...
Moreover during this spring of 1916 Petrograd, against my knowledge,
wove webs about my feet. I had never shared the common belief that
Moscow was the only town in Russia. I had always known that Petrograd
had its own grace and beauty, but it was not until, sore and sick at
heart, lonely and bitter against fate, haunted always by the face and
laughter of one whom I would never see again, I wandered about the
canals and quays and deserted byways of the city that I began to
understand its spirit. I took, to the derision of my few friends, two
tumbledown rooms on Pilot's Island, at the far end of Ekateringofsky
Prospect. Here amongst tangled grass, old, deserted boats, stranded,
ruined cottages and abraided piers, I hung above the sea. Not indeed the
sea of my Glebeshire memories; this was a sluggish, tideless sea, but in
the winter one sheet of ice, stretching far beyond the barrier of the
eye, catching into its frosted heart every colour of the sky and air,
the lights of the town, the lamps of imprisoned barges, the moon, the
sun, the stars, the purple sunsets, and the strange, mysterious lights
that flash from the shadows of the hovering snow-clouds.
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