ARGUMENT
A vision in curl papers awakes Thaddeus—Belated discovery of a
mistake—The tavern—The emissary—The skilful use of a snuffbox
turns discussion into the proper channel—The jungle—The
bear—Danger of Thaddeus and the Count—Three shots—The dispute of
the Sagalas musket with the Sanguszko musket settled in favour of
the single-barrelled Horeszko carbine—Bigos—The Seneschal’s tale
of the duel of Dowejko and Domejko, interrupted by hunting the
hare—End of the tale of Dowejko and Domejko.
Ye comrades of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania, trees of Bialowieza, Switez,
Ponary, and Kuszelewo! whose shade once fell upon the crowned heads of the
dread Witenes and the great Mindowe, and of Giedymin, when on the height
of Ponary, by the huntsmen’s fire, he lay on a bear skin, listening to the
song of the wise Lizdejko; and, lulled by the sight of the Wilia and the
murmur of the Wilejko, he dreamed of the iron wolf;62 and awakened, by the
clear command of the gods, he built the city of Wilno, which sits among
the forests as a wolf amid bison, wild boars, and bears. From this city of
Wilno, as from the she-wolf of Rome, went forth Kiejstut and Olgierd and
his sons,63 as mighty hunters as they were famous knights, in pursuit now
of their enemies and now of wild beasts. A hunter’s dream disclosed to us
the secrets of the future, that Lithuania ever needs iron and wooded
lands.
Ye forests! the last to come hunting among you was the last king who wore
the cap of Witold,64 the last fortunate warrior of the Jagiellos, and the
last huntsman among the rulers of Lithuania. Trees of my Fatherland! if
Heaven grants that I return to behold you, old friends, shall I find you
still? Do ye still live? Ye, among whom I once crept as a child—does great
Baublis65 still live, in whose bulk, hollowed by ages, as in a goodly
house, twelve could sup at table? Does the grove of Mendog66 still bloom
by the village church? And there in the Ukraine, does there still rise on
the banks of the Ros, before the mansion of the Holowinskis, that linden
tree so far-spreading that beneath its shade a hundred youths and a
hundred maidens were wont to join as partners in the dance?
Monuments of our fathers! how many of you each year are destroyed by the
axes of the merchants, or of the Muscovite government! These vandals leave
no refuge either for the forest warblers or for the bards, to whom your
shade was as dear as to the birds. Yet the linden of Czarnolas, responsive
to the voice of Jan Kochanowski, inspired in him so many rimes!67 Yet that
prattling oak still sings of so many marvels to the Cossack bard!68
How much do I owe to you, trees of my Homeland! A wretched huntsman,
fleeing from the mockery of my comrades, in exchange for the game that I
missed how many fancies did I capture beneath your calm, when in the wild
thicket, forgetful of the chase, I sat me down amid a clump of trees!
Around me here the greybearded moss showed silver, streaked with the blue
of dark, crushed berries; there heathery hillocks shone red, decked with
cowberries as with rosaries of coral.—All about was darkness: over me the
branches hung like low, thick, green clouds; somewhere above the
motionless vault the wind played with a wailing, roaring, howling,
crashing thunder; a strange, deafening uproar! It seemed to me that there
above my head rolled a hanging sea.
Below, the crumbling remains of cities meet the eye. Here an overthrown
oak protrudes from the ground, like an immense ruin; on it seem to rest
fragments of walls and columns; on this side are branching stumps, on that
half-rotted beams, enclosed with a hedge of grass. Within the barricade it
is terrible to look: there dwell the lords of the forest, wild boars,
bears, and wolves; at the gate lie the half-gnawed bones of some unwary
guests. Sometimes there rise up through the green of the grass, like two
jets of water, a pair of stag’s antlers; and a beast flits between the
trees like a yellow streak, as when a sunbeam falls between the forest
trees and dies.
And again there is quiet below. A woodpecker on a fir tree raps lightly
and flies farther on and vanishes; it has hidden, but does not cease to
tap with its beak, like a child when it has hidden and wishes to be sought
for. Nearer sits a squirrel, holding a nut in its paws and gnawing it; its
tail hangs over its eyes like the plume over a cuirassier’s helmet: even
though thus protected, it keeps glancing about; perceiving the guest, this
dancer of the woods skips from tree to tree and flashes like lightning;
finally it slips into an invisible opening of a stump, like a Dryad
returning to her native tree. Again all is quiet.
Now a branch shakes from the touch of some one’s hand, and between the
parted clusters of the service berries shines a face more fair than they.
It is a maiden gathering berries or nuts; in a basket of simple bark she
offers you freshly gathered cowberries, rosy as her lips. By her side
walks a youth who bends down the branches of the hazel tree; the girl
catches the nuts as they flash by her.
Now they have heard the peal of the horns and the baying of the hounds;
they guess that a hunt is drawing near them; and between the dense mass of
boughs, full of alarm, they vanish suddenly from the eye, like deities of
the forest.
In Soplicowo there was a great commotion; but neither the barking of the
dogs, nor the neighing of the horses and the creaking of the carts, nor
the blare of the horns that gave the signal for the hunt could stir
Thaddeus from his bed; falling fully dressed on his couch, he had slept
like a marmot in its burrow. None of the young men thought of looking for
him in the yard; every one was occupied with his own affairs and was
hurrying to his appointed place; they entirely forgot their sleeping
comrade.
He was snoring. Through the heart-shaped opening that was cut in the
shutter the sun poured into the darkened room like a fiery column,
straight on the brow of the sleeping lad. He wanted to doze longer and
twisted about, trying to avoid the light; suddenly he heard a knocking and
awoke; cheerful was his awakening. He felt blithe as a bird and breathed
freely and lightly; he felt himself happy and smiled to himself. Thinking
of all that had happened to him the day before, he blushed and sighed, and
his heart beat fast.
He looked at the window. Marvellous to say, in the sunlit aperture, within
that heart, there shone two bright eyes, opened wide, as is wont to be the
case when one gazes from daylight into darkness; he saw also a little
hand, raised like a fan on the side towards the sun, to shield the gaze;
the tiny fingers, turned towards the rosy light, reddened clear through,
as if made of rubies; he beheld curious lips, slightly parted, and little
teeth that shone like pearls among corals; and the face, though it was
protected from the sun by a rosy palm, itself glowed all over like the
rose.
Thaddeus was sleeping beneath the window; himself hidden in the shade,
lying on his back, he wondered at the marvellous apparition, which was
directly above him, almost touching his face. He did not know whether he
was awake, or whether he was imagining one of those dear, bright childish
faces that we remember to have seen in the dreams of our innocent years.
The little face bent down: he beheld, trembling with fear and joy, alas!
he beheld most clearly—he recalled and recognised now that short, bright
golden hair done up in tiny curl papers white as snow, like silvery pods,
which in the gleam of the sun shone like a crown on the image of a saint.
He started up, and the vision straightway vanished, frightened by the
noise; he waited, but it did not return! He only heard again a
thrice-repeated knocking and the words: “Get up, sir; it is time for
hunting, you have overslept.” He jumped from his couch, and with both
hands pushed back the shutters, so that their hinges rattled, and flying
open they knocked against the wall on either side. He rushed out and
looked around, amazed and confused, but he saw nothing, nor did he
perceive traces of any one. Not far from the window was the garden fence;
on it the hop leaves and the flowery garlands were trembling; had some
light hands touched them or had the wind stirred them? Thaddeus gazed long
on them, but did not dare enter the enclosure; he only leaned on the
fence, raised his eyes, and, with his finger pressed on his lips, bade
himself be silent, in order not to break the stillness by a hasty word.
Then he rapped his forehead, as though he were tapping for some ancient
memories that had been lulled to sleep within him; finally, gnawing his
fingers, he drew blood, and shouted at the top of his voice: “It serves me
right, it does.”
In the yard, where a few moments before there had been so many cries, now
everything was desolate and silent as in a graveyard; all had gone afield.
Thaddeus pricked up his ears, and put his hands to them like trumpets; he
listened till the wind that blew from the forest brought to him the sound
of horns and the shouts of the hunting throng.
Thaddeus’s horse was waiting saddled in the stable. So, musket in hand, he
vaulted upon it, and like a madman galloped towards the inns that stood
near the forest chapel, where the beaters were to have gathered at early
dawn.
The two taverns bent forward from either side of the road, threatening
each other with their windows like enemies. The old one rightfully
belonged to the owner of the castle; the new one Judge Soplica had built
to spite the castle. In the former, as in his own inheritance, Gerwazy
ruled supreme; in the latter Protazy occupied the highest place at the
table.
The new tavern was not peculiar in its appearance. The old one was built
according to an ancient model, which was invented by Tyrian carpenters,
and later spread abroad over the world by the Jews; a style of
architecture completely unknown to foreign builders: we inherit it from
the Jews.
The tavern was in front like an ark, behind like a temple; the ark was
Noah’s genuine oblong chest, known to-day under the simple name of stable;
in it there were various beasts, horses, cows, oxen, bearded goats; and
above flocks of birds; and a pair each of various sorts of reptiles—and
likewise insects. The rear portion, formed like a marvellous temple,
reminded one by its appearance of that edifice of Solomon that Hiram’s
carpenters, the first skilled in the art of building, erected on Zion. The
Jews imitate it to this day in their schools, and the design of the
schools may be traced in their taverns and stables. The roof of lath and
straw was peaked, turned-up, and crooked as a Jew’s torn cap. From the
gable protruded the edges of a balcony, supported on a row of close-set
wooden columns; the columns, which were a great architectural marvel, were
solid, though half decayed, and were put up crooked, as in the tower of
Pisa; they did not conform to Greek models, for they lacked bases and
capitals. On the columns rested semicircular arches, also of wood, in
imitation of Gothic art. Above were artistic ornaments, crooked as the
arms of Sabbath candlesticks,69 executed not with the graver or chisel,
but with skilful blows of the carpenter’s hatchet; at their ends hung
balls, somewhat resembling the buttons that the Jews hang on their
foreheads when they pray, and which, in their own, tongue, they call
_cyces_. In a word, from a distance the tottering, crooked tavern was like
a Jew, when he nods his head in prayer; the roof is his cap, the
disordered thatch his beard, the smoky, dirty walls his black frock, and
in front the carving juts out like the _cyces_ on his brow.
In the centre of the tavern was a partition like that in a Jewish school;
one portion, divided into long and narrow rooms, was reserved exclusively
for ladies and gentlemen who were travelling; the other formed one immense
hall. Along each wall stretched a many-footed narrow, wooden table; by it
were benches, which, though lower, were as like the table as children are
like their father. On these benches around the room sat peasants, both men
and women, and likewise some of the minor gentry, all in rows; only the
Steward sat by himself. After early Mass they had come from the chapel to
Jankiel’s, since it was Sunday, to have a drink and to amuse themselves.
By each a cup of greyish brandy was already frothing, the hostess was
running about with the bottle, serving every one. In the centre of the
room stood the host, Jankiel, in a long gown that reached to the floor,
and was fastened with silver clasps; one hand he had tucked into his black
silk girdle, with the other he stroked in dignified fashion his grey
beard. Casting his eye about, he issued orders, greeted the guests who
came in, went up to those that were seated, and started conversation,
reconciled persons quarrelling, but served no one—he only walked to and
fro. The Jew was old, and famed everywhere for his probity; for many years
he had been keeping the tavern, and no one either of the peasants or of
the gentry had ever made complaint against him to his landlord. Of what
should they complain? He had good drinks to choose from; he kept his
accounts strictly, but without any knavery; he did not forbid merriment,
but would not endure drunkenness. He was a great lover of entertainments;
at his tavern marriages and christenings were celebrated; every Sunday he
had musicians come from the village, including a bass viol and bagpipes.
He was familiar with music and was himself famous for his musical talent;
with the dulcimer, his national instrument, he had once wandered from
estate to estate and amazed his hearers by his playing and his songs, for
he sang well and with a trained voice. Though a Jew, he had a fairly good
Polish pronunciation, and was particularly fond of the national songs, of
which he had brought back a multitude from each trip over the Niemen,
_kolomyjkas_70 from Halicz and _mazurkas_ from Warsaw. A report, I do not
know how well founded, was current throughout the district, that he was
the first to bring from abroad and make popular in that time and place the
song which is to-day famous all over the world, and which was first played
in the Ausonian land to Italians by the trumpets of the Polish legions.71
The talent of song pays well in Lithuania; it gains people’s affection and
makes one famous and rich. Jankiel had made a fortune; sated with gain and
glory, he had hung his nine-stringed dulcimer upon the wall, and settling
down with his children in the tavern he had taken up liquor-selling.
Besides this he was the under-rabbi in the neighbouring town, and always a
welcome guest in every quarter, and a household counsellor: he had a good
knowledge of the grain trade on the river barges;72 such knowledge is
needful in a village. He had also the reputation of being a patriotic
Pole.73
He was the first to bring to an end the quarrels between the two taverns,
which had often led even to bloodshed, by leasing them both. He was
equally respected by the old partisans of the Horeszkos and by the
servants of Judge Soplica. He alone knew how to keep an ascendancy over
the terrible Warden of the Horeszkos and the quarrelsome Apparitor; in
Jankiel’s presence both Gerwazy terrible of hand and Protazy terrible of
tongue stifled their ancient wrongs.
Gerwazy was not there; he had gone to join the beaters, not wishing that
the Count, young and inexperienced, should undertake alone so important
and difficult an expedition. So he had gone with him for counsel, and
likewise for defence.
To-day Gerwazy’s place, the farthest from the threshold, between two
benches, in the very corner of the tavern (called _pokucie_74), was
occupied by the Monk, Father Robak, the alms-gatherer. Jankiel had seated
him there; he evidently highly respected the Bernardine, for whenever he
noticed that his glass was empty he immediately ran up and told them to
pour out for him July mead.75 They said that the Bernardine and he had
been acquainted when young, somewhere off in foreign lands. Robak often
came by night to the tavern, and consulted secretly with the Jew about
important matters; they said that the Monk was smuggling goods, but this
was a slander unworthy of belief.
Leaning on the table, Robak was discoursing in a low voice; a throng of
gentry surrounded him and pricked up their ears, and bent down their noses
to the Monk’s snuffbox. Each took a pinch, and the gentlemen sneezed like
mortars.
“Reverendissime,” said Skoluba with a sneeze, “that is fine tobacco, it
goes way up to your topknot. Never since I have worn a nose”—here he
stroked his long nose—“have I met its like”—here he sneezed a second time.
“It is real Bernardine, doubtless made in Kowno, a city famous throughout
the world for tobacco and mead. I was there in——”
“To the health of you all, my noble gentlemen!”
Robak interrupted him. “As for the tobacco—hm—it comes from farther off
than my friend Skoluba thinks; it comes from Jasna Gora, the Bright
Mountain; the Paulist Brethren prepare such tobacco in the city of
Czenstochowa,76 where stands the image, famed for so many miracles, of Our
Lady the Virgin, Queen of the Crown of Poland: she is likewise still
called Duchess of Lithuania! She still watches over her royal crown, but
in the Duchy of Lithuania the schism77 is now established!”
“From Czenstochowa?” said Wilbik. “I confessed myself there when I went on
a pilgrimage thirty years ago. Is it true that the French are now visiting
the city, and that they are going to tear down the church and seize the
treasury—for this is all printed in the _Lithuanian Courier?_”
“No, it is not true,” said the Bernardine. “His Majesty the Emperor
Napoleon is a most exemplary Catholic; the Pope himself anointed him, and
they live in harmony, and spread the faith among the French people, which
has become a trifle corrupted. To be sure they have contributed much
silver from Czenstochowa to the national treasury, for the Fatherland, for
Poland, as the Lord God himself bids; his altars are always the treasury
of the Fatherland. Why, in the Duchy of Warsaw we have a Polish army of a
hundred thousand, perhaps soon there will be more. And who will pay that
army? Will it be you Lithuanians? You are now giving your pennies only for
the Muscovite coffers.”
“The devil we are!” cried Wilbik; “they take them from us by force.”
“O, my dear sir,” a peasant spoke up humbly, bowing to the Monk and
scratching his head, “for the gentry it is only half bad, but they skin
_us_ like linden bark.”
“You stupid son of Ham!”78 cried Skoluba, “it is easier for you; you
peasants are as used to skinning as eels; but for us _men of birth_, us
gentlemen accustomed to golden liberty! Ah, brothers! Why, in old times a
gentleman on his garden patch——”
“Yes, yes,” they all cried, “was a wojewoda’s match.”79
“To-day they even deny our gentle birth; they bid us hunt up papers and
prove it by documents.”
“That’s nothing for such as you!” shouted Juraha. “Your precious ancestors
were peasants who obtained nobility, but I am of princes’ blood! To ask me
for a patent, showing when I became a nobleman! Only God remembers that!
Let the Muscovite go to the forest and ask the oak grove who gave it a
patent to grow above all the shrubs!”
“Prince!” said Zagiel. “Go tell that to some one else! You will find no
end of princes’ coronets in this district.”
“You have a cross in your coat of arms,” shouted Podhajski; “that is a
covert allusion to the fact that a baptised Jew was a member of your
line.”
“That is false!” interrupted Birbarz; “now I spring from the blood of
Tatar counts, and yet my coat bears crosses above a ship.”
“The white rose of five petals,” cried Mickiewicz, “with a cap in a golden
field: it is a princely coat; Stryjkowski writes frequently of it.”80
After this a mighty hubbub arose all over the room. The Bernardine had
recourse to his snuffbox; he offered a pinch to each of the orators in
turn, and the wrangling immediately subsided: each accepted for courtesy’s
sake, and sneezed several times. The Bernardine, taking advantage of the
intermission, continued:—
“Ah! this tobacco has made great men sneeze! Will you believe me that four
times General Dombrowski has taken a pinch from this snuffbox?”
“Dombrowski!” they shouted.
“Yes, yes, he, the general. I was in the camp when he was recapturing
Dantzic from the Germans.81 He had something to write; and, fearing that
he might go to sleep, he took a pinch, sneezed, and twice patted me on the
back. ‘Father Robak,’ he said, ‘Father Bernardine, perhaps we shall see
each other in Lithuania before the year is over. Tell the Lithuanians to
receive me with Czenstochowa tobacco; I take none but that.’ ”
The Monk’s speech aroused such amazement and such joy that the whole noisy
assembly was silent for a moment; then they repeated under their breath
the words, “Tobacco from Poland? Czenstochowa? Dombrowski? from the
Italian land?” until finally all at once, as if thought had fused with
thought and word with word, all cried with one voice, as if a signal had
been given: “Dombrowski!” All shouted together, all embraced one another;
the peasant and the Tatar count, the prince’s hat and the cross, the white
rose, the griffin, and the ship; they forgot everything, even the
Bernardine; they only sang and shouted: “Brandy, mead, wine!”
Father Robak listened to the song for a long time; finally he wanted to
cut it short. So he took in both hands his snuffbox, broke up the melody
with a sneeze; and, before they got together again, he hastened to speak
thus:—
“You praise my tobacco, my good friends; now see what is going on inside
the snuffbox.”
Here, wiping with his handkerchief the soiled base of the box, he showed
them a little painted army, like a swarm of flies: in the middle sat a man
on a charger, the size of a beetle, evidently the leader of the troop; he
had made his horse rear, as though he wanted to leap into the skies; one
hand he held on the bridle, the other up to his nose.
“Gaze,” said Robak, “at that threatening form, and guess whose it is.”
All looked with curiosity.
“That is a great man, an emperor, but not of the Muscovites; their tsars
have never used tobacco.”
“A great man,” cried Cydzik, “and in a long grey coat? I thought that
great men wore gold, for among the Muscovites any sort of a general, sir,
fairly shines with gold, like a pike in saffron.”
“Bah!” interrupted Rymsza; “why, in my youth I saw Kosciuszko, the chief
of our nation: he was a great man, but he wore a Cracow peasant’s coat,
that is to say, a _czamara_.”
“Much he wore a _czamara_!” retorted Wilbik. “They used to call it a
_taratatka_.”82
“But the _taratatka_ has fringe,” shouted Mickiewicz, “and the other is
entirely plain.”
Thereupon there arose disputes over the various forms of the _taratatka_
and the _czamara_.
The ingenious Robak, seeing that the conversation was thus becoming
scattered, undertook again to gather it to a focus—to his snuffbox: he
treated them, they sneezed and wished one another good health; he
continued his speech:— “When the Emperor Napoleon in an engagement takes
snuff time after time, it is a sure sign that he is winning the battle.
For example, at Austerlitz: the French just stood beside their cannon, and
on them charged a host of Muscovites. The Emperor gazed and held his
peace; whenever the French shot, the Muscovites were simply mowed down by
regiments like grass. Regiment after regiment galloped on and fell from
the saddle; whenever a regiment fell, the Emperor took a pinch of snuff,
until finally Alexander with his little brother Constantine and the German
Emperor Francis fled from the field. So the Emperor, seeing that the fight
was over, gazed at them, laughed, and dusted his fingers. And now if any
of you gentlemen who are present here ever serves in the army of the
Emperor, let him remember this.”
“Ah! my dear Monk!” cried Skoluba, “when will that be? Why, on every
holiday set down in the calendar they prophesy to us that the French are
coming, A man looks and looks until his eyes are weary, but the Muscovite
keeps on holding us by the neck as he always has. I fear that before the
sun rises the dew will ruin our eyes.”
“Sir, it is womanish to complain,” said the Bernardine, “and a Jewish
trick to wait with folded hands until some one rides up to the tavern and
knocks on the door. With Napoleon it is not so hard to beat the
Muscovites; he has already three times thrashed the hide of the Suabians,
he has trodden down the nasty Prussians, and has cast back the English
straight across the sea: surely he will be equal to the Muscovites. But,
my dear sir, do you know what will be the result? The gentry of Lithuania
will mount their steeds and seize their sabres, but not until there is no
longer any enemy with whom to fight. Napoleon, after crushing everybody
alone, will finally say: ‘I can get along without you: who are you?’ So it
is not enough to await a guest, not enough even to invite him in; one
needs to gather the servants and set up the tables; and before the banquet
one must clean the house of dirt; clean the house, I repeat; clean the
house, my boys!”
A silence followed, and then voices in the throng:—
“How clean our house? What do you mean by that? We will do everything for
you, we are ready for anything; only, my dear Father, pray explain
yourself more clearly.”
The Monk glanced out of the window, interrupting the conversation; he
noticed something peculiar, and put his head out of the window. In a
moment he said, rising:—
“To-day we have no time, later we will talk together more at length.
To-morrow I shall be in the district town on business, and on the way I
will call on you gentlemen to gather alms.”
“Then call at Niehrymow to spend the night,” said the Steward; “the Ensign
will be glad to see you, sir. An old Lithuanian proverb says: ‘As lucky a
man as an alms-gatherer in Niehrymow.’ ”
“And be good enough to visit us,” said Zubkowski. “You will get a
half-piece of linen, a firkin of butter, a sheep or a cow. Remember these
words, sir: ‘A man is lucky if he strikes it as rich as a monk in
Zubkow.’ ”
“And on us,” said Skoluba; “and on us,” added Terajewicz; “no Bernardine
ever departed hungry from Pucewicze.”
Thus all the gentry said good-bye to the Monk with prayers and promises;
he was already the other side of the door.
Through the window he had caught sight of Thaddeus flying along the
highway, at full gallop, without his hat, with head bent forward, and with
a pale, gloomy face, continually whipping and spurring on his horse. This
sight greatly disturbed the Bernardine; so he hastened with quick steps
after the young man, towards the great forest, which, as far as the eye
could reach, showed black along the entire horizon.
Who has explored the deep abysses of the Lithuanian forests up to the very
centre, the kernel of the thicket? A fisherman is scarcely acquainted with
the bottom of the sea close to the shore; a huntsman skirts around the bed
of the Lithuanian forests; he knows them barely on the surface, their form
and face, but the inner secrets of their heart are a mystery to him; only
rumour or fable knows what goes on within them. For, when you have passed
the woods and the dense, tangled thickets, in the depths you come upon a
great rampart of stumps, logs, and roots, defended by a quagmire, a
thousand streams, and a net of overgrown weeds and ant-hills, nests of
wasps and hornets, and coils of serpents. If by some superhuman valour you
surmount even these barriers, farther on you will meet with still greater
danger. At each step there lie in wait for you, like the dens of wolves,
little lakes, half overgrown with grass, so deep that men cannot find
their bottom; in them it is very probable that devils dwell. The water of
these wells is iridescent, spotted with a bloody rust, and from within
continually rises a steam that breathes forth a nasty odour, from which
the trees around lose their bark and leaves; bald, dwarfed, wormlike, and
sick, hanging their branches knotted together with moss, and with humped
trunks bearded with filthy fungi, they sit around the water, like a group
of witches warming themselves around a kettle in which they are boiling a
corpse.
Beyond these pools it is vain to try to penetrate even with the eye, to
say nothing of one’s steps, for there all is covered with a misty cloud
that rises incessantly from quivering morasses. But finally behind this
mist (so runs the common rumour) extends a very fair and fertile region,
the main capital of the kingdom of beasts and plants. In it are gathered
the seeds of all trees and herbs, from which their varieties spread abroad
throughout the world; in it, as in Noah’s ark, of all the kinds of beasts
there is preserved at least one pair for breeding. In the very centre, we
are told, the ancient buffalo and the bison and the bear, the emperors of
the forest, hold their court. Around them, on trees, nest the swift lynx
and the greedy wolverene, as watchful ministers; but farther on, as
subordinate, noble vassals, dwell wild boars, wolves, and horned elks.
Above their heads are the falcons and wild eagles, who live from the
lords’ tables, as court parasites. These chief and patriarchal pairs of
beasts, hidden in the kernel of the forest, invisible to the world, send
their children beyond the confines of the wood as colonists, but
themselves in their capital enjoy repose; they never perish by cut or by
shot, but when old die by a natural death. They have likewise their
graveyard, where, when near to death, the birds lay their feathers and the
quadrupeds their fur. The bear, when with his blunted teeth he cannot chew
his food; the decrepit stag, when he can scarcely move his legs; the
venerable hare, when his blood already thickens in his veins; the raven,
when he grows grey, and the falcon, when he grows blind; the eagle, when
his old beak is bent into such a bow that it is shut for ever and provides
no nourishment for his throat;83 all go to the graveyard. Even a lesser
beast, when wounded or sick, runs to die in the land of its fathers. Hence
in the accessible places, to which man resorts, there are never found the
bones of dead animals.84 It is said that there in the capital the beasts
lead a well-ordered life, for they govern themselves; not yet corrupted by
human civilisation, they know no rights of property, which embroil our
world; they know neither duels nor the art of war. As their fathers lived
in paradise, so their descendants live to-day, wild and tame alike, in
love and harmony; never does one bite or butt another. Even if a man
should enter there, though unarmed, he would pass in peace through the
midst of the beasts; they would gaze on him with the same look of
amazement with which on that last, sixth day of creation their first
fathers, who dwelt in the Garden of Eden, gazed upon Adam, before they
quarrelled with him. Happily no man wanders into this enclosure, for Toil
and Terror and Death forbid him access.
Only sometimes hounds, furious in pursuit, entering incautiously among
these mossy swamps and pits, overwhelmed by the sight of the horrors
within them, flee away, whining, with looks of terror; and long after,
though petted by their master’s hand, they still tremble at his feet,
possessed by fright. These ancient hidden places of the forests, unknown
to men, are called in hunter’s language _jungles_.
Stupid bear! If thou hadst abode in the jungle, never would the Seneschal
have learned of thee; but, whether the fragrance of the honeycomb lured
thee, or thou feltest too great a longing for ripe oats, thou earnest out
to the edge of the forest, where the trees were less dense, and there at
once the forester detected thy presence, and at once sent forth beaters,
clever spies, to learn where thou wast feeding and where thou hadst thy
lair by night. Now the Seneschal with his beaters, extending his lines
between thee and the jungle, cuts off thy retreat.
Thaddeus learned that no short time had already passed since the hounds
had entered into the abyss of the forest.
All is quiet—in vain the hunters strain their ears; in vain, as to the
most curious discourse, each hearkens to the silence, and waits long in
his position without moving; only the music of the forest plays to them
from afar. The dogs dive through the forest as loons beneath the sea; but
the sportsmen, turning their double-barrelled muskets towards the wood,
gaze on the Seneschal. He kneels, and questions the earth with his ear. As
in the face of a physician the eyes of friends read the sentence of life
or death for one who is dear to them, so the sportsmen, confident in the
Seneschal’s skill and training, fix upon him glances of hope and terror.
“They are on the track!” he said in a low voice, and rose to his feet. He
had heard it! They were still listening—finally they too hear; one dog
yelps, then two, twenty, all the hounds at once in a scattered pack catch
the scent and whine; they have struck the trail and howl and bay. This is
not the slow baying of dogs that chase a hare, a fox, or a deer, but a
constant, sharp yelp, quick, broken, and furious. So the hounds have
struck no distant trail, the beast is before their eyes—suddenly the cry
of the pursuit stops, they have reached the beast—again there is yelping
and snarling—the beast is defending himself, and is undoubtedly maiming
some of them; amid the baying of the hounds one hears more and more often
the howl of a dying dog.
The hunters stood still, and each of them, with his gun ready, bent
forward like a bow with his head thrust into the forest; they could wait
no longer! Already one after another left his station and crowded into the
thicket; each wished to be the first to meet the beast; though the
Seneschal kept cautioning them, though the Seneschal rode to each station
on his horse, crying that whoever should leave his place, be he simple
peasant or gentleman’s son, should get the lash upon his back. There
was-no help for it! All, against orders, ran into the wood. three guns
sounded at once, then a continual cannonade, until, louder than the
reports, the bear roared and filled with echoes all the forest. A dreadful
roar, of pain, fury, and despair! After it the yelping of the dogs, the
cries of the sportsmen, the horns of the beaters thundered from the centre
of the thicket. Some hunters hasten into the forest, others cock their
guns, and all rejoice. Only the Seneschal in grief cries that they have
missed him. The sportsmen and the beaters had all gone to the same side,
between the toils and the forest, to cut off the beast; but the bear,
frightened by the throng of dogs and men, turned back into places less
carefully guarded, towards the fields, whence the sportsmen set to guard
them had departed, where of the many ranks of hunters there remained only
the Seneschal, Thaddeus, the Count, and a few beaters.
Here the wood was thinner; from within could be heard a roaring, and the
crackling of breaking boughs, until finally the bear darted from the dense
forest like a thunderbolt from the clouds. From all sides the dogs were
chasing him, terrifying him, tearing him, until at last he rose on his
hind legs and looked around, frightening his enemies with a roar; with his
fore paws he tore up now the roots of a tree, now charred stumps, now
stones that had grown into the earth, hurling them at dogs and men;
finally he broke down a tree, and brandishing it like a club to the right
and the left, he rushed straight at the last guardians of the line of
beaters, at the Count and Thaddeus. They stood their ground unafraid, and
levelled the barrels of their muskets at the beast, like two
lightning-rods at the bosom of a dark cloud; then both at once pulled
their triggers (inexperienced lads!) and the guns thundered together: they
missed. The bear leapt towards them; they seized with four hands a pike
that had been stuck in the earth, and each pulled it towards him; they
gazed at the bear till two rows of tusks glittered from a great red mouth,
and a paw armed with claws was already descending on their brows. They
turned pale, jumped back, and slipped away to where the trees were less
dense. The beast reared up behind them, already he was making a slash with
his claws; but he missed, ran on, reared up again aloft, and with his
black paw aimed at the Count’s yellow hair. He would have torn his skull
from his brains as a hat from the head, but just then the Assessor and the
Notary jumped out from either side, and Gerwazy came running up some
hundred paces away in front, and after him Robak, though without a gun—and
the three shot together at the same instant. as though at a word of
command. The bear leapt into the air. like a hare before the hounds, came
down upon his head, and turning a somersault with his four paws, and
throwing the bloody weight of his huge body right under the Count, hurled
him from his feet to the earth; he still roared, and tried to rise, when
the furious Strapczyna and the ferocious Sprawnik descended on him.
Then the Seneschal seized his buffalo horn, which hung by a strap, long,
spotted, and crooked as a boa constrictor, and with both hands pressed it
to his lips. He blew up his cheeks like a balloon, his eyes became
bloodshot, he half-lowered his eyelids, drew his belly into half its size,
sending thence into his lungs his entire supply of breath, and began to
play. The horn, like a cyclone with a whirling breath, bore the music into
the forest and an echo repeated it. The sportsmen became silent, the
hunters were amazed by the power, purity, and marvellous harmony of the
notes. The old man was once more exhibiting before an audience of huntsmen
all that art for which he had once been famous in the forests; straightway
he filled and made alive the woods and groves as though he had led into
them a whole kennel and had begun the hunt. For in the playing there was a
short history of the hunt. First there was a ringing, brisk summons—that
was the morning call; then yelp upon yelp whined forth—that was the baying
of the dogs; and here and there was a harsher tone like thunder—that was
the shooting.
Here he broke off, but he still held the horn. It seemed to all that the
Seneschal was still playing on, but that was the echo playing.
He began once more. You might think that the horn was changing its form,
and that in the Seneschal’s lips it grew now thicker and now thinner,
imitating the cries of animals; once, prolonging itself into a wolf’s
neck, it howled long and piercingly; again, as if broadening into a bear’s
throat, it roared; then the bellowing of a bison cut the wind.
Here he broke off, but he still held the horn. It seemed to all that the
Seneschal was still playing on, but that was the echo playing. Hearing
this masterpiece of horn music, the oaks repeated it to the oaks and the
beeches to the beeches.
He blew again. In the horn there seemed to be a hundred horns; one could
hear mingled outcries of setting on the dogs, wrath and terror of the
hunters, the pack, and the beasts: finally the Seneschal raised his horn
aloft, and a hymn of triumph smote the clouds.
Here he broke off, but he still held the horn. It seemed to all that the
Seneschal was still playing on, but that was the echo playing. In the wood
there seemed to be a horn for every tree; one repeated the song to
another, as though it spread from choir to choir. And the music went on,
ever broader, ever farther, ever more gentle, and ever more pure and
perfect, until it died away somewhere far off, somewhere on the threshold
of the heavens!
The Seneschal, taking both hands from the horn, spread them out like a
cross; the horn fell, and swung on his leather belt. The Seneschal, his
face swollen and shining, and his eyes uplifted, stood as if inspired,
catching with his ear the last expiring tones. But meanwhile thousands of
plaudits thundered forth, thousands of congratulations and shouts of
vivat.
They gradually became quiet, and the eyes of the throng were turned on the
huge, fresh corpse of the bear. He lay besprinkled with blood and pierced
with bullets; his breast was plunged into the thick, matted grass; his
paws were spread out before him like a cross; he still breathed, but he
poured forth a stream of blood through his nostrils; his eyes were still
open, but he did not move his head. The Chamberlain’s bulldogs held him
beneath the ears; on the left side hung Strapczyna; on the right Sprawnik,
choking his throat, sucked out the black blood.
Thereupon the Seneschal bade place an iron bar between the teeth of the
dogs, and thus open their jaws. With the butts of their guns they turned
the remains of the beast on its back, and again a triple vivat smote the
clouds.
“Well?” cried the Assessor, flourishing the barrel of his musket; “well?
how about my little gun? It aims high, does it! Well? how about my little
gun? It is not a large birdie,85 but what a showing it made! That is no
new thing for it either; it never wastes a charge upon the air. It was a
present to me from Prince Sanguszko.”
Here he showed a musket which, though small, was of marvellous
workmanship, and began to enumerate its virtues.
“I was running,” interrupted the Notary, wiping the sweat from his brow,
“I was running right after the bear; but the Seneschal called out, ‘Stay
in your places!’ How could I stay there; the bear was making full speed
for the fields, like a hare, farther and farther; finally I lost my breath
and had no hope of catching up; then I looked to the right: he was
standing right there, and the trees were not dense. When I aimed at him, I
thought, ‘Hold on, Bruin!’ and sure enough, there he lies dead. It’s a
fine gun, a real Sagalas; there is the inscription, _Sagalas, London à
Balabanowka_.” (A famous Polish smith lived there, who made Polish guns,
but decorated them in English fashion.)
“How’s that?” snorted the Assessor, “in the name of a thousand bears! The
idea of your killing it! What rubbish are you talking?”
“Listen,” replied the Notary, “this is no court investigation; this is a
hunting party; we will summon all as witnesses.”
So a furious brawl arose in the company, some taking the side of the
Assessor and some that of the Notary. No one remembered about Gerwazy, for
all had run in from the sides, and had not noticed what was going on in
front. The Seneschal took the floor:—
“Now at all events there is some reason for a quarrel, for this,
gentlemen, is no worthless rabbit; this is a bear: here one need have no
compunctions about seeking satisfaction, whether it be with the sabre or
even with pistols. It is hard to reconcile your dispute, so according to
the ancient custom we give you our permission for a duel. I remember that
in my time there lived two neighbours, both worthy gentlemen, and of long
descent; they dwelt on opposite sides of the river Wilejka; one was named
Domejko and the other Dowejko.86 They both shot at the same time at a
she-bear; which killed it it was hard to ascertain, and they had a
terrible quarrel, and swore to shoot at each other over the hide of the
bear: that was in true gentleman’s style, almost barrel to barrel. This
duel made a great stir, and in those days they sang songs about it. I was
their second; how everything came to pass—I will tell you the whole story
from the beginning.”
Before the Seneschal began to speak, Gerwazy had settled the dispute. He
walked attentively around the bear; finally he drew his hanger, cut the
snout in two, and in the rear of the head, opening the layers of the
brain, he found the bullet. He took it out, wiped it on his coat, measured
it with a cartridge, applied it to the barrel of his flintlock, and then
said, raising his palm with the bullet resting upon it:—
“Gentlemen, this bullet is not from either of your weapons; it came from
this single-barrelled Horeszko carbine.” (Here he raised an old flintlock,
tied up with strings.) “But I did not shoot it. O, how much daring was
needed then! it is terrible to remember it; my eyes grew dark! For both
the young gentlemen were running straight towards me, and behind them was
the bear—just, just above the head of the Count, the last of the
Horeszkos, though in the female line! ‘Jesus Maria!’ I exclaimed, and the
angels of the Lord sent to my aid the Bernardine Monk. He put us all to
shame; O, he is a glorious monk! While I trembled, while I dared not touch
the trigger, he snatched the musket from my hands, aimed, and fired. To
shoot between two heads! at a hundred paces! and not to miss! and in the
very centre of his jaw! to knock out his teeth so! Gentlemen, long have I
lived, and but one man have I seen who could boast himself such a
marksman: that man once famous among us for so many duels, who used to
shoot out the heels from under women’s shoes, that scoundrel of
scoundrels, renowned in memorable times, that Jacek, commonly called
Mustachio; his surname I will not mention. But now it is no time for him
to be hunting bears; that ruffian is certainly buried in Hell up to his
very mustaches. Glory to the Monk, he has saved the lives of two men, and
perhaps of three. Gerwazy will not boast, but if the last child of the
Horeszkos’ blood had fallen into the jaws of the beast, I should no longer
be in this world, and perhaps the bear would have gnawed clean my old
bones. Come, Father Monk, let us drink your good health!”
In vain they searched for the Monk: all that they could discover was that
after the killing of the beast he had appeared for a moment, had leapt
towards the Count and Thaddeus, and, seeing that both were safe and sound,
had raised his eyes to Heaven, quietly repeated a prayer, and had run
quickly into the field, as though some one were chasing him.
Meanwhile at the Seneschal’s bidding they had thrown into a heap bundles
of heather, dry brushwood, and logs; the fire burst forth, and a grey pine
tree of smoke grew up and spread out aloft like a canopy. Over the flame
they joined pikes into a tripod; on the spears they hung big-bellied
kettles; from the waggons they brought vegetables, meal, roast meats, and
bread.
The Judge opened a locked liquor case, in which there could be seen rows
of white necks of bottles; from among them he took the largest crystal
decanter—this the Judge had received as a gift from the Monk, Robak. It
was Dantzic brandy, a drink dear to a Pole. “Long live Dantzic!” cried the
Judge, raising the flask on high; “the city once was ours, and it will be
ours again!” And he filled each glass with the silvery liquor, until at
last it began to drip golden and glitter in the sun.87
In the kettles they were cooking _bigos_.88 In words it is hard to express
the wonderful taste and colour of bigos and its marvellous odour; in a
description of it one hears only the clinking words and the regular rimes,
but no city stomach can understand their content. In order to appreciate
Lithuanian songs and dishes, one must have health, must live in the
country, and must be returning from a hunting party.
However, even without these sauces, bigos is no ordinary dish, for it is
artistically composed of good vegetables. The foundation of it is sliced,
sour cabbage, which, as the saying is, goes into the mouth of itself;
this, enclosed in a kettle, covers with its moist bosom the best parts of
selected meat, and is parboiled, until the fire extracts from it all the
living juices, and until the fluid boils over the edge of the pot, and the
very air around is fragrant with the aroma.
The bigos was soon ready. The huntsmen with a thrice-repeated vivat, armed
with spoons, ran up and assailed the kettle; the copper rang, the vapour
burst forth, the bigos evaporated like camphor, it vanished and flew away;
only in the jaws of the caldrons the steam still seethed, as in the
craters of extinct volcanoes.
When they had eaten and drunk their fill, they put the beast on a waggon,
and themselves mounted their steeds. All were gay and talkative, except
the Assessor and the Notary, who were more testy than the day before,
quarrelling over the merits of that Sanguszko gun and that Sagalas musket
from Balabanowka. The Count and Thaddeus also rode on in no merry mood,
being ashamed that they had missed and had retreated; for in Lithuania
whoever lets a bear get through the circle of beaters must toil long
before he repairs his fame.
The Count said that he had reached the pike first, and that Thaddeus had
hindered him from encountering the beast; Thaddeus maintained that, being
the stronger, and the more skilful in work with a heavy pike, he had
wished to relieve the Count of the trouble. Such nipping words they said
to each other, now and again, in the midst of the cries and uproar of the
train.
The Seneschal was riding in the middle; the worthy old man was merry
beyond his wont and very talkative. Wishing to amuse the quarrelsome
hunters and to bring them to an agreement, for their benefit he concluded
his story of Dowejko and Domejko:—
“Assessor, if I wanted you to fight a duel with the Notary, don’t think
that I thirst for human blood; God forbid! I wanted to amuse you, I
wanted, so to speak, to arrange a comedy for you, to renew a conceit that
I invented forty years ago, a splendid one! You are younger men, and do
not remember about it, but in my time it was famous from this forest to
the woods of Polesie.
“All the animosities of Domejko and Dowejko proceeded, strange to say,
from the very unfortunate similarity of their names. For when, at the time
of the district diets,89 the friends of Dowejko were recruiting partisans,
some one would whisper to a gentleman, ‘Give your vote to Dowejko’; but
he, not hearing quite correctly, would give his vote to Domejko. Once
when, at a banquet, the Marshal Rupejko proposed a toast, ‘Vivat Dowejko,’
others shouted ‘Domejko’; and the guests sitting in the middle did not
know what to do, especially considering one’s indistinct speech at dinner
time.
“That was not the worst: once a certain drunken squire had a sword fight
in Wilno with Domejko and received two wounds; later that squire,
returning home from Wilno, by a strange chance took the same boat as
Dowejko. So, when they were journeying along the Wilejka in the same boat,
and he asked his neighbour who he was, the reply was ‘Dowejko.’ Without
further ado he drew his blade from under his winter coat; slash, slash,
and on Domejko’s account he cut off the mustache of Dowejko.
“Finally, as the last straw, it must needs be that on a hunting party
things happened thus. The two men of the name were standing near each
other, and both shot at the same time at the same she-bear. To be sure,
immediately after their shots it did fall lifeless, but before that it had
been carrying a dozen bullets in its belly. Many persons had guns of the
same calibre. Who killed the bear? Try to find out! How can you tell?
“Here they shouted: ‘Enough! We must end this matter once for all. Whether
God or the devil united us, we must separate; two of us, like two suns,
seem to be too much for one world.’ And so they drew their sabres and took
their positions. Both were worthy men; the more the other gentry tried to
reconcile them, the more furiously they let fly at each other. They
changed their arms; from sabres they passed to pistols; they took their
positions, we cried that they had put the barriers too near together.
They, to spite us, swore to shoot over the skin of the bear, sure death!
almost barrel to barrel; both were fine shots. ‘Let Hreczecha be our
second.’ ‘All right,’ I said, ‘let the sexton dig a hole at once, for such
a dispute cannot end without results. But fight like gentlemen, and not
like butchers. It is well enough to shorten the distance, I see that you
are bold fellows; but do you want to shoot with your pistols on each
other’s bellies? I will not permit it; I agree to pistols, but you shall
shoot from a distance neither longer nor shorter than across the bear’s
hide; with my own hands as second I will stretch the hide of the bear on
the ground, and I myself will station you. You shall stand on one side, at
the end of the snout, and you at the tail.’—‘Agreed,’ they shouted; ‘the
time?’—‘To-morrow.’—‘The place?’—‘The Usza tavern.’—They parted. But I set
to reading Virgil.”
Here the Seneschal was interrupted by a cry of “At him!” Right from under
the horses a hare had darted out; first Bobtail and then Falcon started
after it. They had taken the greyhounds to the hunt, knowing that as they
returned through the fields they might very likely happen on a rabbit.
They were walking without leashes alongside the horses; when they caught
sight of the hare, before the hunters could urge them on they started
after it. The Notary and the Assessor wanted to follow on horseback, but
the Seneschal checked them, saying; “Hold! stand and watch! I will not
permit a person to stir from the spot. From here we can all see well how
the hare runs for the field.” In very truth, the hare felt behind it the
hunters and the pack; it was making for the field; it stretched out behind
it its ears like two deer’s horns; it showed like a long grey streak
extended above the ploughed land; beneath it its legs stuck out like four
rods; you would have said that it did not move them, but only tapped the
earth on the surface, like a swallow kissing the water. Behind it was
dust, behind the dust the dogs; from a distance it seemed that the hare,
the dust, and the dogs blended into one body, as though some great serpent
were winding over the plain; the hare was the head, the dust in the rear
was like a dark blue neck, and the dogs seemed to form a restless double
tail.
The Notary and the Assessor gazed with open mouths, and held their breath.
Suddenly the Notary grew pale as a handkerchief; the Assessor grew pale
too: they saw—something fatal was happening; the farther that serpent
went, the longer it became; it was already breaking in half; already that
neck of dust had vanished; the head was already near the wood, and the
tails somewhere behind! The head disappeared; for one last instant some
one seemed to wave a tassel; it was lost in the wood, and near the wood
the tail broke up.
The poor dogs ran bewildered along the border; they seemed to offer each
other mutual advice and accusations. Finally they came back, slowly
bounding over the furrows, with drooping ears and tails between their
legs; and, running up, for very shame they did not dare to lift their
eyes; and, instead of going to their masters, they stopped on one side.
The Notary drooped his gloomy brow towards his breast; the Assessor
glanced around, but in no merry mood. Then they began to explain to the
audience how their greyhounds were not used to going without leashes, how
the hare had started out suddenly, how it was a poor chase over the
ploughed field, where the dogs ought to have had boots, it was all so
covered with flints and sharp stones.
They learnedly elucidated the matter, as experienced masters of hounds;
from their words the hunters might have profited greatly, but they did not
listen attentively; some began to whistle, others to titter; others,
remembering the bear, talked about that, being still occupied by the
recent hunt.
The Seneschal had hardly once glanced at the hare: seeing that it had
escaped, he indifferently turned his head and finished his interrupted
discourse:—
“Where did I stop? Aha, at my making them both promise that they would
shoot across the bear skin! The gentlemen cried out: ‘That is sure death,
almost barrel to barrel!’ But I laughed to myself, for my friend Maro had
taught me that the skin of a beast is no ordinary measure. You know, my
friends, how Queen Dido sailed to Libya, and there with great trouble
managed to buy a morsel of land, such as could be covered with a bull’s
hide.90 On that tiny morsel of land arose Carthage! So I thought that over
attentively by night.
“Hardly was day dawning, when from one side came Dowejko in a gig, and
from the other Domejko on horseback. They beheld that over the river
stretched a shaggy bridge, a girdle of bear skin cut into strips. I
stationed Dowejko at the tail of the beast on one side, and Domejko on the
other side. ‘Now blaze away,’ I said, ‘for all your lives if you choose,
but I won’t let you go until you are friends again.’ They got furious, but
then the gentry present fairly rolled on the ground for laughter; and the
priest and I with impressive words set to giving them lessons from the
Gospel and from the Statutes. There was no help for it; they laughed and
had to be reconciled.
“Their quarrel turned later into a lifelong friendship, and Dowejko
married the sister of Domejko; Domejko espoused the sister of his
brother-in-law, Panna Dowejko: they divided their property into two equal
portions, and on the spot where so strange an occurrence had happened they
built a tavern, and called it the Little Bear.”