CHAPTER VIII

SEVENTH PERIOD, FROM PÚSHKIN TO THE WRITERS OF THE FORTIES.

Even Karamzín's vast influence on his contemporaries cannot be compared

with that exercised by Púshkin on the literature of the '20's and '30's

of the nineteenth century; and no Russian writer ever effected so mighty

a change in literature as Púshkin. Among other things, his influence

brought to life many powerful and original talents, which would not have

ventured to enter the literary career without Púshkin's friendly support

and encouragement. He was remarkably amiable in his relations with all

contemporary writers (except certain journalists in St. Petersburg and

Moscow), and treated with especial respect three poets of his day,

Délvig, Baratýnsky, and Yázykoff. He even exaggerated their merits,

exalting the work of the last two above his own, and attributing great

significance to Délvig's most insignificant poems and articles. Hence

their names have become so closely connected with his, that it is almost

impossible to mention him without mentioning them.

Baron Antón Antónovitch Délvig (1798-1831) the descendant of a Baltic

Provinces noble, was one of Púshkin's comrades in the Lyceum, and

published his first collection of poems in 1829.

Evgény Abrámovitch Baratýnsky (1800-1844) came of a noble family of good

standing. His poetry was founded on Byronism, like all European poetry

of that day, and was also partly under the influence of the fantastic

romanticism introduced by Zhukóvsky. He never developed beyond a point

which was reached by Púshkin in his early days in "The Prisoner of the

Caucasus," "The Gypsies," "The Fountain of Baktchesarái," and the first

chapters of "Evgény Onyégin." He wrote one very fine poem, devoted to

Finland.

Nikolái Mikháilovitch Yázykoff (1803-1846) was of noble birth, and

published a number of early poems in 1819. One of his best and longest,

published about 1836, was a dramatic tale of "The Fire Bird." Between

1837-1842 his "The Lighthouse," "Gastún," "Sea Bathing," "The Ship,"

"The Sea," and a whole series of elegies, are also very good. Yázykoff's

poetry is weaker and paler in coloring than Délvig's or Baratýnsky's,

yet richer than all of theirs in really incomparable outward form of the

verse, and in poetical expression of thought; in fact, he was "the poet

of expression," and rendered great service by his boldness and

originality of language, in that it taught men to write not as all

others wrote, but as it lay in their individual power to write; in other

words, he inculcated individuality in literature.

The only one of the many poets of Púshkin's epoch in Russia who did not

repeat and develop, in different keys, the themes of their master's

poetry, was Alexánder Sergyéevitch Griboyédoff (1795-1829). He alone was

independent, original, and was related to the Púshkin period as Krylóff

was to the Karamzín period--merely by the accident of time, not by the

contents of his work. Griboyédoff was the first of a series of Russian

poets who depicted life in absolutely faithful, but gloomy, colors; and

it was quite in keeping with this view, that he did not live to see in

print the comedy in which his well-earned fame rested, at the time, and

which still keeps it fresh, by performances on the stage at the present

day.

There was nothing very cheerful or bright about the social life of the

'20's in the nineteenth century to make Russian poets take anything but

a gloomy view of matters in general. Griboyédoff, as an unprejudiced

man, endowed with great poetical gifts, and remarkable powers of

observation, was able to give a faithful and wonderfully complete

picture of high life in Moscow of that day, in his famous comedy "Woe

from Wit" ("Góre ot Umá"), and introduce to the stage types which had

never, hitherto, appeared in Russian comedy, because no one had looked

deep enough into Russian hearts, or been capable of limning, impartially

and with fidelity to nature, the emptiness and vanity of the characters

and aims which preponderated in Russian society.

He was well born and very well educated. After serving in the army in

1812, like most patriotic young Russians of the day, he entered the

foreign office, in 1817. There he probably made the acquaintance of

Púshkin, but he never became intimate with him, as he belonged to a

different literary circle, which included actors and dramatic writers.

His first dramatic efforts were not very promising, though his first

comedy, "The Young Married Pair," was acted in St. Petersburg in 1816.

In 1819 he was offered the post of secretary of legation in Persia,

which he accepted; and this took him away from the gay and rather wild

society existence which he was leading, with bad results in many ways.

In Persia, despite his multifarious occupations, and his necessary study

of Oriental languages, Griboyédoff found time to plan his famous comedy

in 1821, and in 1822 he wrote it in Georgia, whither he had been

transferred. But he remodeled and rewrote portions of it, and it was

finished only in 1823, when he spent a year in Moscow, his native city.

When it was entirely ready for acting, he went to St. Petersburg, but

neither his most strenuous efforts, nor his influence in high quarters,

sufficed to secure the censor's permission for its performance on stage,

or to get the requisite license for printing it. But it circulated in

innumerable manuscript copies, and every one was in raptures over it.

Even the glory of Púshkin's "Evgény Onyégin," which appeared at about

the same time, did not overshadow Griboyédoff's glory. Strange to say,

Púshkin, who had magnified Délvig, Baratýnsky, and Yázykoff far above

their merits, and in general, was accustomed to overrate all talent,

whether it belonged to his own friends or to strangers, was extremely

severe on Griboyédoff's comedy, and detected many grave defects in it.

Griboyédoff was greatly irritated by his failure to obtain proper public

recognition of his comedy. He expressed his feelings freely, became more

embittered than ever against mankind in general, and went back to

Georgia, in 1825, where he added to his previous poems, and took part in

the campaign against Persia, in which he rendered great services to the

commander-in-chief. As a reward, he was sent to St. Petersburg (1828),

to present the treaty of peace to the Emperor. He was promptly appointed

minister plenipotentiary to Persia, and on his way thither, in Tiflís,

married a Georgian princess. His stern course of action and his

disregard of certain rooted Oriental customs aroused the priesthood and

the ignorant masses of Teheran against him, and a riot broke out. After

a heroic defense of the legation, all the Russians, including

Griboyédoff, were torn to pieces. His wife had been left behind in

Tabreez and escaped. She buried his remains at a monastery near Tiflís,

in accordance with a wish which he had previously expressed.

There is not much plot to "Woe from Wit." Moltchálin, Famúsoff's

secretary, a cold, calculating, fickle young man, has been making love

to Famúsoff's only child, an heiress, Sophia, an extremely sentimental

young person. Famúsoff rails against foreign books and fashions,

"destroyers of our pockets and our hearth," and lauds Colonel Skalozúb,

an elderly pretender to Sophia's hand, explaining the general servile

policy of obtaining rank and position by the Russian equivalent of

"pull," which is called "connections." He compares his with Tchátsky, to

the disadvantage of the latter, who had been brought up with Sophia, and

had been in love with her before his departure on his travels three

years previously, though he had never mentioned the fact. Tchátsky gives

rise to this diatribe by returning from his travels at this juncture,

asking for Sophia's hand, and trying to woo the girl herself with equal

unsuccess. Tchátsky's arraignment of the imitation of foreign customs

then everywhere prevalent, does not win favor from any one. Worse yet,

he expresses his opinion of Moltchálin; and Sophia, in revenge, drops a

hint that Tchátsky is crazy. The hint grows apace, and the cause is

surmised to be a bullet-wound in the head, received during a recent

campaign. Another "authority" contradicts this; it comes from drinking

champagne by the gobletful--no, by the bottle--no, by the case. But

Famúsoff settles the matter by declaring that it comes from knowing too

much. This takes place at an evening party at the Famúsoffs, and

Tchátsky returns to the room to meet with an amazing reception.

Eventually, he discovers that he is supposed to be mad, and that he is

indebted to Sophia for the origin of the lie; also, that she is making

rendezvous with the low-minded, flippant Moltchálin. At last Sophia

discovers that Moltchálin is making love to her maid through

inclination, and to her only through calculation. She casts him off, and

orders him out of the house. Tchátsky, cured of all illusions about her,

renounces his suit for her hand, and declares that he will leave Moscow

forever. Tchátsky, whose woe is due to his persistence in talking sense

and truth to people who do not care to hear it, and to his manly

independence all the way through, comes to grief through having too much

wit; hence the title.

Not one of Púshkin's successors, talented as many of them were, was able

to attain to the position of importance which the great poet had

rendered obligatory for future aspirants. It is worth noting that

Púshkin's best work, in his second, non-Byronic, purely national style,

enjoyed less success among his contemporaries than his early,

half-imitative efforts, where the characters were weak, lacking in

independent creation, and where the whole tone was gloomy. This gloomy

tone expressed the sentiments of all Russia of the period, and it was

natural that Byronic heroes should be in consonance with the general

taste. At this juncture, a highly talented poet arose, Mikháil

Yúrievitch Lérmontoff (1814-1841), who, after first imitating Púshkin,

speedily began to imitate Byron--and that with far more success than

Púshkin had ever done--with great delicacy and artistic application to

the local conditions. Thus, as a vivid, natural echo of this epoch in

Russian life, the poet became dear to the heart of Russians; and in the

'40's they regarded him as the equal of the writers they most loved.

Lérmontoff, the son of a poor but noble family, was reared by his

grandmother, as his mother died when he was a baby, and his father, an

army officer, could not care for him. The grandmother did her utmost to

give him the best education possible at that time, and to make him a

brilliant society man. The early foreign influence over Púshkin was, as

we have seen, French. That over Lérmontoff was rather English, which was

then becoming fashionable. But like many another young Russian of that

day, Lérmontoff wrote his first poems in French, imitating Púshkin's

"The Fountain of Baktchesarái" and Byron's "The Prisoner of Chillon." He

finished the preparatory school with the first prize for composition and

history, and entered the University, which he was soon compelled to

leave, in company with a number of others, because of a foolish prank

they had played on a professor. In those days, when every one was

engrossed in thoughts of military service and a career, and when the few

remaining paths which were open to a poor young man had thus been closed

to him, but one thing was left for him to do--enter the army.

Accordingly, in 1832, Lérmontoff entered the Ensigns' School in St.

Petersburg; but during his two years there he did not abandon

verse-making, and here he first began to imitate Byron. A couple of

poems, "Ismail Bey" (1832) and "Hadji Abrek" (1833) were published by a

comrade, without Lérmontoff's knowledge, at this time. In general, it

may be said of Lérmontoff at that period that he cared not in the least

for literary fame, and made no haste to publish his writings, as to

which he was very severe. Many were not published until five or six

years after they were written.

Soon after leaving the military school Lérmontoff wrote a drama, "The

Masquerade" (1834), and the fine poem, "Boyárin Órsha," but his fame

began only in 1837, with his splendid poem on the death of Púshkin, "The

Death of the Poet," beginning, "The poet perished, the slave of honor,"

in which he expressed his entire sympathy with the poet in his untimely

death, and poured out all his bitterness upon the circle which was

incapable of appreciating and prizing the genius. This, in a multitude

of manuscript copies, created a great sensation in St. Petersburg. Soon

afterwards, on hearing contradictory rumors as to the duel and Púshkin's

death, he added sixteen verses, beginning, "And you, ye arrogant

descendants." One of the prominent persons therein attacked having had

his attention called to the matter in public by an officious gossip (he

had probably known all about it before, and deliberately ignored the

matter), felt obliged to report Lérmontoff. The result was that

Lérmontoff was transferred as ensign to a dragoon regiment which was

serving in Georgia, and early in 1837 he set out for the Caucasus.

Through his grandmother's efforts he was permitted to return from the

Caucasus about eight months later, to a hussar regiment. By this time

people were beginning to appreciate him; he had written his magnificent

"Ballad of Tzar Iván Vasílievitch, the Young Lifeguardsman, and the Bold

Merchant Kaláshnikoff," which every one hailed as an entirely new

phenomenon in Russian literature, amazing in its highly artistic

pictures, full of power and dignity, combined with an exterior like that

of the inartistic productions of folk-poetry. This poem was productive

of all the more astonishment, because his "The Demon,"[13] written much

earlier (1825-1834), was little known. "The Demon" is poor in contents,

but surprisingly rich in wealth and luxury of coloring, and in the

endless variety of its pictures of Caucasian life and nature.

In 1838, while residing in St. Petersburg, Lérmontoff wrote little at

first, but in 1839 he wrote "Mtzyri," and a whole series of fine tales

in prose, which eventually appeared under the general title of "A Hero

of Our Times." This work, which has lost much of its vivid interest for

people of the present day, must remain, nevertheless, one of the most

important monuments of that period to which Lérmontoff so completely

belonged. In the person of the hero, Petchórin, he endeavored to present

"a portrait composed of the vices of the generation of which he was a

contemporary," and he "drew the man of the period as he understood him,

and as, unfortunately, he was too often met with." Lérmontoff admitted

that in Petchórin he had tried to point out the "malady" which had

attacked all Russian society of that day. All this he said in a preface

to the second edition, after people had begun to declare that in the

novel he had represented himself and his own experiences. Naturally

Petchórin was drawn on Byronic lines, in keeping with the spirit of the

'30's, when individuality loudly protested against the oppressive

conditions of life. Naturally, also, all this now appears to be a

caricature, true to the life of the highest Russian society as it was

when it was written. Before he had quite completed this work, in

February, 1840, Lérmontoff fought a duel with the son of Baron de

Barante, a well-known French historian, and was transferred, in

consequence, to an infantry regiment in the Caucasus, whither he betook

himself for the third time. A year later, after being permitted to make

a brief stay in St. Petersburg, he returned to the Caucasus, and three

months afterwards he was killed in a duel (on July 25, O. S., 1841) with

a fellow officer, Martýnoff, and was buried on the estate in the

government of Pénza, where he had been reared by his grandmother. The

latest work of the poet, thus cut off almost before his prime, consisted

of lyrics, which were full of power and perfection, and gave plain

promise of the approaching maturity of the still young and not fully

developed but immense talent.

His famous "Ballad of Tzar Iván Vasílievitch, the Young Lifeguardsman,

and the Bold Merchant Kaláshnikoff" must be given in a summary and

occasional quotations, as it is too long to reproduce in full. It lends

itself better to dignified and adequate reproduction than do his lyrics,

because it is not rhymed.[14] After a brief preface, the poet says: "We

have composed a ballad in the ancient style, and have sung it to the

sound of the dulcimer."

The red sun shineth not in the heaven,

The blue clouds delight not in it;

But at his banqueting board, in golden crown,

Sitteth the Terrible Tzar Iván Vasílievitch.

Behind him stand the table-deckers,

Opposite him all the boyárs and the princes,

At his side, all about, the lifeguardsmen;

And the Tzar feasteth to the glory of God,

To his own content and merriment.

The ballad goes on to relate how the Tzar then ordered the beakers to be

filled with wine from beyond the seas, and how all drank and lauded the

Tzar. One brave warrior, a gallant youth, did not dip his mustache in

the golden cup, but dropped his eyes, drooped his head, and meditated.

The Tzar frowned, rapped on the floor with his iron-tipped staff, and

finding that the young man still paid no heed, called him to account.

"Hey, there, our faithful servant Kiribyéevitch, art thou concealing

some dishonorable thought? Or art thou envious of our glory? Or hath our

honorable service wearied thee?" and he reproaches the youth. Then

Kiribyéevitch answered him, bowing to his girdle, begging the Tzar not

to reproach his unworthy servant, but if he has offended the Tzar, he

begs that the latter will order his head to be cut off. "It oppresseth

my heroic shoulders, and itself unto the damp earth doth incline." The

Tzar inquires why the lifeguardsman is sad. "Has his kaftan of gold

brocade grown threadbare? Has his cap of sables got shabby? Has he

exhausted his treasure? Has his well-tempered saber got nicked? Or has

some merchant's son from across the Moscow River overcome him in a

boxing match?" The young lifeguardsman shakes his curly head, and says

that all these things are as they should be, but that while he was

riding his mettlesome steed in the Trans-Moscow River quarter of the

town (the merchant's quarter), with his silken girdle drawn taut, his

velvet cap rimmed jauntily with black sables, fair young maidens had

stood at the board gates, gazing at him, admiring and whispering

together; but one there was who gazed not, admired not, but covered her

face with her striped veil, "and in all Holy Russia, our Mother, no such

beauty is to be found or searched out. She walketh swimmingly, as

though she were a young swan. She gazeth sweetly, as though she were a

dove. When she uttereth a word, 'tis like a nightingale warbling. Her

cheeks are aflame with roses, like unto the dawn in God's heaven. Her

tresses of ruddy gold, intertwined with bright ribbons, flow rippling

down her shoulders, and kiss her white bosom. She was born in a

merchant's family. Her name is Alyóna[15] Dmítrievna."

He describes how he has fallen in love with her at first sight, and

cares no more for anything in all the world save her, and begs that he

may be sent away to the steppes along the Volga, to live a free kazák

life, where he may lay his "turbulent head" on a Mussulman's spear (in

the fights with the Tatars of Kazán is what is meant), where the

vultures may claw out his tearful eyes, and his gray bones be washed by

the rain, and his wretched dust, without burial, may be scattered to the

four quarters of the compass. Tzar Iván Vasílievitch laughs, advises him

to send gifts to his Alyóna, and celebrate the wedding. The

lifeguardsman then confesses that he has not told the whole truth; that

the beauty is already the wife of a young merchant.

In Part II., the young merchant is represented as seated at his

shop-board, a stately, dashing young fellow, Stepán Paramónovitch

Kaláshnikoff, spreading out his silken wares, beguiling his patrons (or

"guests") with flattering speech, counting out gold and silver. But it

is one of his bad days; the wealthy lords pass and do not so much as

glance at his shop. "The bells of the holy churches have finished

chiming for Vespers. The cloudy glow of evening burneth behind the

Kremlin. Little clouds are flitting athwart the sky. The great Gostíny

Dvor[16] is empty." And Stepán Paramónovitch locks the oaken door of his

shop with a German (that is, a foreign) spring-lock, fastens the fierce,

snarling dog to the iron chain, and goes thoughtfully home to his young

housewife beyond the Moscow River. On arriving there he is surprised

that his wife does not come to meet him, as is her wont. The oaken table

is not set, the taper before the _ikóna_ (the holy picture) is almost

burned out. He summons the old maid-servant and asks where his wife is

at that late hour, and what has become of his children? The servant

replies that his wife went to Vespers as usual, but the priest and his

wife have already sat down to sup, yet the young housewife has not

returned, and his little children are neither playing nor in bed, but

weeping bitterly. As young Merchant Kaláshnikoff then looks out into the

gloomy street he sees that the night is very dark, snow is falling,

covering up men's tracks, and he hears the outer door slam, then hasty

footsteps approaching, turns round and beholds his young wife, pale,

with hair uncovered (which is highly improper for a married woman), her

chestnut locks unbraided, sprinkled with snow and hoarfrost, her eyes

dull and wild, her lips muttering unintelligibly. The husband inquires

where she has been, the reason for her condition, and threatens to lock

her up behind an iron-bound oaken door, away from the light of day. She,

weeping bitterly, begs her "lord, her fair little red sun," to slay her

or to listen to her, and she explains, that as she was coming home from

Vespers she heard the snow crunching behind her, glanced round, and

beheld a man running. She covered herself with her veil, but the man

seized her hands, bade her have no fear, and said that he was no robber,

but the servant of the Terrible[17] Tzar, Kiribyéevitch, from the famous

family of Maliúta, promised her her heart's desire--gold, pearls, bright

gems, flowered brocades--if she would but love him, and grant him one

embrace. Then he caressed and kissed her, so that her cheeks are still

burning, while the neighbors looked on, laughed, and pointed their

fingers at her in scorn. Tearing herself from his hands, she fled

homewards, leaving in his hands her flowered kerchief (her husband's

gift) and her Bokhará veil. She entreats her husband not to give her

over to the scorn of their neighbors, she is an orphan, her elder

brother is in a foreign land, her younger brother still a mere child.

Stepán Paramónovitch thereupon sends for his two younger brothers, but

they send back a demand to know what has happened that he should require

their presence on a dark, cold night. He informs them that

Kiribyéevitch, the lifeguardsman, has dishonored their family; that such

an insult the soul cannot brook, neither a brave man's heart endure. On

the morrow there is to be a fight with fists in the presence of the Tzar

himself, and it is his intention to go to it, and stand up against that

lifeguardsman and fight him to the death until his strength is gone. He

asks them, in case he is killed, to step forth for "Holy Mother right,"

and as they are younger than he, fresher in strength, and with fewer

sins on their heads, perchance the Lord will show mercy upon them. And

this reply his brethren spake: "Whither the breeze bloweth beneath the

sky, thither hasten the dutiful little clouds. When the dark blue eagle

summoneth with his voice to the bloody vale of slaughter, summoneth to

celebrate the feast, to clear away the dead, to him do the little

eaglets wing their flight. Thou art our elder brother, our second

father, do what thou see'st fit, and deemest best, and we will not fail

thee, our own blood and bone."

Part III. picturesquely and vividly describes the scene of the

encounter; the challenge to the combatants to stand forth, by command of

the Tzar, with a promise in the latter's name that the victors shall

receive from him rewards. Then the redoubtable Lifeguardsman

Kiribyéevitch steps forth. Thrice the challenge is repeated before any

one responds. Then young Merchant Kaláshnikoff comes forward, makes his

reverence to the Tzar, and when Kiribyéevitch demands his name, he

announces it, and adds that he was born of an honorable father and has

always lived according to God's law; he has not cast his eyes on another

man's wife, nor played the bandit on a dark night, nor hid from the

light of heaven, and that he means to fight to the death. On hearing

this, Kiribyéevitch "turned pale as snow in autumn, his bold eyes

clouded over, a shiver ran through his mighty shoulders, on his parted

lips the words fell dead." With one blow, the young merchant crushes in

the lifeguardsman's breast, and the latter falls dead, the death being

beautifully described in stately, picturesque language. At sight

thereof, the Tzar Iván Vasílievitch waxed wroth, stamped on the earth,

scowled with his black brows; ordered that the young merchant be seized

and hauled before him. He then demands whether Kaláshnikoff has slain

his faithful servant Kiribyéevitch "voluntarily, involuntarily, or

against his will." Kaláshnikoff boldly makes answer that he has done it

with deliberate intent, and that the reason therefor he will not tell to

the Tzar, but only to God alone. He tells the Tzar to order him to be

executed, but not to deprive his little children or his young widow and

his brothers of his favor. The Tzar replies that it is well Kaláshnikoff

has answered truthfully; he will give the young widow and the children a

grant from his treasury, and give command that, from that day forth, his

brothers may traffic throughout the wide Russian realm free of taxes.

But Kaláshnikoff must mount the scaffold, lay down his turbulent head,

and the executioner shall be ordered to make his axe very sharp, and the

great bell shall be tolled in order that all the men of Moscow may know

that the Tzar has not deprived him of his favor. The execution and

Kaláshnikoff's farewell speeches to his brothers, with his last messages

to his wife not to grieve so greatly, and his commands that she is not

to tell his children how their father died, together with requests for

prayers for his soul, are described in very touching and lofty terms, as

are also the burial, and the scenes at the grave.

* * * * *

The influence of Schelling's philosophy on the society of Moscow (the

literary center until half-way through the '30's of the nineteenth

century) was very great. This philosophy held that every historical

nation should express some idea or other; that a nation could be called

historical only on condition of its being independent in this respect;

and that its importance in the progress of general civilization is

determined by its degree of independence. This set all thoughtful people

to considering the place of Russia among the European nations; and all

the problems suggested by this philosophy came up with special force in

the Russian literature of the end of the '30's, and split society into

two great camps--the Slavyanophils (slavophils)[18] and the Westerners.

These camps had existed earlier, but had concerned themselves only with

the purification of the Russian language, or with sentimental admiration

for everything Russian, or for everything foreign, as the case might be.

But now both parties undertook to solve the problems connected with the

fate of the nation.

Schelling's philosophy also suggested new views as to the theory of art

and the significance of literature in the life of a nation, and evolved

the conclusion, that a nation's literature, even more than its

civilization, should be entirely independent. This naturally led the

Slavyanophils to reflect upon the indispensability of establishing

Russian literature on a thoroughly national, independent basis.

Naturally, also, this led to the Slavyanophils contesting the existence

of a Russian literature in the proper sense of the term; since the whole

of it, from Lomonósoff to Púshkin, had been merely a servile imitation

of Western literature, and did not in the least express the spirit of

the Russian people, and of the Schellingists. A number of the professors

in the Moscow University belonged to this party. Naturally the students

in their department--the philological faculty--came under their

influence, and under this influence was reared the famous Russian

critic, Vissarión Grigórievitch Byelínsky (1811-1848). His name is

chiefly identified with the journal "The Annals of the Fatherland" (of

St. Petersburg), where he published his brilliant critical articles on

Griboyédoff, Gógol's "The Inspector," on Lérmontoff's works, and on

those of other writers; on French contemporary literature, and on

current topics at home and abroad, among them articles condemning many

characteristics of Russian society, both intellectual and moral, such as

the absence of intellectual interests, routine, narrowness, and egotism

in the middle-class merchants; self-satisfied philistinism; the

patriarchal laxity of provincial morals; the lack of humanity and the

Asiatic ferocity towards inferiors; the slavery of women and children

under the weight of family despotism. His volume of articles on Púshkin

constitutes a complete critical history of Russian literature, beginning

with Lomonósoff and ending with Púshkin. By these Byelínsky's standing

as an important factor in literature was thoroughly established, and all

the young writers of the succeeding epoch, that of the '50's, gathered

around him. Grigoróvitch, Turgéneff, Gontcharóff, Nekrásoff, Apollón

Máikoff, Dostoévsky, Tolstóy, and the rest, may be said to have been

reared on Byelínsky's criticism, inspired by it to creative activity,

and indebted to it for much of their fame. Byelínsky, moreover, educated

the minds of that whole generation, and prepared men for the social

movement of the '60's, which was characterized by many reforms.

After 1846 Byelínsky was connected with the journal, "The Contemporary,"

published by the poet Nekrásoff, and I. I. Panáeff, to which the best

writers of the day contributed. Here, during the brief period when his

health permitted him to work, he expressed even bolder and more

practical ideas, and became the advocate of the "natural school," of

which he regarded Gógol as the founder, wherein poetry was treated as

an integral part of every-day life. Turgéneff has declared, that

Byelínsky indisputably possessed all the chief qualities of a great

critic, and that no one before him, or better than he, ever expressed a

correct judgment and an authoritative verdict, and that he was,

emphatically, "the right man in the right place."

One author who deserves to be better known outside of Russia produced

the really original and indescribably fascinating works on which his

fame rests during the last ten or twelve years of his long life, late in

the '40's and '50's, although he was much older than the authors we have

recently studied, and began to write much earlier than many of them. His

early writing, however, was in the classical style, and does not count

in comparison with his original descriptions of nature, and of the life

of the (comparatively) distant past. Sergyéi Timoféevitch Aksákoff

(1791-1859), the descendant of a very ancient noble family, was born in

far-away eastern Russia, in Ufá, and was very well educated by his

mother, at schools, and at Kazán University. His talents first revealed

themselves in 1847, in his "Notes on Angling," and his "Diary of a

Sportsman with a Gun," in the Orenburg Government (1852). Most famous of

all, and most delightful, are the companion volumes, "A Family Chronicle

and Souvenirs" (1856) and "The Childhood's Years of Bagróff's Grandson"

(1858). In these Russian descriptive language made a great stride in

advance, even after Púshkin and Gógol; and as a limner of landscape, he

has no equal in Russian literature. The most noteworthy point about his

work is that there is not a trace of creative fancy or invention; he

describes reality, takes everything straight from life, and describes

it with amazing faithfulness and artistic harmony. He was the first

Russian writer to look on Russian life from a positive instead of from a

negative point of view.[19]

Púshkin's period had been important, not only in rendering Russian

literature national, but still more so in bringing literature into close

connection with life and its interests. This had in turn led to a love

of reading and of literature all over the country, and had developed

latent talents. This love spread to classes hitherto unaffected by it;

and among the talents it thus developed, none was more thoroughly

independent than that of Alexéi Vasílievitch Koltzóff (1809-1842), who

was so original, so wholly unique in his genius, that he cannot rightly

be assigned to any class, and still stands as an isolated phenomenon. He

was the son of a merchant of Vorónezh, who was possessed of considerable

means, and he spent the greater part of his youth on the steppes,

helping his father, a drover, who supplied tallow-factories. After being

taught to read and write by a theological student, young Koltzóff was

sent to the district school for four months, after which his education

was regarded as finished, because he knew as much as the people about

him, and because no more was required for business purposes. But the lad

acquired a strong love of reading, and devoted himself to such

literature as he could procure, popular fairy-tales, the "Thousand and

One Nights," and so forth. He was sixteen years of age when Dmítrieff's

works fell into his hands, and inspired him with a desire to imitate

them, and to "make songs" himself. As yet he did not understand the

difference between poetry and popular songs, and did not read verses,

but sang them. The local book-seller was the first to recognize his

poetical tendency, and in a degree, guided him on the right road with a

"Russian Prosody," and other suitable books, such as the works of

Zhukóvsky, Púshkin, and other contemporary poets. A passion for writing

poetry was in the air in the '20's. But although he yielded to this and

to the promptings of his genius, it was a long time before he was able

to clothe his thoughts in tolerable form. An unhappy love had a powerful

influence on the development of his poetical talent, and his versified

efforts suddenly became fervent songs of love and hate, of melancholy,

soulful cries of grief and woe, full of melodious expressions of the

world about him. One of Byelínsky's friends, whose family lived near

Vorónezh, made his acquaintance, read his poems and applauded much in

them. Three years later, in 1833, at the request and expense of this new

friend, Koltzóff published a small collection, containing eighteen poems

selected by him, which showed that he possessed an original and really

noteworthy poetical gift. In 1835 Koltzóff visited St. Petersburg and

made acquaintance with Púshkin, Zhukóvsky, and many other literary men,

and between 1836 and 1838 his fame penetrated even to the knowledge of

the citizens in his native town. He continued to aid his father in

business, but his heart was elsewhere--he longed for the intellectual

companionship of his friends in Moscow, and all this rendered him

extremely unhappy. In 1840 he spent three months with Byelínsky in St.

Petersburg, and after that he remained in Vorónezh, had another unhappy

love affair, and dreamed continually of the possibility of quitting the

place for good. But his father would not give him a kopék for such a

purpose. His health gave way, and he died in 1842, aged thirty-three.

His poems are few in number, and the best of them belong to an entirely

peculiar style, which he alone in Russian literature possesses, to which

he alone imparted significance--the ballad, the national ballad compact,

powerful, rich in expression, and highly artistic. The charm of

nationality is so great, as expressed in Koltzóff's songs, that it is

almost impossible to read them; one wants to sing them as the author

sang the verses of others in his boyhood. Even his peculiar measures,

which are not at all adapted to popular songs, do not destroy the

harmonious impression made by them, and such pieces as "The Forest,"

"The Ballads of Cabman Kudryávitch," "The Perfidy of the Affianced

Bride," and others, not only belong to the most notable productions of

Russian lyric poetry, but are also representatives of an important

historical phenomenon, as the first attempt to combine in one organic

whole Russian artistic literature and the inexhaustible vast inartistic

poetry of the people. "The Perfidy of the Affianced Bride," which is not

rhymed in the original, runs as follows:

Hot in heaven the summer sun doth shine,

But me, young though I be, it warmeth not!

My heart is dead with cold

Through the perfidy of my affianced bride.

Woe-sadness upon me hath fallen,

Upon my sorrowful head;

My soul by deadly anguish is tormented,

And from my body my soul doth long to flee.

Unto men have I resorted for help--

With a laugh have they turned away;

To the grave of my father, my mother--

But they rise not at my call.

The world grew dark before mine eyes,

Upon the grass I swooned.

At dead of night, in a dreadful storm,

They lifted me from the grave.

At night, in the storm, I saddled my steed;

I set out, caring not whither I went--

To lead a wretched life, to console myself,

With rancor to demand satisfaction from men.

Romanticism established, as its first principles, freedom of creation

and nationality of poetry, and these principles survived romanticism

itself. Now, while romanticism preached freedom of creation, it

circumscribed this freedom by selecting as subjects for poetical

compositions chiefly the extraordinary sides of life, its majestic

moments. Its heroes were always choice, powerful natures, who suffered

profoundly because of the lot of all mankind, and were capable of

gigantic conflicts against the whole world. Classicism had bequeathed

this habit of regarding as worthy of poetical treatment only heroes who

stood out from the mass, and of depicting these heroes only at critical

crises. All this depended, in a great degree, upon the political and

social conditions which prevailed at that epoch--the beginning of the

nineteenth century. But quieter, more peaceful times dawned, and with

them men's tastes and habits of mind underwent a change. They grew tired

of scorning and hating reality, because it did not conform to their

cherished dreams, and they began coolly to study it. The titanic heroes,

who had become tiresome and anti-pathetic to the last degree, made way

for ordinary mortals in their everyday surroundings. Lyrical exaltation

was superseded by calm observation, or disintegrating analysis of the

different elements of life; pathetic misery made way for cold irony, or

jeeringly melancholy humor; and at last poetry was succeeded by prose,

and the ruling poetical forms of the new epoch became the romance and

the novel. This change took place almost simultaneously in all the

literatures of Europe.

We have seen that Púshkin, towards the end of his career, entered upon

this new path, with his prose tales, "The Captain's Daughter,"

"Dubróvsky," and so forth, and throughout the '30's of the nineteenth

century, the romance and novel came, more and more, to occupy the most

prominent place in Russian literature. We may pass over the rather long

list of second-class writers who adventured in this field (of whom

Zagóskin and Márlinsky are most frequently referred to), and devote our

attention to the man who has been repeatedly called "the father of

modern Russian realism," Nikolái Vasílievitch Gógol (1809-1852). He is

credited with having created all the types which we encounter in the

works of the great novelists who followed him, and this is almost

literally true, at least so far as the male characters are concerned. In

particular, this applies to his famous "Dead Souls," which contains if

not the condensed characterization in full of these types, at least the

readily recognized germs of them. But in this respect, his early Little

Russian Stories, "Tales from a Farm-house Near Dikánka," and the

companion volume, "Mírgorod," as well as his famous comedy, "The

Inspector," must not be forgotten, for they contributed their full

quota. Púshkin was one of Gógol's earliest and most ardent admirers, and

it was because he recognized the latter's phenomenal talent in seizing

the national types that he gave to him the idea for "Dead Souls," which

he had intended to use himself. Thanks to his own genius (as well as to

the atmosphere of the epoch in which he lived), he solved for himself,

quite independently of any foreign influence, the problem of bringing

Russian literature down from the clouds to everyday real life. He

realized that the world was no longer living in a sort of modern epic,

as it had been during the French Revolution and the Napoleonic

campaigns, and that literature must conform to the altered conditions.

Naturally, in his new quest after truth, Gógol-Yanóvsky (to give him his

full name) mingled romanticism and realism at first. But he soon

discovered the true path. He was born and reared in Little Russia, at

Sorótchinsky, Government of Poltáva, and was separated only by two

generations from the famous epoch of the Zaporózhian kazáks, who lived

(as their name implies) below the rapids of the Dniépr. He has depicted

their life in his magnificent novel "Tarás Búlba." His grandfather had

been the regimental scribe--a post of honor--of that kazák army, and the

spirit of the Zaporózhian kazáks still lingered over the land which was

full of legends, fervent, superstitious piety, and poetry.

Gógol's grandfather, who figures as "Rúdy Pánko, the bee-farmer," in the

two volumes of Little Russian stories which established his fame,

narrated to him at least one-half of those stories. His father, also,

who represented the modern spirit, was an inimitable narrator of comic

stories, and the talents of father and grandfather rendered their house

the popular center of a very extensive neighborhood.

At school Gógol did not distinguish himself, but he wrote a good deal,

all of an imitative character. After leaving school, it was with

difficulty that he secured a place as copying-clerk, at a wretched

salary, in St. Petersburg. He promptly resigned this when fame came, and

secured the appointment as professor of history. But he was a hopelessly

incompetent professor of history, despite his soaring ambitions, both on

account of his lack of scholarship and the natural bent of his mind. The

literary men who had obtained the position for him had discerned his

immense talent in a perfectly new style of writing; and after failure

had convinced him that heavy, scientific work was not in his line, he

recognized the fact himself, and decided to devote himself to the sort

of work for which nature had intended him. The first volume of his

"Tales from a Farm-house Near Dikánka" appeared at the end of 1831, and

had an immense success. The second volume, "Mírgorod," was equally

successful, all the more so, as it introduced, together with the pure

merriment which had characterized the earlier tales, and the realism

which was his specialty, so to speak, a new element--pathos; "laughter

piercing through a mist of tears." In this style "Old-fashioned

Gentry"[20] and "How Iván Ivánovitch Quarrelled with Iván Nikifórovitch"

are famous examples. Success always turned Gógol's head, and he

immediately aspired to some undertaking far beyond his powers. In this

case, for instance, despising, as usual, what he could do best, he

planned a huge work, in nine volumes, on the history of the Middle

Ages. Fortunately, his preparatory studies in the history of Little

Russia led him to write his splendid epic, which is a composition of the

highest art, "Tarás Búlba," and diverted him from his ill-digested

project.

He began to recognize that literary work was not merely a pastime, but

his moral duty; and the first result of this conviction was his great

play "The Inspector," finished in April, 1836. The authorities refused

to produce it, but the Emperor Nicholas I. heard about it, read it, and

gave imperative orders that it should be put on the stage, upholding

Gógol with rapturous delight. Everybody--officials, the police, literary

people, merchants--attacked the author. They raged at this comedy,

refused to recognize their too lifelike portraits, and still endeavored

to have the play prohibited. Gógol's health and spirits failed under

this persecution, and he fled abroad, whence thereafter he returned to

Russia only at long intervals and for brief visits, chiefly to Moscow,

where most of his faithful friends resided. He traveled a great deal,

but spent most of his time in Rome, where his lavish charities kept him

perennially poor despite the eventual and complete success, both

artistically and financially, of "The Inspector," and of Part I. of

"Dead Souls," which would have enabled him to live in comfort. He was

wont to say that he could see Russia plainly only when he was at a

distance from her, and in a measure, he proved the truth of his

contention in the first volume of "Dead Souls." Thereby he justified

Púshkin's expectations in giving him the subject of that work, which he

hoped would enable Gógol to depict the classes and localities of the

fatherland in the concentrated form of types. But he lived too long in

Rome. The Russian mind in general is much inclined to mysticism, and

Little Russia, in Gógol's boyhood, was exceptionally permeated with

exaggerated religious sentiment. Mysticism seems to be peculiarly fatal

to Russian writers of eminence; we have seen how Von Vízin and Zhukóvsky

were affected toward the end of their lives; we have a typical and even

more pronounced example of it in a somewhat different form at the

present time in Count L. N. Tolstóy. Lérmontoff had inclined in that

direction. Hence, it is not surprising that the moral and physical

atmosphere of Rome, during a too prolonged residence there, eventually

ruined Gógol's mind and health, and extinguished the last sparks of his

genius, especially as even in his school-days he had shown a marked

tendency (in his letters to his mother) to religious exaltation. Now,

under the pressure of his personal tendencies and friendships, and the

clerical atmosphere of Rome, he developed into a mystic and an ascetic

of the most extreme type. He regarded all his earlier writings as sins

which must be atoned for (precisely as Count L. N. Tolstóy regards his

masterpieces at the present time); and nevertheless, his overweening

self-esteem was so flattered by the tremendous success of "The

Inspector" and the first part of "Dead Souls" that he began to regard

himself as a sort of divinely commissioned prophet, on whom it was

incumbent to preach to his fellow-men. It will be seen that the parallel

holds good in this respect also. Extracts from his hortatory letters

which he published proved to Russians that his day was over. His failure

in his self-imposed mission plunged him into the extremes of

self-torment, and his lucid moments grew more and more rare. He

destroyed what he had written of the second part of "Dead Souls," in

the attacks of ecstatic remorse at such profane work which followed. (By

some authorities it is believed that he did this unintentionally,

meaning to destroy an entirely different set of papers.) In 1848 he made

a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and went thence to Moscow, where he resided

until his death, becoming more and more extreme in his mysticism and

asceticism. He spent sleepless nights in prayer; he tried to carry

fasting to the extent of living for a week on one of the tiny double

loaves which are used for the Holy Communion in the Eastern Catholic

Church, a feat which it is affirmed can be performed with success, and

even to more exaggerated extent, by practiced ascetics. Gógol died. His

observation was acute; his humor was genuine, natural, infectious; his

realism was of the most vivid description; his power of limning types

was unsurpassed, and it is these types which have entered, as to their

essential ingredients, into the works of his successors, that have

rendered the Russian realistic literary school famous. He wrote only one

complete play besides "The Inspector," and it is still acted

occasionally, but it is not of a sort to appeal to the universal public,

as is his famous comedy. The fantastic but amusing plot of this lesser

comedy, "Marriage," is founded upon a young girl's meditations on that

theme, and the actions which lead up to and follow them. The wealthy

heroine of the merchant class, being desirous of marrying, enlists the

services of the professional match-maker, the old-time Russian

matrimonial agent, in the merchant and peasant classes. This match-maker

offers for her choice several eligible suitors (all strangers), and the

girl makes her choice. She is well pleased with it, but suddenly begins

to speculate on the future; is moved to tears by the prospect that her

daughter may be unhappy in a hypothetical marriage, in the dim future;

and at last, driven to despair by this painful picture of her fancy, she

evades her betrothed and breaks off the match.

The interest of "The Inspector" is perennial and universal; official

negligence, corruption, bribery, masculine vanity and boastfulness, and

feminine failings to match, are the exclusive prerogatives of no one

nation or epoch. The comedy is not a caricature, but it is a faithful

society portrait and satire, with intense condensation of character, and

traits which are not only truly and typically Russian, but come within

the ken of all fair-minded persons of other lands. The scene opens in a

room at the house of the Chief of Police in a provincial town. Those

present are: The Chief himself, the Curator of the Board of Benevolent

Institutions, the Superintendent of Schools, the Judge, the Commissioner

of Police, the Doctor, and two policemen.

CHIEF.--I have summoned you hither, gentlemen, in order to

communicate to you an unpleasant piece of news. An Inspector is

coming.

JUDGE.--What! An Inspector?

CHIEF.--An Inspector from St. Petersburg, incognito, and with

secret orders, to boot.

JUDGE.--I thought so!

CURATOR.--If there's not trouble, I'm mistaken!

CHIEF.--I have warned you, gentlemen. See to it! I have made

some arrangements in my own department, and I advise you to do

the same. Especially you, Artémy Philípp'itch! Without a doubt,

this traveling official will wish, first of all, to inspect

your institutions, and therefore, you must arrange things so

that they will be decent. The nightcaps should be clean, and

the sick people should not look like blacksmiths, as they

usually do in private.

CURATOR.--Well, that is a mere trifle. We can put clean

nightcaps on them.

CHIEF.--Moreover, you ought to have written up, over the head

of each bed, in Latin or some other language--that's your

affair--the name of each disease; when each patient was taken

sick, the day and the hour. It is not well that your sick

people should smoke such strong tobacco that one has to sneeze

every time he goes in there. Yes, and it would be better if

there were fewer of them; it will be set down at once to bad

supervision, or to lack of skill on the doctor's part.

CURATOR.--Oh, so far as the doctoring is concerned, Christián

Iván'itch and I have already taken measures; the nearer to

nature, the better--we don't use any expensive medicines. Man

is a simple creature; if he dies, why then, he dies; if he gets

well, why then, he gets well; and moreover, it would have been

difficult for Christián Iván'itch to make them understand him;

he doesn't know one word of Russian.

CHIEF.--I should also advise you, Ammós Feódor'itch, to turn

your attention to court affairs. In the anteroom, where the

clients usually assemble, your janitor has got a lot of geese

and goslings, which waddle about under foot. Of course it is

praiseworthy to be thrifty in domestic affairs, and why should

not the janitor be so, too? Only, you know, it is not proper in

that place. I intended to mention it to you before, but always

forgot it.

JUDGE.--I'll order them to be taken to the kitchen this very

day. Will you dine with me?

CHIEF.--And moreover, it is not well that all sorts of stuff

should be put to dry in the court-room, and that over the very

desk with the documents, there should be a hunting-whip....

Yes, and strange to say, there is no man who has not his

faults. God himself has arranged it so, and it is useless for

free-thinkers to maintain the contrary.

JUDGE.--What do you mean by 'faults,' Antón Antón'itch? There

are various sorts of faults. I tell every one frankly that I

take bribes; but what sort of bribes? Greyhound pups. That's

quite another thing.

CHIEF.--Well, greyhound pups or anything else, it's all the

same.

JUDGE.--Well, no, Antón Antón'itch. But, for example, if some

one has a fur coat worth five hundred rubles, and his wife has

a shawl--

CHIEF.--Well, and how about your taking greyhound pups as

bribes? Why don't you trust in God? You never go to church. I

am firm in the faith, at all events, and go to church every

Sunday. But you--oh, I know you! If you begin to talk about the

creation, one's hair rises straight up on his head.

JUDGE.--It came of itself, of its own accord.

CHIEF.--Well, in some cases, it is worse to have brains than to

be entirely without them. As for you, Luká Lúk'itch, as

superintendent of schools, you must bestir yourself with regard

to the teachers. One of them, for instance, the fat-faced

one--I don't recall his name--cannot get along without making

grimaces when he takes his seat--like this (_makes a grimace_);

and then he begins to smooth his beard out from under his

neckerchief with his hand. In short, if he makes such faces at

the scholars, there is nothing to be said; it must be

necessary; I am no judge as to that. But just consider--if he

were to do that to a visitor, it might be very unpleasant; the

Inspector, or anyone else, might take it as personal. The Devil

knows what might come of it.... And I must also mention the

teacher of history. He's a learned man, that's plain; but he

expresses himself with so much warmth that he loses control of

himself. I heard him once; well, so long as he was talking

about the Assyrians and the Babylonians, it was all right; but

when he got to Alexander of Macedon, I can't describe to you

what came over him. I thought there was a fire, by heavens! He

jumped up from his seat, and dashed his chair down against the

floor with all his might. Alexander of Macedon was a hero, no

doubt; but why smash the chairs?([21]) There will be a deficit

in the accounts, just as the result of that.

SUPERINTENDENT.--Yes, he is hasty! I have spoken to him about

it several times. He says: "What would you have? I would

sacrifice my life for science."

CHIEF.--Yes, such is the incomprehensible decree of Fate; a

learned man is always a drunkard, or else he makes faces that

would scare the very saints.

As the play proceeds in this lively vein, two men about town--in a

humble way--the public busybodies, happen to discover at the Inn a

traveler who has been living on credit for two weeks, and going nowhere.

The landlord is on the point of putting the man in prison for debt, when

the busybodies jump to the conclusion that he is the Inspector. The

Prefect and the other officials accept their suggestion in spite of the

traveler's plain statement as to his own identity as an uninfluential

citizen. They set about making the town presentable, entertain him,

bribe him against his will, and bow down before him. He enters into the

spirit of the thing after a brief delay, accepts the hospitality, asks

for loans, makes love to the Prefect's silly wife and daughter, betroths

himself to the latter, receives the petitions and the bribes of the

downtrodden townspeople, and goes off with the best post-horses the town

can furnish, ostensibly to ask the blessing of a rich old uncle on his

marriage. The Postmaster intercepts a cynically frank letter which the

man has written to a friend, and in which he heaps ridicule on his

credulous hosts. This opens their eyes at last, and at that moment, a

gendarme appears and announces that the Inspector has arrived. Tableau.

Gógol's two volumes of Little Russian Tales, above-mentioned, must

remain classics, and the volume of St. Petersburg Tales contains

essentially the same ingredients, so that they may be considered as a

whole. All the tales in the first two volumes are from his beloved

native Little Russia. Some are merely poetical renderings of popular

legends, counterparts of which are to be found in the folk-lore of many

lands; such are "Vy," and "St. John's Eve's" and the exquisite "May

Night," where the famous poetical spirit of the Ukraína (borderland) is

displayed in its fullest force and beauty. "Know ye the night of the

Ukraína?" he writes. "O, ye do not know the Ukraína night! Look upon it;

from the midst of the sky gazes the moon; the illimitable vault of

heaven has withdrawn into the far distance, has spread out still more

immeasurably; it burns and breathes; the earth is all bathed in silvery

light; and the air is wondrous, and cool, and perfumed, and full of

tenderness, and an ocean of sweet odors is abroad. A night divine! An

enchanting night! The forests stand motionless, inspired, full of

darkness, and cast forth a vast shadow. Calm and quiet are the pools;

the coldness and gloom of their waters is morosely hemmed in by the dark

green walls of gardens. The virgin copses of wild bird-cherry and black

cherry trees stretch forth their roots towards the coolness of the

springs, and from time to time their leaves whisper as though in anger

and indignation, when a lovely little breeze, and the wind of the night,

creeping up for a moment, kisses them. All the landscape lies in

slumber. But on high, everything is breathing with life, everything is

marvelous, everything is solemnly triumphant. And in the soul there is

something illimitable and wondrous, and throngs of silvery visions make

their way into its depths. Night divine! Enchanting night! And all of a

sudden, everything has become instinct with life; forests, pools, and

steppes. The magnificent thunder of the Ukraína nightingale becomes

audible, and one fancies that the moon, in the midst of the sky, has

paused to listen to it.... As though enchanted, the hamlet dreams upon

the heights. The mass of the cottages gleams still whiter, still more

agreeably under the light of the moon; still more dazzlingly do their

lowly walls stand out against the darkness. The songs have ceased.

Everything is still. Pious people are all asleep. Only here and there

are the small windows still a-glow. In front of the threshold of a few

cottages only is a belated family eating its late supper."

Others of the tales are more exclusively national; such as "The Lost

Document," "Sorótchinsky Fair," "The Enchanted Spot," and the like. But

they display the same fertility of invention, combined with skill in

management, and close study of every-day customs, superstitions, and

life, all of which render them invaluable, both to Russians and to

foreigners. More important are such stories as "Old-fashioned Gentry,"

"The Cloak" (from the volume of "St. Petersburg Tales"), wherein kindly

wit is tempered with the purest, deepest pathos, while characters and

customs are depicted with the greatest art and fidelity. "The Portrait,"

again, is semi-fantastic, although not legendary; and the "Diary of a

Madman" is unexcelled as an amusing but affecting study of a diseased

mind in the ranks of petty officialdom, where the tedious, insignificant

routine disperses what few wits the poor man was originally endowed with

by nature.

In Gógol's greatest work, "Dead Souls," all his qualities are developed

to the highest degree, though there is less pathos than in some of the

short stories. This must forever rank as a Russian classic. The types

are as vivid, as faithful, for those who know the Russia of to-day, as

when they were first introduced to an enthusiastic Russian public, in

1847.

In the pre-emancipation days, a "soul" signified a male serf. Women were

not taken account of in the periodical revisions; although the working

unit, or _tyagló_, consisted of a man, his wife, and his horse--the

indispensable trinity in agricultural labors. In the interval between

revisions, a landed proprietor continued to pay taxes on all the male

serfs accredited to him on the official list, births being considered as

an exact offset to deaths, for the sake of convenience. Another

provision of the law was, that no one should purchase serfs without the

land to which they belonged, except for the purpose of colonization. An

ingenious fraud, suggested by a combination of these two laws, forms the

basis of plot for "Dead Souls." The hero, Tchítchikoff, is an official

who has struggled up, cleverly but not too honestly, through the devious

ways of bribe-taking, extortion, and not infrequent detection and

disgrace, to a snug berth in the customs service, from which he has been

ejected under conditions which render further upward flight quite out of

the question. In this dilemma, he hits upon the idea of purchasing from

landed proprietors of mediocre probity all their "souls" which are dead,

though still nominally alive, and are taxed as such. Land is being given

away gratuitously in the southern governments of Khersón and Taúris to

any one who will settle on it. This is a matter of public knowledge, and

Tchítchikoff's plan consists in buying a thousand non-existent

serfs--"dead souls"--at a maximum of one hundred rubles apiece, for

colonization on an equally non-existent estate in the south. He will

then mortgage them to the loan bank of the nobility, known as the

Council of Guardians, and obtain a capital. In pursuance of this clever

scheme, the adventurer sets out on his travels, visits provincial towns,

and the estates of landed gentry of every shade of character, honesty,

and financial standing; and from them he buys for a song (or cajoles

from them for nothing, as a gift, when they are a trifle scrupulous over

the tempting prospect of illegal gain) huge numbers of "dead souls."

Púshkin himself could not have used with such tremendous effect the

phenomenal opportunities which this plot of Tchítchikoff's wanderings

offered for setting forth Russian manners, characters, customs, all

Russian life, in town and country, as Gógol did. The author even

contrives, in keen asides and allusions, to throw almost equal light on

the life of the capital as well. His portraits of women are not exactly

failures; they are more like composite photographs. His portraiture of

men is supreme. In fact, there is no such thing in the whole of Gógol's

work as a heroine, properly speaking, who plays a first-class part, or

who is analyzed in modern fashion. The day was not come for that as yet.

"Tarás Búlba," his great historical novel, offers a vivid picture of the

famous kazák republic on the Dniépr, and equally with his other volumes,

it stands in the first rank for its poetry, its dramatic force, its

truth to life. It alone may be said to have a passionate love story.

QUESTIONS FOR REVIEW

1. What special gift as a writer had Yázykoff?

2. Give the chief events in the career of Griboyédoff.

3. What was the character of Russian social life at this time?

4. What was the plot of "Woe from Wit"?

5. Describe the influence of Lérmontoff.

6. What is the story of his famous "Ballad of the Tzar, the

Lifeguardsman, and the Merchant"? Supply full title.

7. What was Schelling's philosophy, and how did it affect

Russian thinkers?

8. What important influence had Byelínsky?

9. What marked powers of description had Aksákoff?

10. How does Koltzóff's life illustrate the widening influence

of Russian literature?

11. How did the change from poetry to prose writing come about?

12. Give an account of the chief events in the life of Gógol.

13. How was the Russian tendency to mysticism illustrated in

his case?

14. Describe his famous play "The Inspector." What qualities

does he show in this?

15. What are the characteristics of his "Tales"?

16. Why is "Dead Souls" regarded as his greatest work?

17. What is the character of "Tarás Búlba"?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

_A Hero of To-Day._ M. Y. Lérmontoff. (Several translations.)

Works of Gógol: _The Inspector._ (Translated by Arthur Sykes.)

_Tarás Búlba._ (Translated by I. F. Hapgood.)

_Dead Souls, St. John's Eve, and Other Stories._ (Selections

from the two volumes of _Little Russian and St. Petersburg

Tales_. Translated by I. F. Hapgood.)

FOOTNOTES:

[13] Rubinstein used this as a foundation for the libretto of his

delightful opera, with the same title.

[14] Rubinstein used this as the libretto foundation for his opera of

the same title, which was produced once, prohibited by the censor,

produced once again after a lapse of eight or ten years, and again

promptly prohibited. After another interval of years it was again

permitted.

[15] An unaristocratic form of Eléna--Helen.

[16] The "Guests' Court," that is, the bazaar.

[17] His Russian name, "Grózny," means, rather, "menacing, threatening,"

than "terrible," the customary translation, being derived from "grozá,"

a thunderstorm.

[18] Most Russians prefer to have the world "Slavyáne" translated

Slavonians, rather than Slavs, as the latter is calculated to mislead.

[19] His "Family Chronicle" was the favorite book (during her girlhood)

of Márya Alexándrovna, the daughter of Alexander II., afterwards Duchess

of Edinburg, and now Duchess of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. I made acquaintance

with this fascinating work by reading aloud from her copy to a mutual

friend, a Russian.

[20] Literally, "Old-fashioned Landed Proprietors," who would, as a

matter of course, belong to the gentry, or "nobility," as the Russian

term is. This title is often translated, "Old-fashioned Farmers."

[21] This expression has become proverbial in Russia, and is used to

repress any one who becomes unduly excited.

CHAPTER IX

SEVENTH PERIOD: GONTCHARÓFF. GRIGORÓVITCH. TURGÉNEFF.

Under the direct influence of Byelínsky's criticism, and of the highly

artistic types created by Gógol, a new generation of Russian writers

sprang up, as has already been stated--the writers of the '40's:

Grigoróvitch, Gontcharóff, Turgéneff, Ostróvsky, Nekrásoff, Dostoévsky,

Count L. N. Tolstóy, and many others. With several of these we can deal

but briefly, for while they stand high in the esteem of Russians, they

are not accessible in English translations.

Despite the numerous points which these writers of the '40's possessed

in common, and which bound them together in one "school," this community

of interests did not prevent each one of them having his own definite

individuality; his own conception of the world, ideals, character, and

creative processes; his own literary physiognomy, so to speak, which did

not in the least resemble the physiognomy of his fellow-writers, but

presented a complete opposition to them in some respects. Perhaps the

one who stands most conspicuously apart from the rest in this way is

Iván Alexándrovitch Gontcharóff (1812-1890). He was the son of a wealthy

landed proprietor in the southeastern government of Simbírsk, pictures

of which district are reproduced in his most famous novel, "Oblómoff."

This made its appearance in 1858. No one who did not live in Russia at

that time can fully comprehend what an overwhelming sensation it

created. It was like a bomb projected into the midst of cultivated

society at the moment when every one was profoundly affected by the

agitation which preceded the emancipation of the serfs (1861), when the

literature of the day was engaged in preaching a crusade against

slumberous inactivity, inertia, and stagnation. The special point about

Gontcharóff's contribution to this crusade against the order of things,

and in favor of progress, was that no one could regard "Oblómoff" from

the objective point of view. Every one was compelled to treat it

subjectively, apply the type of the hero to his own case, and admit that

in greater or less degree he possessed some of Oblómoff's

characteristics. In this romance the gift of generalization reached its

highest point. Oblómoff not only represented the type of the landed

proprietor, as developed by the institution of serfdom, but the racial

type, which comprised the traits common to Russians in general, without

regard to their social rank, class, or vocation. In fact, so typical was

this character that it furnished a new word to the language,

"oblómovshtchina,"--the state of being like Oblómoff. Oblómoff carried

the national indolence--"_khalátnost_," or dressing-gown laziness, the

Russians call it in general--to such a degree that he not only was

unable to do anything, but he was not able even to enjoy himself. Added

to this, he was afflicted with aristocratic enervation of his faculties,

unhealthy timidity, incapacity to take the smallest energetic effort,

dove-like gentleness, and tenderness of soul, rendering him utterly

incapable of defending his own interests or happiness in the slightest

degree. And these characteristics were recognized as appertaining to

Russians in general, even to those who had never owned serfs, and thus

the type presented by Oblómoff may be said to be not only racial, but to

a certain extent universal--one of the immortal types, like Don Quixote,

Don Juan, Hamlet, and the like. The chief female character in the book,

Olga, can hardly be called the heroine; she appears too briefly for

that. But she is admitted to be a fine portrait of the Russian woman as

she was about to become, not as she then existed. Gontcharóff's "An

Every-day Story" is also celebrated; equally so is his "The Ravine," a

very distressing picture of the unprincipled character of an anarchist.

As the author changed his mind about the hero in part while writing the

book, it is not convincing.

Another of the men who made his mark at this time was Dmítry

Vasílievitch Grigoróvitch (born in 1812), who wrote a number of

brilliant books between 1847-1855. His chief merit is that he was the

first to begin the difficult study of the common people; the first who

talked in literature about the peasants, their needs, their virtues,

their helplessness, their misfortunes, and their sufferings. Of his

early short stories, "Antón Goremýka" (wretched fellow) is the best. In

it he is free from the reproach which was leveled at his later and more

ambitious long stories, "The Emigrants" and "The Fishermen." In the

latter, for the sake of lengthening the tale, and of enlisting interest

by making it conform to the general taste of readers, he made the

interest center on a love-story, in which the emotions and procedure

were described as being like those in the higher walks of life; and this

did not agree with the facts of the case. But the remainder of the

stories are founded on a genuine study of peasant ways and feelings.

Grigoróvitch had originally devoted himself to painting, and after 1855

he returned to that profession, but between 1884-1898 he again began to

publish stories.

Among the writers who followed Grigoróvitch in his studies of peasant

life, was Iván Sergyéevitch Turgéneff (1818-1883), who may be said not

only to have produced the most artistic pictures of that sphere ever

written by a Russian, but to have summed up in his longer novels devoted

to the higher classes, in a manner not to be surpassed, and in a

language and style as polished and brilliant as a collection of precious

stones--a whole obscure period of changes and unrest. He was descended

from an ancient noble family, and his father served in a cuirassier

regiment. On the family estate in the government of Orél[22] (where,

later in life, he laid the scene of his famous "Notes of a Sportsman"),

he was well provided with teachers of various nationalities--Russian

excepted. One of his mother's serfs, a man passionately fond of reading,

and a great admirer of Kheraskóff, was the first to initiate the boy

into Russian literature, with "The Rossiad." In 1834 Turgéneff entered

the Moscow University, but soon went to St. Petersburg, and there

completed his course in the philological department. Before he

graduated, however, he had begun to write, and even to publish his

literary efforts. After spending two years in Berlin, to finish his

studies, he returned to Moscow, in 1841, and there made acquaintance

with the Slavyanophils--the Aksákoffs, Khomyakóff (a military man,

chiefly known by his theological writings), and others, the leaders of

the new cult. But Turgéneff, thoroughly imbued with western ideas, did

not embrace it. He entered the government service, although there was no

necessity for his so doing, but soon left it to devote himself entirely

to literature, Byelínsky having written an enthusiastic article about a

poem which Turgéneff had published under another name. But poetry was

not Turgéneff's strong point, any more than was the drama, though he

wrote a number of plays later on, some of which have much merit, and are

still acted occasionally. He found his true path in 1846, when the

success of his first sketch from peasant life, "Khor and Kalínitch,"

encouraged him to follow it up with more of the same sort; the result

being the famous collection "The Notes (or Diary) of a Sportsman."

These, together with numerous other short stories, written between

1844-1850, won for him great and permanent literary fame.

The special strength of the "school of the '40's" consisted in its

combining in one organic and harmonious whole several currents of

literature which had hitherto flowed separately and suffered from

one-sidedness. The two chief currents were, on the one hand, the

objectivity of the Púshkin school, artistic contemplation of everything

poetical in Russian life; and on the other hand, the negatively

satirical current of naturalism, of the Gógol school, whose principal

attention was directed to the imperfections of Russian life. To these

were added, by the writers of the '40's, a social-moral movement, the

fermentation of ideas, which is visible in the educated classes of

Russian society in the '40's and '50's. As this movement was effected

under the influence of the French literature of the '30's and '40's, of

which Victor Hugo and Georges Sand were the leading exponents (whose

ideas were expressed under the form of romanticism), these writers

exercised the most influence on the Russian writers of the immediately

succeeding period. But it must be stated that their influence was purely

intellectual and moral, and not in the least artistic in character. The

influence of the French romanticists on the Russian writers of the '40's

consisted in the fact that the latter, imbued with the ideas of the

former, engaged in the analysis of Russian life, which constitutes the

strength and the merit of the Russian literature of that epoch.

Of all the Russian writers of that period, Turgéneff was indisputably

the greatest. No one could have been more advantageously situated for

the study of the mutual relations between landed proprietors and serfs.

The Turgéneff family offered a very sharp type of old-fashioned

landed-proprietor manners. Not one gentle or heartfelt trait softened

the harshness of those manners, which were based wholly upon merciless

despotism, and weighed oppressively not only upon the peasants, but upon

the younger members of the family. Every one in the household was kept

in a perennial tremor of alarm, and lived in hourly, momentary

expectation of some savage punishment. Moreover, the author's father

(who is depicted in the novel "First Love"), was much younger than his

wife, whom he did not love, having married her for her money. His

mother's portrait is to be found in "Púnin and Babúrin." Extremely

unhappy in her childhood and youth, when she got the chance at last she

became a pitiless despot, greedy of power, and indulged the caprices and

fantastic freaks suggested by her shattered nerves upon her family, the

house-servants, and the serfs. It is but natural that from such an

experience as this Turgéneff should have cherished, from the time of

his miserable childhood (his disagreements with his mother later in

life are matters of record also), impressions which made of him the

irreconcilable foe of serfdom. In depicting, in his "Notes of a

Sportsman," the tyranny of the landed gentry over their serfs, he could

have drawn upon his personal experience and the touching tale "Mumú;"

actually is the reproduction of an episode which occurred in his home.

His "Notes of a Sportsman" constitutes a noteworthy historical monument

of the period, not only as a work of the highest art, but also as a

protest against serfdom. In a way these stories form a worthy

continuation of Gógol's "Dead Souls." In them, as in all his other

stories, at every step the reader encounters not only clear-cut

portraits of persons, but those enchanting pictures of nature for which

he is famous.

The publication of his short sketches from peasant life in book

form--"Notes of a Sportsman"--aroused great displeasure in official

circles; officialdom looked askance upon Turgéneff because also of his

long residence abroad. Consequently, when, in 1852, he published in a

Moscow newspaper a eulogistic article on Gógol (when the latter died),

which had been prohibited by the censor in St. Petersburg, the

authorities seized the opportunity to punish him. He was arrested and

condemned to a month in jail, which the daughter of the police-officer

who had charge of him, contrived to convert into residence in their

quarters, where Turgéneff wrote "Mumú"; and to residence on his estate,

which he was not allowed to leave for about two years. In 1855 he went

abroad, and thereafter he spent most of his time in Paris, Baden-Baden

(later in Bougival), returning from time to time to his Russian estate.

During this period his talent attained its zenith, and he wrote all the

most noteworthy works which assured him fame: "Rúdin," "Faust," "A Nest

of Nobles," "On the Eve," and "First Love," which alone would have

sufficed to immortalize him. In 1860 he published an article entitled

"Hamlet and Don Quixote," which throws a brilliant light upon the

characters of all his types, and upon their inward springs of action.

And at last, in 1862, came his famous "Fathers and Children." The key to

the comprehension of his works is contained in his "Hamlet and Don

Quixote." His idea is that in these two types are incarnated all the

fundamental, contrasting peculiarities of the human race--both poles of

the axis upon which it revolves--and that all people belong, more or

less, to one of these two types; that every one of us inclines to be

either a Hamlet or a Don Quixote. "It is true," he adds, "that in our

day the Hamlets have become far more numerous than the Don Quixotes, but

the Don Quixotes have not died out, nevertheless." Such is his hero

"Rúdin," that central type of the men of the '40's--a man whose whole

vocation consists in the dissemination of enlightening ideas, but who,

at the same time, exhibits the most complete incapacity in all his

attempts to realize those ideas in practice, and scandalous

pusillanimity when there is a question of any step which is, in the

slightest degree, decisive--a man of the head alone, incapable of doing

anything himself, because he has no nature, no blood. Such, again, is

Lavrétzky ("A Nest of Nobles"), that concentrated type, not only of the

man from the best class of the landed gentry, but in general, of the

educated Slavonic man--a man who is sympathetic in the highest degree,

full of tenderness, of gentle humanity and kindliness, but who, at the

same time, does not contribute to life the smallest active principle,

who passively yields to circumstances, like a chip borne on the stormy

torrent. Such are the majority of Turgéneff's heroes, beginning with the

hero of "Ásya," and ending with Sánin, in "Spring Floods," and

Litvínoff, in "Smoke." Several Don Quixotes are to be found in his

works, but not many, and they are of two sorts. One typically Russian

category includes Andréi Kólosoff, and Yákoff Pásinkoff, Púnin, and a

few others; the second are Volýntzeff and Uvár Ivánovitch, in "On the

Eve." A third type, invented by Turgéneff as an offset to the Hamlets,

is represented by Insároff in "On the Eve."

With the publication, in 1862, of "Fathers and Children," a fateful

crisis occurred in Turgéneff's career. In his memoirs and in his letters

he insists that in the character of Bazároff he had no intention of

writing a caricature on the young generation, and of bearing himself in

a negative manner towards it. "My entire novel," he writes, "is directed

against the nobility as the leading class." Nevertheless, the book

raised a tremendous storm. His mistake lay in not recognizing in the new

type of men depicted under the character of Bazároff enthusiasts endowed

with all the merits and defects of people of that sort; but on the

contrary, they impressed him as skeptics, rejecters of all conventions,

and he christened them with the name of "nihilists," which was the cause

of the whole uproar, as he himself admitted. But he declares that he

employed the word not as a reproach, or with the aim of insulting, but

merely as an accurate and rational expression of an historical fact,

which had made its appearance.

Turgéneff always regarded himself as a pupil of Púshkin, and a worthy

pupil he was, but he worked out his own independent style, and in turn

called forth a horde of imitators. It may be said of Turgéneff, that he

created the artistic Russian novel, carrying it to the pitch of

perfection in the matter of elegance, and finely proportioned exposition

and arrangement of its parts--its architecture, so to speak--combined

with artless simplicity and realism. The peculiarity of Turgéneff's

style consists in the remarkable softness and tenderness of its tones,

combined with a certain mistiness of coloring, which recalls the air and

sky of central Russia. Not a single harsh or coarse line is to be found

in Turgéneff's work; not a single glaring hue. The objects depicted do

not immediately start forth before you, in full proportions, but are

gradually depicted in a mass of small details with all the most delicate

shades. Turgéneff is most renowned artistically for the landscapes which

are scattered through his works, and principally portray the nature of

his native locality, central Russia. Equally famous, and executed with

no less mastery and art, are his portrayal and analysis of the various

vicissitudes of the tender passion, and in this respect, he was regarded

as a connoisseur of the feminine heart. A special epithet, "the bard of

love," was often applied to him. Along with a series of masculine types,

Turgéneff's works present a whole gallery of Russian women of the '50's

and '60's, portrayed in a matchless manner with the touch of absolute

genius. And it is a fact worth noting that in his works, as in those of

all the "authors of the '40's," the women stand immeasurably higher than

the men. The heroines are frequently set forth in all their moral

grandeur, as though with the express intention of overshadowing the

insignificance of the heroes who are placed beside them.

Towards the beginning of the '60's, the germs of pessimism began to make

their appearance in Turgéneff's work, and its final expression came in

"Poems in Prose." The source of this pessimism must be sought in his

whole past, beginning with the impressions of his childhood, and the

disintegrating influence of the reaction of the '50's, when the nation's

hopes of various reforms seemed to have been blighted, and ending with a

whole mass of experiences of life and the literary failures and

annoyances which he underwent during the second half of his life. And in

this connection it must not be forgotten that the very spirit of

analysis and skepticism wherewith the school of writers of the '40's is

imbued, leads straight to pessimism, like any other sort of skepticism.

The following specimen, from "The Notes of a Sportsman," is selected

chiefly for its comparative brevity:

"THE WOLF."

I was driving from the chase one evening alone in a racing

gig.[23] I was about eight versts from my house; my good mare

was stepping briskly along the dusty road, snorting and

twitching her ears from time to time; my weary dog never

quitted the hind wheels, as though he were tied there. A

thunderstorm was coming on. In front of me a huge, purplish

cloud was slowly rising from behind the forest; overhead, and

advancing to meet me, floated long, gray clouds; the willows

were rustling and whispering with apprehension. The stifling

heat suddenly gave way to a damp chill; the shadows swiftly

thickened. I slapped the reins on the horse's back, descended

into a ravine, crossed a dry brook, all overgrown with

scrub-willows, ascended the hill, and drove into the forest.

The road in front of me wound along among thick clumps of

hazel-bushes, and was already inundated with gloom; I advanced

with difficulty. My gig jolted over the firm roots of the

centenarian oaks and lindens, which incessantly intersected the

long, deep ruts--the traces of cart-wheels; my horse began to

stumble. A strong wind suddenly began to drone up above, the

trees grew turbulent, big drops of rain clattered sharply, and

splashed on the leaves, the lightning and thunder burst forth,

the rain poured in torrents. I drove at a foot-pace, and was

speedily compelled to halt; my horse stuck fast. I could not

see a single object. I sheltered myself after a fashion under a

wide-spreading bush. Bent double, with my face wrapped up, I

was patiently awaiting the end of the storm, when, suddenly, by

the gleam of a lightning-flash, it seemed to me that I descried

a tall figure on the road. I began to gaze attentively in that

direction--the same figure sprang out of the earth as it were

beside my gig.

"Who is this?" asked a sonorous voice.

"Who are you yourself?"

"I'm the forester here."

I mentioned my name.

"Ah, I know; you are on your way home?"

"Yes. But you see what a storm--"

"Yes, it is a thunderstorm," replied the voice. A white flash

of lightning illuminated the forester from head to foot; a

short, crashing peal of thunder resounded immediately

afterwards. The rain poured down with redoubled force.

"It will not pass over very soon," continued the forester.

"What is to be done?"

"I'll conduct you to my cottage if you like," he said,

abruptly.

"Pray do."

"Please take your seat."

He stepped to the mare's head, took her by the bit, and turned

her from the spot. We set out. I clung to the cushion of the

drózhky, which rocked like a skiff at sea, and called the dog.

My poor mare splashed her feet heavily through the mire,

slipped, stumbled; the forester swayed from right to left in

front of the shafts like a specter. Thus we proceeded for

rather a long time. At last my guide came to a halt. "Here we

are at home, master," he said, in a calm voice. A wicket gate

squeaked, several puppies began to bark all together. I raised

my head, and by the glare of the lightning, I descried a tiny

hut, in the center of a spacious yard, surrounded with wattled

hedge. From one tiny window a small light cast a dull gleam.

The forester led the horse up to the porch, and knocked at the

door. "Right away! right away!" resounded a shrill little

voice, and the patter of bare feet became audible, the bolt

screeched, and a little girl, about twelve years of age, clad

in a miserable little chemise, girt about with a bit of list,

and holding a lantern in her hand, made her appearance on the

threshold.

"Light the gentleman," he said to her:--"and I will put your

carriage under the shed."

The little lass glanced at me, and entered the cottage. I

followed her. The forester's cottage consisted of one room,

smoke-begrimed, low-ceiled and bare, without any sleeping-shelf

over the oven, and without any partitions; a tattered sheepskin

coat hung against the wall. On the wall-bench hung a

single-barreled gun; in the corner lay scattered a heap of

rags; two large pots stood beside the oven. A pine-knot was

burning on the table, sputtering mournfully, and on the point

of dying out. Exactly in the middle of the room hung a cradle,

suspended from the end of a long pole. The little maid

extinguished the lantern, seated herself on a tiny bench, and

began to rock the cradle with her left hand, while with her

right she put the pine-knot to rights. I looked about me, and

my heart grew sad within me; it is not cheerful to enter a

peasant's hut by night. The baby in the cradle was breathing

heavily and rapidly.

"Is it possible that thou art alone here?" I asked the little

girl.

"Yes," she uttered, almost inaudibly.

"Art thou the forester's daughter?"

"Yes," she whispered.

The door creaked, and the forester stepped across the

threshold, bending his head as he did so. He picked up the

lantern from the floor, went to the table, and ignited the

wick.

"Probably you are not accustomed to a pine-knot," he said, as

he shook his curls.

I looked at him. Rarely has it been my fortune to behold such a

fine, dashing fellow. He was tall of stature, broad-shouldered,

and splendidly built. From beneath his dripping shirt, which

was open on the breast, his mighty muscles stood prominently

forth. A curly black beard covered half of his surly and manly

face; from beneath his broad eyebrows, which met over his nose,

small, brown eyes gazed bravely forth. He set his hands lightly

on his hips, and stood before me.

I thanked him, and asked his name.

"My name is Fomá," he replied--"but my nickname is 'The

Wolf'."[24]

"Ah, are you The Wolf?"

I gazed at him with redoubled curiosity. From my Ermoláï and

from others I had often heard about the forester, The Wolf,

whom all the peasants round about feared like fire. According

to their statements, never before had there existed in the

world such a master of his business. "He gives no one a chance

to carry off trusses of brushwood, no matter what the hour may

be; even at midnight, he drops down like snow on one's head,

and you need not think of offering resistance--he's as strong

and as crafty as the Devil.... And it's impossible to catch him

by any means; neither with liquor nor with money; he won't

yield to any allurement. More than once good men have made

preparations to put him out of the world, but no, he doesn't

give them a chance."

That was the way the neighboring peasants expressed themselves

about The Wolf.

"So thou art The Wolf," I repeated. "I've heard of you,

brother. They say that thou givest no quarter to any one."

"I perform my duty," he replied, surlily; "it is not right to

eat the master's bread for nothing."

He pulled his axe from his girdle, sat down on the floor, and

began to chop a pine-knot.

"Hast thou no housewife?" I asked him.

"No," he replied, and brandished his axe fiercely.

"She is dead, apparently."

"No--yes--she is dead," he added, and turned away.

I said nothing; he raised his eyes and looked at me.

"She ran away with a petty burgher who came along," he

remarked, with a harsh smile. The little girl dropped her eyes;

the baby waked up and began to cry; the girl went to the

cradle. "There, give it to him," said The Wolf, thrusting into

her hand a soiled horn.[25] "And she abandoned him," he went

on, in a low tone, pointing at the baby. He went to the door,

paused, and turned round.

"Probably, master," he began, "you cannot eat our bread; and I

have nothing but bread."

"I am not hungry."

"Well, suit yourself. I would boil the samovár for you, only I

have no tea.... I'll go and see how your horse is."

He went out and slammed the door. I surveyed my surroundings.

The hut seemed to me more doleful than before. The bitter odor

of chilled smoke oppressed my breathing. The little girl did

not stir from her place, and did not raise her eyes, from time

to time she gave the cradle a gentle shove, or timidly hitched

up on her shoulder her chemise which had slipped down; her bare

legs hung motionless.

"What is thy name?" I asked.

"Ulíta," she said, drooping her sad little face still lower.

The forester entered, and seated himself on the wall-bench.

"The thunderstorm is passing over," he remarked, after a brief

pause; "if you command, I will guide you out of the forest."

I rose. The Wolf picked up the gun, and inspected the priming.

"What is that for?" I inquired.

"They are stealing in the forest. They're felling a tree at the

Hare's Ravine," he added, in reply to my inquiring glance.

"Can it be heard from here?"

"It can from the yard."

We went out together. The rain had ceased. Heavy masses of

cloud were piled up in the distance, long streaks of lightning

flashed forth, from time to time; but over our heads, the dark

blue sky was visible; here and there, little stars twinkled

through the thin, swiftly flying clouds. The outlines of the

trees, besprinkled with rain and fluttered by the wind, were

beginning to stand out from the gloom. We began to listen. The

forester took off his cap and dropped his eyes. "The--there,"

he said suddenly, and stretched out his arm; "you see what a

night they have chosen."

I heard nothing except the rustling of the leaves. The Wolf led

my horse out from under the shed. "But I shall probably let

them slip this way," he added aloud--"I'll go with you, shall

I?"--"All right," he replied, and backed the horse. "We'll

catch him in a trice, and then I'll guide you out. Come on."

We set out, The Wolf in advance, I behind him. God knows how he

found the road, but he rarely halted, and then only to listen

to the sound of the axe. "You see," he muttered between his

teeth. "You hear? do you hear?" "But where?" The Wolf shrugged

his shoulders. We decended into a ravine, the wind died down

for an instant, measured blows clearly reached my ear. The Wolf

glanced at me and shook his head. We went on, over the wet

ferns and nettles. A dull, prolonged roar rang out....

"He has felled it," muttered The Wolf.

In the meantime the sky had continued to clear; it was almost

light in the forest. We made our way out of the ravine at last.

"Wait here," the forester whispered to me, bent over, and

raising his gun aloft, vanished among the bushes. I began to

listen with strained intentness. Athwart the constant noise of

the wind, I thought I discerned faint sounds not far away: an

axe was cautiously chopping on branches, a horse was snorting.

"Where art thou going? Halt!" the iron voice of The Wolf

suddenly thundered out. Another voice cried out plaintively,

like a hare.... A struggle began. "Thou li-iest. Thou

li-iest," repeated The Wolf, panting; "thou shalt not escape."

... I dashed forward in the direction of the noise, and ran to

the scene of battle, stumbling at every step. Beside the felled

tree on the earth the forester was moving about: he held the

thief beneath him, and was engaged in tying the man's hands

behind his back with his girdle. I stepped up. The Wolf rose,

and set him on his feet. I beheld a peasant, soaked, in rags,

with a long, disheveled beard. A miserable little nag,

half-covered with a small, stiff mat, stood hard by, with the

running-gear of a cart. The forester uttered not a word; the

peasant also maintained silence, and merely shook his head.

"Let him go," I whispered in The Wolf's ear. "I will pay for

the tree."

The Wolf, without replying, grasped the horse's foretop with

his left hand; with his right he held the thief by the belt.

"Come, move on, simpleton!" he ejaculated surlily.

"Take my axe yonder," muttered the peasant. "Why should it be

wasted," said the forester, and picked up the axe. We started.

I walked in the rear.... The rain began to drizzle again, and

soon was pouring in torrents. With difficulty we made our way

to the cottage. The Wolf turned the captured nag loose in the

yard, led the peasant into the house, loosened the knot of the

girdle, and seated him in the corner. The little girl, who had

almost fallen asleep by the oven, sprang up, and with dumb

alarm began to stare at us. I seated myself on the wall-bench.

"Ekh, what a downpour," remarked the forester. "We must wait

until it stops. Wouldn't you like to lie down?"

"Thanks."

"I would lock him up in the lumber-room, on account of your

grace," he went on, pointing to the peasant, "but, you see, the

bolt...."

"Leave him there, don't touch him," I interrupted The Wolf.

The peasant cast a sidelong glance at me. I inwardly registered

a vow that I would save the poor fellow at any cost. He sat

motionless on the wall-bench. By the light of the lantern I was

able to scrutinize his dissipated, wrinkled face, his pendant,

yellow eyebrows, his thin limbs.... The little girl lay down on

the floor, at his very feet, and fell asleep again. The Wolf

sat by the table with his head propped on his hands. A

grasshopper chirped in one corner..... The rain beat down upon

the roof and dripped down the windows; we all maintained

silence.

"Fomá Kúzmitch," began the peasant suddenly, in a dull, cracked

voice: "hey there, Fomá Kúzmitch!"

"What do you want?"

"Let me go."

The Wolf made no reply.

"Let me go ... hunger drove me to it ... let me go."

"I know you," retorted the forester, grimly. "You're all alike

in your village, a pack of thieves."

"Let me go," repeated the peasant. "The head clerk ... we're

ruined, that's what it is ... let me go!"

"Ruined!... No one ought to steal!"

"Let me go, Fomá Kúzmitch ... don't destroy me. Thy master, as

thou knowest, will devour me, so he will."

The Wolf turned aside. The peasant was twitching all over as

though racked with fever. He kept shaking his head, and he

breathed irregularly.

"Let me go," he repeated with melancholy despair. "Let me go,

for God's sake, let me go! I will pay, that I will, by God. By

God, hunger drove me to it ... the children are squalling, thou

knowest thyself how it is. It's hard on a man, that it is."

"All the same, don't go a-thieving."

"My horse," continued the peasant, "there's my horse, take it

if you choose ... it's my only beast ... let me go!"

"Impossible, I tell thee. I also am a subordinate, I shall be

held responsible. And it isn't right, either, to connive at thy

deed."

"Let me go! Poverty, Fomá Kúzmitch, poverty, that's what it is

... let me go!"

"I know thee!"

"But let me go!"

"Eh, what's the use of arguing with you; sit still or I'll give

it to you, don't you know? Don't you see the gentleman?"

The poor fellow dropped his eyes.... The Wolf yawned, and laid

his head on the table. The rain had not stopped. I waited to

see what would happen.

The peasant suddenly straightened himself up. His eyes began to

blaze, and the color flew to his face. "Well, go ahead, devour!

Go ahead, oppress! Go ahead," he began, screwing up his eyes,

and dropping the corners of his lips, "go ahead, accursed

murderer of the soul, drink Christian blood, drink!"

The forester turned round.

"I'm talking to thee, to thee, Asiatic blood-drinker, to thee!"

"Art thou drunk, that thou hast taken it into thy head to

curse!" said the forester with amazement. "Hast thou gone

crazy?"

"Drunk!... It wasn't on thy money, accursed soul-murderer, wild

beast, beast, beast!"

"Akh, thou ... I'll give it to thee!"

"What do I care? It's all one to me--I shall perish anyway;

where can I go without a horse? Kill me--it comes to the same

thing; whether with hunger or thus, it makes no difference.

Deuce take them all: wife, children--let them all perish....

But just wait, thou shalt hear from us!"

The Wolf half-rose to his feet.

"Kill, kill----" the peasant began again in a savage voice;

"Kill, go ahead, kill...." (The little girl sprang up from the

floor, and riveted her eyes on him.) "Kill, kill!"

"Hold thy tongue!" thundered the forester, and advanced a

couple of strides.

"Enough, that will do, Fomá," I shouted--"let him alone....

Don't bother with him...."

"I won't hold my tongue," went on the unfortunate man. "It

makes no difference how he murders me. Thou soul-murderer, thou

wild beast, hanging is too good for thee.... But just wait.

Thou hast not long to vaunt thyself! They'll strangle thy

throat for thee. Just wait a bit!"

The Wolf seized him by the shoulder.... I rushed to the rescue

of the peasant.

"Don't touch us, master!" the forester shouted at me.

I did not fear his threats, and was on the point of stretching

out my arm, but to my extreme amazement, with one twist, he

tore the girdle from the peasant's elbow, seized him by the

collar, banged his cap down over his eyes, flung open the door,

and thrust him out.

"Take thyself and thy horse off to the devil!" he shouted after

him; "and see here, another time I'll...."