"Yes," I said, "it seems to me that in every peril there is an
alternative, and the alternative adopted under the influence of,
say, the sentiment of duty, is bravery, but the alternative adopted
under the influence of a lower sentiment is cowardice; therefore it
is impossible to call a man brave who risks his life out of vanity
or curiosity or greediness, and, _vice versa,_ the man who under the
influence of the virtuous sentiment of family obligation, or simply
from conviction, avoids peril, cannot be called a coward."
The captain looked at me with a queer sort of expression while I was
talking.
"Well, now, I don't know how to reason this out with you," said he,
filling his pipe, "but we have with us a junker, and he likes to
philosophize. You talk with him. He also writes poetry."
I had only become intimate with the captain in the Caucasus, but I had
known him before in Russia. His mother, Marya Ivanovna Khlopova, the
owner of a small landed estate, lives about two _versts_[2] from my
home. Before I went to the Caucasus I visited her. The old lady was
greatly delighted that I was going to see her Páshenka[3] (thus she
called the old gray-haired captain), and, like a living letter, could
tell him about her circumstances and give him a little message. Having
made me eat my fill of a glorious pie and roast chicken, Marya Ivanovna
went to her sleeping-room and came back with a rather large black
relic-bag,[4] to which was attached some kind of silken ribbon.
"Here is this image of our Mother-Intercessor from the September
festival," she said, kissing the picture of the divine Mother attached
to the cross, and putting it into my hand. "Please give it to him,
_bátiushka._ You see, when he went to the Kaikaz, I had a Te Deum
sung, and made a vow, that if he should be safe and sound, I would
order this image of the divine Mother. And here it is seventeen years
that the _Mátushka_ and the saints have had him in their keeping;
not once has he been wounded, and what battles he has been in, as it
seems!... When Mikhailo, who was with him, told me about it, my hair
actually stood on end. You see, all that I know about him I have to
hear from others; he never writes me any thing about his doings, my
dove,[5]--he is afraid of frightening me."
(I had already heard in the Caucasus, but not from the captain himself,
that he had been severely wounded four times; and, as was to be
expected, he had not written his mother about his wounds any more than
about his campaigns.)
"Now let him wear this holy image," she continued. "I bless him with
it. The most holy Intercessor protect him, especially in battle may she
always look after him! And so tell him, my dear, friend,[6] that thy
mother gave thee this message."