When he left Athens in the spring for Constantinople, he had become acquainted with all parts of ancient Greece, and was able to give to his readers a fund of valuable information concerning the country and its products, the people and their industries. He had kept up that triple life which characterized all his later travels in Europe and Asia, and saw everything modern in the way of manners, races, products, commerce, government, and everything that remained of the ancient days in the shape of monuments, temples, or ruins, together with those undefinable yet real suggestions which come to the poet, and to him alone. CHAPTER XXVIII. From Constantinople to Gotha.—Visit to Russia.—Moscow and St. Petersburg.—Return to Prussia.—Arrival in the United States.—Incessant Work.—Lecturing and Travels in California.—The Construction of Cedarcroft.—His Patriotic Addresses and Poems.—Visits Germany in 1861.—Anxiety for the Fate of His Nation.—Life at Cedarcroft. After a short stay in Constantinople, the party, under the guidance of Mr. Taylor, went by steamer to the mouth of the Danube, and thence up that river to his new home at Gotha. Mr. Taylor had set his heart on building a residence in the oak woodland near his old home at Kennett, and now that he was married, his anxiety to see it completed led him to think seriously of returning at once to the United States. Having, however, a vague fear that he might not again visit Europe as a traveller, and being unwilling to leave the largest empire in the world unvisited, he resolved to make a hasty trip to Moscow and St. Petersburg. It was not a tour which he would personally enjoy as he had his stay in Greece, yet it was needed to make complete his knowledge of Europe. Hence he hastened away from Gotha, and, taking Cracow, the salt mines of Wieliczka and Warsaw in his route, arrived at Moscow about the middle of June. Having seen the wonders of that ancient capital of Russia, he went by railroad direct to St. Petersburg. There he was much interested in the massive structures of granite and marble which stand over the land which was once an impassable marsh, and pondered, with feelings of great wonder, upon the control which man exercises over nature. The grand squares, the wide Boulevards, the ponderous bridges, the extensive palaces, the solid cathedral, and the broad quays and docks, give an impression of grandeur in simplicity, which no other city possesses. The great capital has none of that air of gayety and ostentation which one notices in Paris and London; but is stately, dignified, grand. Everything is done on a large scale, and the buildings, halls, streets, and parades, are alike suggestive of might, and a strong will. The city is Peter the Great in stone. It conveys the impression to the traveller, of strength without coarseness, and of beauty without display.