BY DAVID KER.
No Russian boy with a half-holiday before him could wish for a pleasanter place to spend it than the great park which lies around the Czar's country palace of Tsarskoë-Selo (Czar's Village), sixteen miles southeast of St. Petersburg. The poor Czar himself very seldom goes there now, fearing to be shot or blown up: but plenty of his subjects do all through the summer, and many a hard-worked clerk or tired store-keeper, lying on the soft grass, with his children frolicking around him, or eating moroshki (Finland raspberries) and cream in one of the little trellis-work summer-houses near the lake, doubtless congratulates himself that he is not important enough to be assassinated, and can take a day's pleasure without fear of pistols, daggers, or dynamite bombs.
If you strike straight out through the park from the eastern corner of the palace, and head toward Pavlovsk (which lies two miles distant), you will soon hear a chorus of little voices, as if a party of children were enjoying themselves somewhere near. Ask any one what this means, and the answer will be, "Matchta" (the mast), and in another moment you see the top of a tall mast above the trees, and come out upon a small open space with a shed along one side of it, and the mast itself in the middle.
All around the foot of it, for safety's sake, is spread a strong net, upon which a crowd of girls and boys are dancing, rolling about, and jumping backward and forward, while other boys of a more adventurous turn are chasing each other up and down the "stays" and rope-ladders, laughing and hallooing at the full pitch of their voices.
See what rosy cheeks this little lassie in the pink sash has got. She looked pale enough two months ago, but fresh air and out-door games have done wonders for her already. She and her sister Alexia (Alice) have taken her big doll between them, and joining hands with their cousin Nadejda (Hope) are dancing round and round in time to a funny little Russian song.
But who is that tall, bright-eyed, curly-haired boy who is skipping up and down the rigging as nimbly as a cat, watched admiringly by the old Russian sailor who has charge of the play-ground? Young as he is, Michael Suvôrin has already made up his mind to go to sea, and never loses a chance of "practicing for a sailor." He is rather a wild boy, and just a little too fond of playing tricks upon his aunt and cousins, who are watching him rather nervously from below; but with all his wildness, he staid in only last week all through a half-holiday to read to his little sister when she was ill.
Suddenly he flings his straw hat to the ground, and starts right for the mast-head hand over hand in true man-of-war fashion. Up he goes—up, up, up—reaches the top, and giving a triumphant hurrah, turns to come down again.
All at once he is seen to lurch forward; a cry is heard; and the next moment he is hanging head downward in the empty air, caught by one foot in the strands of the rope-ladder.
Instantly all is confusion. Ladies scream, children cry, and the old sailor himself darts forward to mount to the rescue, when the mischievous boy clews himself up again with a loud laugh, and slides down unhurt, the whole thing having been only a trick.
But when he sees his aunt's white scared face, and his little cousins crying bitterly, Michael's warm heart smites him.