The incomparable Alexei
Sklyarenko recently cited the Ada text below...
“Pferd is, of course,
German for "horse" and belongs to the "equine" theme in Ada (according
to Lucette's mother Marina, "the Zemskis were terrible rakes
(razvratniki), one of them loved small girls, and
another
raffolait d'une de ses juments and had her tied up
in a special way... when he dated her in her stall:"
1.37).”
I don’t know whether scholiasts have
previously noted that the elder Zemski’s “passion for one of his
mares” tied up in a special harness when he dated her in her stall is
VN’s gender inversion of a bit of popular Russian folklore about the
voracious Russian Empress Catherine the Great and her favorite
stallion.
Scholarship marches on!
D.Barton
Johnson