North Caucasus

“Today at five in the morning, when I opened the window, my room filled with the scent of flowers growing in the modest front garden. The branches of blossoming cherry trees peer into my windows, and the wind sometimes scatters their white petals across my desk. The view from three sides is wonderful. To the west, the five-peaked Beshtau looms blue, like ‘the last cloud of a dissipating storm’; to the north, Mashuk rises like a shaggy Persian cap, obscuring this entire section of the sky; the view to the east is more cheerful: below me, a neat, brand-new little town sparkles, healing springs murmur, and a multilingual crowd bustles—and there, further on, the mountains pile up like an amphitheater, growing ever bluer and mistier, and on the edge of the horizon stretches a silver chain of snow-capped peaks, beginning with Kazbek and ending with the twin-peaked Elbrus… It’s a joy to live in such a land! A certain sense of joy flows through my very veins. The air is pure and fresh, like a child’s kiss; the sun is bright, the sky is blue—what more could one want? —why are there passions, desires, and regrets here?..”

Mikhail Lermontov. A Hero of Our Time, “Princess Mary”