ST. PETERSBURG, _May_ 2, 1840.
Hurrah! Thanks, Marya Alexandrovna, thanks! You are a very kind and
indulgent creature.
I will begin according to my promise to talk about myself, and I shall
talk with a relish approaching to appetite.... That's just it. Of
anything in the world one may speak with fire, with enthusiasm, with
ecstasy, but with appetite one talks only of oneself.
Let me tell you, during the last few days a very strange experience has
befallen me. I have for the first time taken an all-round view of my
past. You understand me. Every one of us often recalls what is
over--with regret, or vexation, or simply from nothing to do. But to
bend a cold, clear gaze over all one's past life--as a traveller turns
and looks from a high mountain on the plain he has passed through--is
only possible at a certain age ... and a secret chill clutches at a
man's heart when it happens to him for the first time. Mine, anyway,
felt a sick pang. While we are young, _such_ an all-round view is
impossible. But my youth is over, and, like one who has climbed on to a
mountain, everything lies clear before me.
Yes, my youth is gone, gone never to return!... Here it lies before me,
as it were in the palm of my hand.
A sorry spectacle! I will confess to you, Marya Alexandrovna, I am very
sorry for myself. My God! my God! Can it be that I have myself so
utterly ruined my life, so mercilessly embroiled and tortured
myself!... Now I have come to my senses, but it's too late. Has it ever
happened to you to save a fly from a spider? Has it? You remember, you
put it in the sun; its wings and legs were stuck together, glued....
How awkwardly it moved, how clumsily it attempted to get clear!...
After prolonged efforts, it somehow gets better, crawls, tries to open
its wings ... but there is no more frolicking for it, no more
light-hearted buzzing in the sunshine, as before, when it was flying
through the open window into the cool room and out again, freely
winging its way into the hot air.... The fly, at least, fell through
none of its own doing into the dreadful web ... but I!