A VISIT TO TOLSTOY
In midsummer of 1896 I learned to know Tolstoy. It was at the time of
the National Exhibition at Nijni-Novgorod. Cheap excursion tickets on
the railroads and river boats were to be had throughout the summer,
while correspondents for foreign newspapers were given first-class
passes for three months in every rod of railroad trackage in the
country. It was an opportunity for exercising _Wanderlust_ in style such
as had never before come my way. Baedeker's little book on the Russian
language was bought, introductions to friends in St. Petersburg were
secured, and away I went to spend preliminarily a week or so as a
field-hand, or in any other capacity that I was equal to, on Tolstoy's
farm, at Yasnaya Polyana, an estate about one hundred and fifty miles
south of Moscow. At that time I was not sure about the railroad pass. In
St. Petersburg, friends kindly put me in the way of getting it, and on I
went to Moscow, and, before the summer was over, to hundreds of other
towns and villages in different parts of the Empire. On two hundred and
fifty Russian words, or thereabouts, my passport, free railroad
transportation, and perhaps $75, I traveled, before I got back to
Berlin, about twenty-five thousand miles. I kept my hotel expenses down
by living on trains. First-class railroad accommodations include a bed.
So when night came I calmly took my berth in a train bound in any
direction long enough to secure me a good rest. In the morning I got out
and looked about me, or rode on as I liked. This proceeding also saved
me passport dues at hotels, an item of considerable expense in Russia if
one does much traveling. My meals were found at the stations, which
provide the best railroad restaurant service found anywhere. With all
the saving, sight-seeing and riding, however, my vacation over, I was
heartily glad to return to Germany, and for months afterwards my
_Wanderlust_ was delightfully under control.
By all odds the most interesting national feature that Russia allowed me
to see was Count Tolstoy. The Tsar, the museums, the palaces, the large
estates, the great unworked _Ninghik_--these men and things were
entertaining, but they did not take my fancy as did the novelist and
would-be philanthropist. And yet I had never read any of Tolstoy's
novels before meeting him, and my notions of his altruism were vague,
indeed--about what the ideas are of people who have never been in Russia
or seen Tolstoy, and who, on learning that you have been there and met
him ask immediately: "Say, _on the level_, is he a fakir or not?"
Once and for all, so far as my simple intercourse with him is concerned,
it may be most boldly declared that he never was a fakir--no more of one
when he was sampling all the vices he could hear of, than he is now in
urging others not to follow his examples as an explorer of Vicedom. It
is strange, but when a man, who has sampled everything that he could, in
the way of deviltry, and then quits such sampling, says that he has
enough, and attempts to steer others on a better tack than he took,
there is a prodigious amount of doubt in thousands of minds as to
whether the man sampled enough cussedness to know what the real article
is, or whether others should fight shy of what he saw or not.
The man at Yasnaya Polyana in 1896 was a fairly well preserved old
gentleman, with a white beard, sunken gray eyes, overhanging bushy
eyebrows, a slight stoop in the shoulders, which were carrying, I think,
pretty close to seventy years of age. He wore the simple peasant clothes
about which there has been so much nonsensical talk. Every man who lives
in the country in Russia, puts on, when summer comes, garments very
similar in cut and shape to those worn by the Ninghik. The main
difference during the warm months between the Ninghik's outfit and that
of his employer's is that the latter's is clean and the Ninghik's isn't.
My purpose in going to Yasnaya Polyana was mainly journalistic, I fear.
The entire trip in Russia, indeed, was to find "available" copy for the
New York newspaper referred to. The free railroad transportation allowed
me to cover "news" stories on very short notice, and also made it easy
to get material for "space" articles. Or, rather, on first getting it, I
thought that the pass would work wonders along these lines. In other
hands it would very possibly have done so, but the "available" matter
finally delivered by me proved only moderately successful. Putting aside
all questions of ability, reputation and connections, it has been my
experience that European "stuff" is not in such demand in the United
States that the average writer can make it support him even on a
vegetarian diet. Our editors, as a rule, want American "stuff." Only in
very recent years have they given much attention even to the foreign
news service, leaving the gathering, sifting, and distribution of the
day's facts to newsmongers who have often been as unscrupulous as they
were incapable.
Americans flock to Europe in thousands, going feverishly from place to
place as if their very lives depended on seeing such trifles as the old
snuff-boxes of ancient celebrities. Nothing must escape them. They want
their money's worth at every turn. A few tarry longer than the rest and
try to acquire some knowledge of the present condition of the countries
and people they see. But the vast majority push on hurriedly, elbowing
their way into nooks and crannies of alleged historical interest, until
Europe becomes for many of them, probably most of them, a mere museum of
things "starred" or not "starred" as the guidebook man saw fit to make
them. The life of the people, their contemporaries, is looked into only
incidentally; "anteeks" are what the mob is after and look for. This
indifference to present-day Europe, its politics, social customs and
institutions, has in the past been largely to blame for the inefficiency
of our foreign news service. What was the use of going to heavy expense
to inform Americans about things abroad which they would pay no
attention to when they were abroad themselves? The publishers and
editors reasoned that there was no use, and even at this late day many
of them prefer a news item from Yankton, Dakota, to one from London.
Their readers may know very little more about Yankton than about London,
but that does not matter. Perhaps they have relatives in Dakota, or
formerly loaned money to farmers out there at three per cent. a month.
That settles the matter for the newsmongers. The Yankton dispatch is
given prominence, although it refers to nothing of more importance than
a divorce. Its provinciality is of greater cash value to the newspaper
than the cosmopolitan significance of the message from London. This, and
more that might be said, has made a foreign correspondent's life in
Europe unattractive, to say the least. At one time, however, I seriously
considered preparing myself for such a career. The trip to Russia was
meant as a trying-out of my qualifications. It seemed to me then, and,
if our newspapers, or, rather the newspaper readers, would take more
interest in other things than massacres, notable suicides and
fashionable scandals, it would seem to me now, that such a calling ought
to be useful as well as profitable. Until our people care more, however,
for a well-considered article from London or Berlin than they do for a
hasty "wire" from Wilkesbarre concerning the mobbing of an Italian, the
usefulness and commercial value of the foreign correspondent's efforts
do not appear very evident. At any rate, the time came when I decided
that my foreign "stuff" was not of the bread-winning kind, and I threw
overboard the dream of becoming a writer on such lines. To this hour,
however, I regret that some good opening in the foreign service did not
show up at the time the dream was so present.
But to return to Tolstoy and Yasnaya Polyana. All told, I was in and
about this place for ten days, seeing Tolstoy and his family practically
every day; even when I did not stop in the house overnight I divided my
time between Yasnaya Polyana and the home of a neighbor of the Tolstoys.
When staying at Yasnaya Polyana I slept in what was called the Count's
library, but it was evidently a bedroom as well. At the neighbor's home
I had a cot in the barn where two young Russians, friends of the Count,
also slept. They were helping Tolstoy "re-edit" the Four Gospels,
omitting in their edition such verses as Tolstoy found confusing or
non-essential. The life on the old estate at Yasnaya Polyana has been
described so often by both English and American visitors, that there is
very little that I can add to the known description of the grounds and
daily routine. The place looks neglected and unkempt in many respects,
but the two remaining wings of the old mansion are roomy and
comfortable. Eight children of the original sixteen were living at the
time of my visit, ranging in years from fourteen to thirty and over. The
Countess was the "boss" of the establishment in and out of the house.
What she said of a morning constituted the law for the day, so far as
work was concerned. She had assistants, and I think a superintendent, to
help her, but she was the final authority in matters of management. The
Count did not appear to take any active part in the direction of
affairs. He spent his time writing, riding, walking and visiting with
the guests, of whom there were a goodly number. At one time he may have
worked in the fields with the peasants, but in July of 1896 he did not
share any of their toil--at least I personally did not see him at work
among them. His second daughter, Maria Lvovna, however, the one child
that in those days was trying to put her father's theories to a
practical test, was a field worker of no mean importance, certainly to
the peasants, if not to her mother. Trained as a nurse she was also the
neighborhood physician, having a little pharmacy in the straggling,
dirty village outside the lodge gates. It was through her kindness that
I was permitted to join the peasants in the hayfield, and to get
acquainted with them in their dingy cabins. Although it was pleasanter
to gather with the other children on the tennis court, the haying
experience was at any rate healthy and, to some extent, instructive. I
noticed, however, that my presence caused considerable merriment among
the peasants. They had grown accustomed to Maria Lvovna, indeed she had
grown up among them, whereas I was a stranger of whom they knew nothing
beyond the little that Maria had told them. Some of them no doubt
thought it very foolish of me to prefer haying to tennis and
refreshments, while others probably doubted the sincerity of my
purpose--viz.: to get acquainted with their conditions and to see what
effect Maria Lvovna's would-be altruism was having upon them. I might as
well state immediately that at no time did I succeed in finding out
satisfactorily what this effect was, if it existed at all. That she was
a very welcome companion in the fields and cabins there could be no
doubt, but was this due to the peasant's correct interpretation of her
intentions or to her commercial value to them as a voluntary, wageless
helper? Maria herself thought that some of the peasants understood her
position as well as her father's teachings. Not being able to converse
with the peasants privately I cannot say whether she was deceived or
not.
Some years previous she had also tried to conduct a village school
independent of the priest's, but she was finally forced to give it up on
account of clerical opposition. As neighborhood physician and nurse,
however, she had ample opportunity to teach the peasants what she
believed, and to reason with them about following the dictates of their
own consciences rather than the behests of the clergy and the orders of
the military. At the time of my visit I think she had made most headway
among the men, unwilling taxpayers in Russia at all times. To be told
that the priests and military should support themselves without
assistance from the peasantry was sweet music indeed. "Think how much
more money we can have for vodka!" many an Ivan must have whispered when
Maria was exhorting them not to be soldiers, and to refuse their
financial support of the church.
In one cabin we visited together Maria noticed several colored portraits
of the Imperial family hanging on the wall. They were set in metal
frames.
"How comes it," Maria exclaimed, "that I see so many emperors this
morning?"
The big, burly peasant looked sheepishly at her, and then, mumbling that
his wife was to blame, swept the pictures into his hands and threw them
into a cupboard.
"The woman likes such things," the man explained. "I put them away, but
she gets them out again."
Maria thought that the peasant was sincere in his renunciation of Tsar
worship, and perhaps he was. I think, however, that, like many of the
other peasants on the estate, he found it financially profitable rather
than spiritually consoling to have Maria think him one of her converts.
Only two days before our call at this cabin, for instance, he had stolen
some wood from the Countess. I believe that it was a log "which he
thought the Countess would not need." The superintendent had discovered
the theft, and the peasant had been, or was to be, reported.
"But, Maria," he said, when begging Maria to intercede for him with her
mother, "tell the Countess how much more I could have taken. Just a log
like that--that is no crime, is it?" Maria told him that she would do
what she could, and we left the man happy, Maria's promise of
intercession seeming to be as good to him as the forgiveness of the
Countess. Nothing was said about the return of the log.
In this, as in many other cases, Maria was doubtless exploited by the
cunning peasants--the Ninghik can be uncommonly cunning in small
things--but she said in reply to my suspicion in this regard: "Even so.
Who could expect such people to be upright in everything? Besides the
man confessed his offense. He is a good fellow in his way. Seldom beats
his wife and does not drink overmuch. I believe in building all that one
can on such good qualities as he shows, and if I intercede for him it
may increase my influence for good in his family."
"It may also confirm him in his pilfering habits," I interposed. "He
will learn to expect friendly interference on your part on such
occasions."
"Perhaps so, but I prefer to think not," and that ended Maria's argument
in the matter, as it did in many other talks I had with her, the Count
and those neighbors who could be called his "disciples."
Their principles and religious beliefs were never given prominence in
general conversation unless they were directly asked about them. They
chose by preference to live them as best they could, rather than
polemicize about them. Only on two or three occasions did Maria, for
instance, advance any of the ideas about how the world was to be made
better, and then only because I had quizzed her point-blank. Day after
day she went her quiet way, haying, nursing, doctoring, and when she
could spare the time, enjoying herself on the tennis court.
Her older sister, Totyana, was by no means so active in her acceptation
of her father's teachings. Indeed, in 1896 she was still very undecided
about them. She told me, one day, laughingly, that for the present she
was only half won over; "perhaps when I am as old as my father I shall
be wholly won over." In her way she seemed quite as happy as Maria; all
of the children, in fact, saw life on its brighter side, even to one of
the older boys, who was a soldier, and put much store on multi-colored
uniforms and ornamented cigarette cases. What the Countess really
thought about the whole business I never found out. We had one short
conversation about the Count and his work, during which she delivered
herself of these remarks: "You will hear many things here that I do not
agree with--I believe it is better to be and do than to preach." I
judged from these sentiments that Tolstoyism as a cult had not captured
her. That she thought much of the Count as a man and husband was evident
from her solicitous care of him.
The Count himself, although very approachable, was so busy with one
thing and another during my stay, that only on two occasions did we have
anything like a satisfactory conversation. And these two opportunities
could be only partially improved by me because I honestly did not know
what to talk about with the old gentleman--or rather there was so much
that I wanted to ask him, but did not know how to formulate in the way
that I fancied such a great man would expect questions to be put, that
the time went by and I had done but little more than observe the man's
manners, and listen to what he volunteered to say without being
questioned. We spoke in English and German, as it happened to suit.
Now, that I look back over the experience and recall the old gentleman's
willingness to talk on any subject, I regret exceedingly that I did not
quiz him about literary contemporaries and affairs. The principal thing
he said along these lines that comes to mind now concerned poetry and
how it impressed him. We were sitting in the music room, and some one
had said something about the relative values of prose and poetry as
methods of expression. Tolstoy preferred prose.
"Poetry," he said, pointing to the parquet floor, "reminds me of a man
trying to walk zigzag across the room on those squares. It twists and
turns in all directions before it can arrive anywhere. Prose, on the
other hand, is direct; it goes straight at the mark."
Talking about America and Americans, one afternoon, he was much
interested in William Dean Howells, Henry George and the late Henry
Demarest Lloyd. He told me that there were four men in the world that he
was very anxious to bring together; he believed that a conference
between them would throw much light on the world's needs. Two of the
men, if my memory is correct, were Mr. Howells and Mr. Lloyd.
Only one strictly theological, or rather religious bit of conversation
occurs to me now. We were walking in the fields, the Count having spent
the day at his friend's house where the Four Gospels were being
overhauled. The talk wandered along in a rather loose fashion until we
came to the subject of miracles--we also tackled parables before we got
through.
I had become a little mixed in understanding the Count, and said
something like this: "And the miracles you consider so illuminating?"
"No, no, no," he returned, "anything but illuminating; they are
befogging. It is the parables that I find so clear and instructive. The
miracles will have to go, but the parables we could not possibly spare."
On no occasion did the Count ask me what I believed. The matter seemed
to make very little difference to him, or, at any rate, if I believed
anything and was made happy thereby, he did not see the use in taking it
up in conversation.
In the dining room, one noon, he said to me: "I see that you like
tobacco." There was no critical or reproachful accent in the remark; he
merely noted what was a fact.
"I used to be fond of it," he went on, looking down at the floor, "and I
used a _good deal_ of it. I finally thought that it was doing me harm
and let it go." Other things that had been "let go," liquor and meat,
for instance, had apparently been given up on the same simple
ground--they were injurious to his health. Religion, self-denial for
self-denial's sake, "setting a good example," etc., these matters did
not appear to have influenced him. At any rate, he did not speak of them
when talking about his renunciations, and, in the case of tobacco,
frankly said that if he were young again, "no doubt it would be pleasant
to use it again." In a word, his vegetarianism and self-service, so far
as anything that he said to me is concerned, were due as much to
hygienic notions as to religious scruples. And yet I was told by a very
trustworthy person that the old gentleman regrets very much that the
simple life, as he sees it, cannot prevail throughout his home. At
table, for instance, he would prefer that all hands should help one
another, and that the Countess' white-gloved servants be dispensed with.
In his personal life he seemed to be trying to be his own servant as
much as possible.