Illustration: Tarantass with its Troika for the Steppes.
As soon as the day began to close in, the three little carriages accompanying my tarantass pulled up, their occupants being now obliged to return.
Then we stretched ourselves in ourtarantass for our night’s repose.
In a minute we are in the water; two steps more and the swift current is up to the horses' sides, and the tarantassbegins to turn over.
I finally arranged with a Russian trader for a tarantass and baggage cart to take me the two hundred and twenty-five miles to the head of river navigation beyond Kiakhta.
I will say for Ivan, the tarantass driver, that he knew his business and kept the horses on their feet and in the road better than most men could have done.
A few days and nights in a tarantass were all that now lay between me and the uninteresting comforts of Western hotels and trains.
It is best to hire a tarantass to be taken through, or, if you cannot hire one, you had better purchase it outright and sell for what you can get at the end of the journey.
In summer the roads are dusty, the delays at the river crossings are frequently long and vexatious, mosquitoes and flies fill the air, provisions will only keep fresh for a day or so, and the tarantass is a heavy vehicle to draw.
The tarantass is mounted on a pair of stout and flexible poles that serve as springs, and sometimes they are so long that the two axles are at least twelve feet apart.
After a sojourn of three days, he started in a tarantass for Orenburg.
St. Petersburg is a long way off," says he; "how shall I get my tarantass back?
But I am dreaming all this while that the tarantass before me can be hired.
A tarantass in these northern forests is like the white elephant in the Eastern story.
A tarantass lies lightly on a raft of poles; mere lengths of green pine, cut down and trimmed with a peasant's axe, and lashed on the axles of two pairs of wheels, some nine or ten feet apart.
His horses four abreast, and lashed to the tarantass with ropes and chains, the driver tears along the road as though he were racing with his Chert--his Evil One; and all in the hope of getting from his thankless fare an extra cup of tea.
A strong tarantass is said to be worth three hundred and fifty rubles.
In one day's drive in a tarantass I saw a dozen hamlets, in which every man serving as a justice of the peace was a Pole.
He only learned that in years gone by the yard was closed, and my tarantass sold with the other traps.
A tarantass is a better sort of cart, with the addition of splash-board, hood, and step.
The rule is, for the richest peasant of the village to be chosen, and a stranger driving into a hamlet in search of the elder will not often be wrong in pulling up his tarantass at the biggest door.
In ten years' time that tarantass had cost me thrice its original price.
The tarantass had disappeared, for Dmitri Ivanovitch wished to visit an aunt whose house was not far from the road.
The tarantass was occupied by Dmitri Ivanovitch and a cousin.
After a time, which to the children seemed endless, the sound of the tarantass bells was again heard, accompanied this time by numerous heavy footsteps, and the vehicle reappeared, escorted by a company of soldiers commanded by two officers.
We put our baggage in a telyaga with Maack's servant and took the tarantass to ourselves.
We thought thetarantass preferable to the hotel, and retired early to sleep in our carriage.
My tarantass had not been materially injured in the journey, but several screws were loose and there was an air of general debility about it.
The tarantasswas pushed ashore, and as soon as the horses were attached a rapid run took them up the bank to the station.
Where the road was good our tarantass rolled along very well, and the cold, though considerable, was not uncomfortable.
If he should buy a tarantass and it gave out he would be forced to leave it till he came again, or sell it at any price offered.
At Nerchinsk I resumed my efforts to purchase a tarantass, but my investigations showed the Nerchinsk market 'out' of everything in the tarantass line and no promise of a new crop.
The servants filled our tarantass with baggage, while their master filled us with champagne.
We remained in thetarantass through the whole transaction.
Maack found his tarantass at Verkne Udinsk, and as it was larger and better than mine we assigned the latter to Evan and the baggage, and took the best to ourselves.
He had an objectionable habit of entering the tarantass just before me and standing in the way until I was seated.
The horses were detached and remained on the bank until the tarantass was safely on board.
The captain made his bed on a sofa, but I preferred the tarantass where the air was cool and pure.
When we had left the village and were driving along in our tarantass the mystery was satisfactorily cleared up.
It will be well to explain here, parenthetically, what a tarantass is, for I shall often have occasion to use the word.
Altogether, the tarantass is well adapted to the conditions in which it is used.
One day, in the principal thoroughfare, a member had his tarantass overturned, and he himself was thrown into the mud!
An additional person in the tarantass did not increase the expense, and considerably diminished the little unavoidable inconveniences of travel.
Close to the tarantass stood two figures in long cloaks, armed with big sticks, and speaking to each other in an unknown tongue.
Now that the reader has gained some idea of what a tarantass is, we may return to the modes of travelling through the regions which are not yet supplied with railways.
About sunset we had left a village called Morsha, and shortly afterwards, feeling drowsy, and being warned by my companion that we should have a long, uninteresting drive, I had lain down in the tarantass and gone to sleep.
On awaking I found that the tarantass had stopped, and that the stars were shining brightly overhead.
The tarantass we left behind in charge of Schwartz, with orders to follow on as soon as the ice was strong enough to bear the carriage.
The tarantass is a strong roughly made four-wheeled carriage, placed on poles, which rest across the two axletrees.
The poles are made of soft wood, but have some spring in them, and thetarantass is at least more comfortable on rough roads than a Chinese two-wheeled cart.
On the preceding night we had come to grief, by the wheel of our tarantasssinking into a pit that had been dug for a telegraph post, and then filled with snow.
Our tarantass was very much the worse for the wear, and on bad roads it might break down at any time.
Kiachta, and we could only make room in the tarantass for a little brandy, and some tins of bacon, and smoked tongues.
The other horses are attached by rope traces to the axletrees, or any part of the outside of the tarantass which may be available for making fast a rope.
But the close, oven-heat of the room itself was in my case a sufficient objection to sleeping there, and the tarantass was to me the more attractive dormitory of the two.
The hood comes well forward, and with an apron that comes up nearly to the top, and a curtain that can be let down from the front of the hood, the tarantass can be pretty well closed in.
With patience, however, we gained our point, and got tarantass and all across the river, though not without considerable difficulty and danger.
The tarantassentered the court-yard, crushing the nettles under its wheels, and stopped before the portico.
Even Apraxia, who had outlived, not only her intelligence, but almost all her faculties, shook her head, and followed him with sad eyes as he started in the tarantass for the town.
The prisoners have already been on their way two months, at first by tarantass and now, no doubt, by sled.
It was a fortunate thing, under the circumstances, for the tarantass could not have carried both baggage and travelers.
However, at last the tarantass started, and made such good way that by three in the afternoon it had reached Koulatsinskoe, fifty miles farther on.
The impetus the tarantass had received was not to be lost, and the tired horses once more moved forward.
Six hours afterwards the two vehicles, the tarantass preceding the telga, arrived at Ekaterenburg, nothing worthy of note having happened in the descent.
What are those horses which have just been harnessed to the tarantass I saw at the door?
All day the tarantass was driven rapidly by the iemschiks, who succeeded each other at every stage.
The tarantass is as solid and as easy to repair as the telga, and is, moreover, less addicted to leaving its hinder part in the middle of the road.
Happily, the tarantass could be so placed that the storm might strike it obliquely.
In ten minutes Michael was told that his tarantass was ready to start.
Michael proposed to his young companion that he should cross first, embarking in the ferryboat with the tarantass and horses, as he feared that the weight of this load would render it less safe.
At that moment Michael Strogoff threw himself from the tarantass and rushed to his assistance.
Whether or not it was from this way of driving, which requires the iemschiks to possess strong throats more than muscular arms, the tarantass flew along at a rate of from twelve to fourteen miles an hour.
The next day, July 25th, at three o'clock in the morning, the tarantass arrived at Tioukalmsk, having accomplished a distance of eighty miles since it had crossed the Ichim.
The tarantass was going straight for Ichim, where the two correspondents intended to stop, if nothing happened to make them alter their plans.
As soon as the ferryboat landed the tarantass on the right bank of the Ichim, the journey across the steppe was resumed with all speed.
To make matters worse, we had that morning sold the old rascal our tarantass for sixty roubles (about one-third of its real value), on the express understanding that he would charge as little as possible for accommodation.
A message came shortly after from the Chief of Police, to say that he would call at eleven o’clock, and that we must not leave Listvenitz till our tarantass had been searched.
The fare across was not ruinous, eight roubles first, and five roubles second class, the freight of the tarantass being twelve roubles.
Krasnoiarsk, who was found dead in his tarantass two days ago, near Touloung, his throat cut from ear to ear.
A large and luxurious tarantass brought up the rear of this weird procession.
Luckily a large hole into which the tarantass dived, brought us up all standing, and saved us from further mishap.
It became very cold after sundown, and we retired to the tarantass forward, where, the head being to the wind, we kept pretty warm.
The tarantass had to be baled out before we got in.
At times, though, the tarantass wobbled about terribly, and we constantly expected to find ourselves in the old position——feet upwards.
From Kiakhta to Tomsk, viâ Lake Baikal, Irkoutsk, and Krasnoiarsk bytarantass or Russian post carriage, and thence by steam communication on the Obi and Irtish rivers to Tobolsk and Tiumen.
The above list will hopefully give you a few useful examples demonstrating the appropriate usage of "tarantass" in a variety of sentences. We hope that you will now be able to make sentences using this word.
