The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

'.;.270 RUSSIA IN EUEOPE.on the surface. The development of agriculture will gradually reduce them to avast cultivated plain, but Chernozom will then lose the charm inspired by theaspect of free nature. But here, as in the prairies of the Far West, we may stillroam unhindered in the midst of a tall vegetation, its flowers and grassy tufts andears of corn waving above our shoulders in a boundless sea of heaving verdure.Coming southwards, the aspect of the steppes slowly changes according as thevegetable layers diminish in depth, and the marly, granitic, or limestone strata crop128.—The Kkemenetz Hills.Scale 1 : 250,000.Eof PKremenetzVv.-.x :JP '•New PbtchaVevt: : Old Potcha7s\50'Vishn'a vet 21 485J"^>out. To the grassy prairies, clothed in spring with the richest vegetation, succeedplains covered with brushwood, bramble, or coarse grasses, beyond which stretchvast arid tracts cultivated only in the neighbourhood of large towns. The paintedhouses encircled by plum and cherry trees are now replaced by low grey hovels,