On the day after the arrival of the squadron at Cronstadt, when the usual recitations of the day had been completed, all hands were summoned to the steerage of the ship to listen to the preliminary lecture on Russia. As the students knew less of this vast country than of most of the others of Europe, they were more interested in the exercise than usual. Mr. Mapps had a large map of Russia in Europe suspended to the foremast, upon which he had drawn the railroads completed up to that time, and made such other additions as the recent changes in the country demanded. "Russia is probably the largest empire, territorially, that exists now, or ever has existed," the professor began. "Can you tell us how to pronounce the name?" asked Commodore Lincoln. "I do not speak Russian, but Professor Badois does, and I have asked him to give us the name in Russian characters or letters," replied Mr. Mapps, pointing to a large sheet of printing paper, upon which this name and certain statistics were written. "Here it is--РОССІЯ." "That R is backward," suggested the commodore. "No," interposed the professor of languages; "that letter has the value of ya in English. The first letter is the same as the English R; the C's have the value of S, and the I sounds like long E. In Russian the name is pronounced as though it were spelled _Ro-see´-ya_." "It looks like _poke ear_," laughed Scott. "You will not be able to read even a word of Russian, the letters are so different from ours," added Mr. Badois.