The fourth chapter returns southward to the city of Vologda, one of the primary cultural centers of the Russian North. In addition to views of some of its many historic churches—above all, the Cathedral of St. Sophia, commissioned by Ivan the Terrible—the chapter includes some of the surviving examples of Vologda’s once rich ensemble of wooden houses. The Savior-Prilutsky Monastery on the Vologda River is an example of contemporary restoration and church revival. To the northeast along the Sukhona River Basin are numerous towns and villages that comprise one of the densest concentrations of religious and traditional art and architecture...