep, and travellers are sometimes detained a long time in crossing them, upon which occasions it will often happen that they are surrounded and captured by the Tartars. Next come the rivers Koinskawoda and Moloscha, the passage across which is effected by a novel kind of ferry boat. They bind together bundles of small wood into faggots, and place themselves and their goods upon them, and thus by paddling and availing themselves of the stream, they are carried to the opposite side. Others fasten faggots of this kind to the tails of horses, which, by a plentiful use of the whip, they force to drag them over to the opposite shore.

Ugra is a deep and muddy river, which rises in a wood not far from Drogobusch, and empties itself into the Occa,