I never beheld a more glorious sunset than on this evening. We had passed several wooded islands, fringed with river-willows, and forming points of view that almost appeared to have been artificially produced; and we were just sailing past one of these, when the sun disappeared behind the high land by which it was backed, and shed over the sky tints so richly and so deeply marked, as to make the river-ripple sparkle like liquid gems; and to give to the stream the appearance of diluted amethysts and topaz. At this moment a sudden bend in the Danube brought us beneath a rock crowned with the crumbling ruins of a Genoese castle, at whose base a flock of goats were browsing on the green underwood that clothed its fissures. Nothing more was requisite to complete the beauty of the picture; and from this moment we all began to entertain hopes of an improvement in the aspect of the country through which we had yet to pass. The next town we reached was Ruschuk, which is of considerable extent, walled, and surrounded by a ditch. It contains only three thousand inhabitants, though it formerly boasted thirty thousand, but exhibits no symptom of that desolation we had remarked in several other towns on the river. It possesses nine mosques; and its main street is wider and more carefully paved than any in Constantinople. Its principal trade is in salt from Olenitza, sugar, iron, and manufactured goods; its exports are livestock, grain, wool, and timber; and its industry comprises sail-making by the women, and boat-building by the men. The extreme cheapness of food at Ruschuk struck me so much that I took some pains to ascertain the price of the most common articles of consumption; and I subjoin the result of my inquiries as a positive curiosity. Eggs were two hundred for a shilling—fowls were considered exorbitant; and the high value which they constantly maintained was accounted for by the fact that the market of Constantinople was in a great degree supplied from thence; they were twopence each—ducks and geese, from the same cause, cost two pence halfpenny; turkeys averaged tenpence, being a favourite food with the Orientals; beef three halfpence the oke, of two pounds and three quarters; mutton the same price—the wine of the country one piastre the quart—grapes a halfpenny the oke; melons and pasteks of immense size, three farthings each; bread equally cheap, but bad. Shortly after leaving Ruschuk, I was amused for a considerable time in watching some cormorants that were diving for fish; while every sand in the shallows of the river was covered with hundreds of blue plover. Wild ducks and geese also flew past the vessel in clouds; and we purchased small sturgeon and sword-fish from a boat with which we came in contact.